Fog Light Relay Conversion
Update: This 6-step writeup has been performed on a 2001, a 2002, 2003, and a 2004 TJ and has worked properly on all 4 year models. It has been brought to my attention that in 1997-1999 and in some 2000 TJ models, this 6-step writeup is incompatible. So, I have researched and found this info out too. You can find out about the 1997-2000 conversion by either scrolling to the bottom of this page
Legal Notice: in some states (it may be a Federal law?) having high-beams and foglights concurrently operating is for off-road use only and may also be illegal. However, if you don't leave both high-beams and foglights to blind oncoming traffic, you should be fine. It is my belief that this decision should be left up to me and not decided for me by the manufacturer and/or government.
If you have the factory fog lights in your TJ, you may have noticed that they will only work if your headlights are in low-beam only. To test this, while parked facing a wall at night, turn on your low-beams and your fog lights. Now switch to your high-beams. Your fog lights turned off didn't they? Well, there are situations I have run into in which I needed both high-beam and my fog lights and I couldn't do that due to this factory-flawed "bonus feature."
Well, being a wheeler and a gearhead, I had to figure out how to remedy this matter without hacking my factory wiring scheme to pieces. Well I started talking around with fellow Jeepers and found that I wasn't the only person to be bothered by this. Somebody else had already found the solution and Jeff Gettle of AllMyNeeds.com happened to be at the house whilst I was complaining about this. In the next paragraph, and photo you'll see how to solve this "feature."
This is probably the easiest and least expensive mod there could possibly be for your Jeep. This entire project took only two minutes (this estimate includes opening/closing the hood), and this requires only a pair of pliers to complete the job (although you might even be able to do it with your fingers!).
- Open the hood
- Locate the main fuse box (passenger side, just forward of the battery)
- Open main fuse box
- Pull the fog light relay (the diagram in the fuse box lid should have it listed)
- While looking at the 5 pins of the relay, bend ONLY the pin as shown as the upper left pin (Pin #2 in the FSM) in the photo below. Leave the other four pins alone.
- Put the relay back in place and close up the fuse box, YOU'RE DONE!
1997 through 1999 Conversion (some 2000's too)
For 1997-2000 TJ owners, this involves slightly more work than the above 6-step writeup, but not bad at all. Instead of getting under the hood, remove your glovebox as this is where the relay is located. To the right of the fuse block (or behind the fuse block on some TJ builds), you will find 2 foglight relays. They are pictured circled in red below (photo credit, Shane Hart):
Once you have located the relays, pull the relay on the right-hand/passenger-side. It will look similar to the relay in the top photo, with a few minor exceptions. Take the relay you pulled and bend the #2 pin so that your relay looks just like mine pictured in the top photo. Now just replace your relay and reassemble your glovebox.
Page created on 12/18/2003
Last updated on 4/19/2004