Correcting previous owner's bad workmanship

[Pyral]

The previous owner added fog lamps to my 98 which I am fine with, though the execution was horrendous. They threaded the additional wires along the wiring harness and then sealed where the wires came out of the firewall with caulking, as one does when laying bathroom tile or automotive work apparently.

They also didn't use fuses for these fog lights. The wires run up to the interior fuse box and into the blank spot. Ignore the extra wires, have some idea of what they do but not exactly where they go because the wire colors change so frequently and nothing is labeled or neat or secured.

How can I add a fuse for these fog lights?
Does anyone know what size fuse I should put in?
How can I go about removing the caulking at the firewall without damaging the wires?

 

[TheSaturnV]

Douse the area with some isopropyl alcohol and carefully push a razor blade up under the silicone at the firewall. I would only go barely enough so you can get the edges to lift. Don't want to get into the wires obviously. Hopefully you can get that whole mess to peel off. Keep applying the alcohol up underneath the edges.

 

[3bears]

one way to correct the wires is called a fuse tap, im sure you can look it up. It goes in place of a fuse and has a pigtail. YOu then wire to the pig tail . You then have a fused protected circuit.

 

[phattyduck]

That silicone was for a purpose - that spot gets a ton of water over it when it rains. Whatever you do, make sure it is 100% sealed or you will be getting water in the driver's footwell.

-Charlie

 

[Pyral]

That silicone was for a purpose - that spot gets a ton of water over it when it rains. Whatever you do, make sure it is 100% sealed or you will be getting water in the driver's footwell.

-Charlie

I'm sure it was for a reason, but isn't there suppose to be a rubber grommet there for that reason?

I might just leave it for now until I have a good reason to mess with it. Seems too risky for no reward, I shudder thinking what they might of done to that firewall if this was their solution.

Anyone know what fuse value I should use for the fog lights? The fuse cover doesn't tell me anything about the blank space.

 

[phattyduck]

'98 had no OEM fuse for fog lights (and '99+ was in the engine bay fuse box). 20A is probably a good choice for a fuse (2x55W / 12V = 9.2A continuous).

You'll also want to make sure there is a relay on that circuit to keep from burning out whatever switch you have on there too.

Below that mess is probably a cut up OEM boot that was 'repaired' with all that goo...

-Charlie

 

[ToyotaBrah]

Not sure if it would help, but maybe using a hair dryer would help soften the silicone to aid in removing it (heat gun would be too risky).

 

[Pyral]

Its actually worse than I thought. There are 2 sets of wires (that I lnow of) that go through the firewall. One set runs the fog lights, the other just dead ends. The current fog lights are wired on a separate circuit directly to the battery, no fuses no connection to the fuse box.

That thing in the interior fuse box (in my photo) had nothing to do with what is under the hood. I really dug umder the dash and discovered that rather than that wire going through the firewall it makes a sudden turn and goes under the carped back towards the driver seat. I unplugged whatever it was and haven't noticed any difference, wouldn't surprise me if it was another dead end. I have no idea where that set of wires go but I'll check tomorrow when I pull up the carpet for an unrelated matter.

I also found another blue wire that had been knotted around the steering column, I found it an hour ago and will take a look tomorrow. I thought that the only mods done with the wiring were to add fog lights, but it appears that more was done before everything was deactivated for some reason. I didn't have any records when I bought the vehicle apart from the original window sticker.

 

[D'arce]

The fuse is to protect the wire from melting and catching fire, not to protect the fog lights. You will have to size the fuse to the smallest Guage wire used in the circuit. If your concerned about a short I would just disconnect from the battery until you get a fuse holder on it. Rip it all out and do it right later when you have time.

 

[RandyBobandy]

Based on the pictures I’d consider just pulling all the shoddy wiring out and redoing it entirely, just to be sure you don’t miss something that could cause issues and it shouldn’t be hard to do

 

[Pyral]

I made a lot of progress today. I pulled out ~12 feet of wiring today which I now believe to be the remnants of an additional speaker that the owner pulled out before selling (all the wires were cut). Toyota allowed you to get 2 additional speakers in the cargo area if I'm not mistaken, and mine being a base model didn't have that, so I bet someone added speakers after the fact. Most of the wiring looks like speaker wiring. I did find a fuse wired in series with the wiring, so at least they had some foresight.

The wires that go through the fire wall have basically been accounted for. Because I can no longer run wires up to the engine compartment (because they added caulking where you would thread wires through the fire wall), I'll label and secure them for future use should I need to add anything.