G. Hale

the car has no trip computer? I have just had my mirrors replaced and had planned on using the rewiring scheme found in the FAQ. However, I've found that my outside temperature indicator runs through the same fuse as the heated mirrors. Therefore, if I perform the rewiring, my outside indicator would only come on when the rear defroster is on.<p>Seems that the only information I would need to make it work correctly is to simply know which wire comes from the outside temperature gauge, or which wire leads to the heated mirrors after leaving the fuse. If I know the wire to the temp. indicator, I can perform the FAQ, and simply cut the temp. wire and run it through a fuse that keeps constant power. (This would probably be the simpler of the two ways). The other route would be to know the wire to the heated mirrors, cut that wire, and use an inline fuse and continue to follow the FAQ from that point without cutting at the fuse box.<p>I would prefer cutting the outside temp. wire, as the fuse is labeled as the heated mirror fuse, and if I followed the second route, that would no longer be the fuse for the heated mirrors, and would only control the temp. indicator.<p>Anyone know which wire is the one running to the outside temperature indicator behind the gauges?<p>G. Hale<br>'98.5 2.8 QMS

Jim Simone

it may no longer be necessary.<p>It was recently posted that there is a TSB addressing the premature failure of the heated mirrors. Apparently, the new replacements have thermoresistors that only allow current to flow within a range of temps.<p>Not sure but I think Larry Victor posted it last month?<p>HTH,<br>Jim

G. Hale

Yeah, I saw that, but I still would like to rewire them. I have only had my mirrors fog up twice in 5 years of owning a car with heated mirrors. Of course both of those times have been with the A4 this past winter, and that was because I parked the car outside the garage for two nights. The heated part of the mirrors is very rarely used, so to prolong the life, I would rather be able to decide when to turn them on. Preferably, I would like to run a separate switch to them (as my SVX had), but that seems a little too involved.<p>G. Hale<br>'98.5 2.8 QMS

Bob Petruska

The temperature display gets its power from fuse #9 and into a wiring harness up to the dash. It's difficult, if almost impossible to find the single dash wire as the power comes across the dash printed circuit board also. I have looked for it a few times and gave up!<p>The other way is to cut the 12 volt wire to each mirror where they exit the doors into the kick panels. These are usually black/white striped if I remember. You must bring the passenger side connection over to the drivers side with an additional heavy guage wire. Tie the two together and connect this to the newly installed relay. You can now skip cutting the #9 fuse wire and have the temp display. Tap into the #9 fuse wire after the fuse to power the relay and still have fuse protection. This will work!<p>The simple way it just hit defrost switch when you need to know the outside temp. Unless you're obsessed looking at the display every 10 seconds!<p><br>Also, the new upgraded mirrors will probably cook themselves to death as the old ones. It will just take longer, as they are still on all the time during the temperature range window. I installed the defroster mod in OCT and my mirrors are still 80 degrees F when the outside temp is 35 degrees.<br>I used the mirrors about 15 times this winter in PA. My mirrors would have been cooked by now without the switch!<p>

tomt

I seem to recall that the power to each mirror in the kick panels of my '97 was a solid white wire, in the same location (a multi-pin connector) on each side.

Bob Petruska

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