Automatic Headlights

Looks great!

 

Damn nice work :thumb:

Mike

 

Sam,

Is it safe to assume (which I hate doing any time!) that a part number is a part number? If I order Toyota part number 84140-07141, will it be different if that part has in its description "Tundra" or "Sequoia" or "Rav-4"? One would think searching by part number will return a part, and the description is simply to help with compatability (or to see what vehicle that part is used on).

Is it different to order the part from Canada?

I'm sure I'm over-thinking this but I hate to be out the cost of the "critical" part, just to make it look OEM.

Thanks!

Steve

 

I finally completed Phase 1 of this mod on my car. It was a living nightmare trying to get the dash out and figuring out how to disassemble all the associated trim pieces. There are a few notes:

1. I could not get the speaker grills out and gave up trying in fear I might scratch or bend them. But luckily contrary to popular belief, they do not need to be removed in order to pull the dash. Also, I do not see how they could have been removed, no matter what you do, without first removing the porthole trim pieces on each side. The grill actually tucks under them, along with hooking under the dash on the windshield side. So long story short, don't even try removing them without removing the porthole side trims first.
2. The ECU, at least on the Prius V w/ ATP has two boxes right in front of the L7/L8 plugs making working with them a challenge, but not impossible. I'm not sure what these are for, but I didn't see them in any of the pictures posted on here, so I'm guessing it has to do with the radar cruise, park assist, LED lights or something specific to the V.
3. I didn't have the terminal to go into the light sensor, so I just put the stripped bare wire strands right into the hole where the terminal would have went in. I made sure the wire was stripped just long enough so I could actually see the strands on the pin side and the insulation made it a relatively snug fit on the other end. A wire tie placed close to the plug will hopefully keeps it in place over the long term. Since I have a model V, I could not get terminals from the L8, so I did basically the same technique when connecting the wires to the L7.
4. The actual pulling of the dash is a 2 person job. However, it doesn't necessarily have to come out of the car. I just flipped mine on the two front seats reclined completely down, with a tarp over them of course, and worked on it in there.

After putting everything back together with a switch connected to ground, it all worked perfectly. There is about a 10 sec delay when shining a light on the sensor before the headlights will actually go off, and back on when the light is removed. I didn't snap the light sensor completely back into the dash. Just in case something went wrong, I wanted a way of troubleshooting it without having to pull the dash out again. I also might go ahead and get the terminal and install it before popping it completely back in again.

For the I1 connector, does the terminal just side in? I didn't see any side panels I could slide out when looking at the plug. I tried putting various CD audio terminals in there but none seemed to fit. I certainly didn't want to force one in.

Now to start thinking of Phase 2, when I connect up the new stalk. Anyone want to buy my old one with fog light option on it?

 

I am working on this mod also... Reports that pins from L 22 Solar Battery Air Conditioning Blower Vent ECU being the correct size for L7 is not correct, they are a bit too big. They are smaller than unused plug behind dimmer switch in the L18 area... I made a mistake of trying to make them fit anyways as not much bigger. I had done so much work with pulling out dash, and not a lot of sleep, I was pushing myself. I installed pin to L7 by force... assembled car back enough to test to see if mod worked and it worked, I was happy. So finished putting car back together and tested again and Auto headlight started acting up. At first thinking I must have bad connection to light sensor under dash. I was tired and called it a day.

Issue at this point is not only did not work but parking lights did not work. High Beams did not work. Light indicator for headlight or fog lights failed to light up even if headlights were on. Dimmer switch did not dim dash board. GPS did not dim with headlights on. Another issue is Air conditioner on auto air blower would go to full power did not matter what the temperature was set at only way to slow fan down a bit was to hit eco button or go to manual mode. The funny thing is I did not panic as I was too tired.

Next day I cut the ground wire to switch for Auto headlights... This action fixed the parking lights, so now my car was legal to drive at night again. All other issues where still on-going issues. Next cut the light sensor wire. No change... still had issues. Next step remove L7 pin from 21 and 28... L7 plug a bit damaged due to forcing larger pin in. So far I have found 3 different sizes pins. Good news I put L7 back in and now everything is back to normal... Yea...

I am sure pin 21 and pin 28 were making contact with L20 and L29... I am not giving up... I am just thinking about a good way to make a pin that is insulated so it can’t make contact with other pins. The L7 plug is design in a way this should not be an issue if plug is not damaged. When dissembling the plug, I found it comes apart in three pieces. I only removed the row I was working on. Each of the three sections has a cover. That cover is like a comb, each tooth slides between the pins. I found it easier to install pins from this area. The comb keeps the tips from touching each other. The L7 plug keep the rest of the pin from touching.

At the end of the day don't force a pin into the L7 Plug... Now I know two people have just put inserted 22 gauge wire into L7 21 and 28 slots with no pin and made it work. I think that now a bad way to go. If you do not have correct pin, as the wire does fit snug. You could even secure wire with hot glue gun to keep it from backing out.

Note: I am not telling anyone how to do this Mod as you can see I had my own issues…
I have installed wires for LED turn signal mirror upgrade and upgraded under light dash to be green instead of amber. Mirrors are on their way. Found on eBay. Last time I checked there are 3 evadable for $109.00 +20 dollar shipping, I pad another 20 dollars for paint. Got a tracking number… can’t wait!

Any ideas on making insulated pins let me know… I am think 22 gauge wire but pull wire back to where there would be rubber installation wire with no wire in tip… giving a slot for post to slide into and then makes contact with wire. Other idea is if I can find smaller pin to paint the outside of pin with nail polish not sure if that would work.

 

The problem you experienced by forcing the L7 is why I didn't want to force anything into the I1 plug. Also, I too thought about perhaps using pins from the solar air plug, but just by sight I could tell they would be too big. So I didn't even bother with it. Those L7/L8 terminals appear to be the smallest in the whole vehicle. I'm hoping the pins in the L7 are compressing the strands of the wires enough to hold them in tight. If I ever have a problem with them, that hot glue idea sounds like a good solution.

But hopefully we'll have a part number to these terminals soon. From what I've seen, they are common in the latest Toyota/Lexus models. The part might be listed as Lexus. Here are ECU interface names in other such vehicles that have a similar layout and likely same terminals as the L7:
Interface F9 on the Lexus hs250h.
2010 Lexus GX460 (G47), Lexus RX350 & Lexus RX450h (F13),
2010 Toyota 4Runner (F9), 2011 Toyota Sienna (D13)

As for as ordering my Canadian stalk, I got it from autopartspeople.com . I noticed they had two choices for the same part number (84140-07141), one at $92 and another at $96. The only difference in the two was that the cheaper was listed as Scion instead of Toyota. I saved 5% on my terminals as well buying the Scion versions. I didn't know they made Scion's with auto-lights, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed it's indeed actually the same part. lol

 

:rockon:Update: I have completed mod.. Yea... I decided to just use a on\off switch and not take steering wheel off and replace stalk...
I am very happy with Auto Headlights. Thanks goes out to all the people that helped with this mod. I installed same button as Olyprius. Thanks for the pics.

Homemade pin:
I would not suggest this…. Should not be standard way of getting mod working and no way am I telling people what or how to do this mod... This is my disclaimer...Your own your own… good luck!
For the people that wonder how I was able to move forward with all the issues of a P\VwAVP, I basically made a pin... Still a bit tight... but it worked on first try... 8inch piece of 24 AWG solid wire per pin, striped back about 1/2 inch, showing bare solid wire... then pulled on solid wire, to slide outer wire cover down about half inch. So now I have about 1 inch of solid wire exposed and the other end wire insulation tube with no wire as wire is back in the tube about ½ inch. Disassembled plug as I talked about in last thread, insert bare solid wire allow you to pull wire through plug. Note, I did trim the hollow insulated tube after I pulled wire all the way through connector. I trimmed back hollow end of insulation, leaving about 1/8 to 3/16 inch void for pin from ECU... I reassembled plug cut wire to desired length and spliced to ground \Switch and Light Sensor… That it clear as mud LOL…. It worked yea
When plug into ECU you could feel pressure on the pins but snapped in fine.
Note, most of my issues was due to not having the correct pin. I did figure out it is easier to install pins by disassembling plug and slide wire and pin in from bottom as more room from bottom of plug. By design plug is tight at the top, to make sure pin can’t slide out the top.. I am sure for many people they already understand how these wire connectors work. Sorry for no picks… I was just focused on getting it done and because it was more of trial and error did not take photos… Button Install looks just like Olyprius photo…

Very Cool Mod:rockon::rockon::rockon:

 

That's awesome! Looks like all that hard work you did paid off! I'm so happy we have members here on PC that go above and beyond discovering and developing these type of mods for the rest of us to perform and enjoy!

 

What confuses me the most about this whole thing is why Toyota removed the wire from the light sensor to the ECU to begin with. They could have easily disabled the auto headlights just by not having the option on the stalk and no wire from stalk to ECU. By removing the light sensor wire, they "broke" the auto-dimming of the dash thereby forcing everyone to have to snap their dash dimmer to max (forced day mode) whenever using headlights in daytime, i.e. when its raining or if you just want DRL. It was very annoying and this alone made me want to do the mod more so than the auto on/off of the headlights. The dash was very dim during the day with headlights on, even at the highest setting (other than the snapped forced mode). You might say why not always have it snapped in daytime mode? Well that blinds you at night, along with permanently forcing the nav screen background to be white/daylight mode as well.

 

Ok, I've completed the last phase of this project. Actually it turned out to be complicated to say the least. Reports that the steering wheel just comes right off is not true of all Prius's out there. Mine would not budge, no matter what I did. I rented the steering wheel puller kit from AutoZone, but the wheel was on there so tight, it ended up threading the bolt holes in the aluminum steering frame. I next tried stainless steel tie-wraps around the frame and the wheel puller, each rated at 100lbs of pressure. I put eight of those things on, four on each side. As I increased pressure the ties eventually snapped. lol I was going to try retapping the bolt holes and using bigger bolts, but I figured if 800lbs of pressure wasn't good enough to pop the thing off, chances are I'd end up doing more damage then good. The wheel puller even threaded the 19mm center bolt due to the extreme pressure I had on it. Luckily the nut was able to go back on, although I did have to file it some for it to do so. I decided to take it down to the dealer to see what they could do with it. I have no idea how they did it, but they were able to get the thing off and install the new stalk. It was $110 total but they replaced one of my broken front signal lights too, so it wasn't too bad. I'm just glad its done now. About $230 or so total for the job and a lot of time. But if I could sell this old stalk to someone wanting to install fog lights, I could bring that down some. Anyone need a stalk with the fog light option? =)

One mystery though. The clock or XM presets were not reset after getting the car back, so it appears the dealer did not unplug the battery before removing the steering airbag.. that's if they even removed it? hmm..

 

The last time I was in this thread was page 20, I ordered the canadian stalk back in MARCH of this year and it took me 6 months to get motivated enough to install the canadian stalk with auto and fog lights switch.

I am sorry I waited so long, it honestly took me 40 minutes flat. It was very easy for me to replace the stalk. I was a bit disappointed after I put it all back together and it didn't work..

After catching up pages 20-23 now, I guess I need to connect 2 wires?

 

OK, re-read the 23 pages, WOW this thread has gotten crazy...

Basically these are the final steps:

1) Install Canadian stalk w/ foglights 84140-07141 OR w/o foglights 84140-47120
2) run wire: behind top glovebox left black connected IF pin12 exists, run wire to ECU L7 - PIN21

if pin 12 does not exist, remove top dash and run PIN4 @ light sensor to ECU L7 - PIN21
3) run wire from new stalk (L47) PIN 19 to ECU L7 - PIN28

I1 - Light Sensor itself (remove dash)
LI1 - Left Black connector behind top glovebox
L7 - ECU (top right connector)
L47 - Canadian Stalk harness

Wire connectors:
82998-24290 L47 pin 19
82998-12750 I1 pin 4
?????-????? L7 (no one has discovered)

 

OK!! I COMPLETED! Success on a 2011 Prius 2 base in Chicago, IL!!
If there are any neighboring Prius owners in Chicago, I will help/assist!

BTW - I completed this last night in my garage and assumed I had done something wrong because my LED flashlight did NOT trick the sensor into thinking it was daylight, nor did it see my garage lighting as daylight. I pulled out this morning and 15 seconds later the headlights turned off, I threw a piece of paper over the sensor and 15 seconds later - headlights turned back on!!

$100 in a canadian stalk and $7 in wire, this mod ROCKED! Thanks to all to make this possible!!

 

I've completed this mod on my 2011 Prius V with ATP! Thanks to all those that made this mod possible!!

Like most people that have posted performing this mod I didn't have an existing wire from the light sensor I1 to connector LI1 pin 12 as mentioned by BrettS. So out my dash came and while it took about 4 hours to complete this mod I didn't think it was too difficult. You should have a connector or wire nut on this sensor wire near LI1 so that if you need to remove the dash again you can easily disconnect the wire from the wire going to L7 through the dash.

With the AT package my L8 connector was in use so I shoved 22 ga wires into the L7 connector as mentioned by dwhutch. This is NOT the best way to make connections to L7 but I haven't figured out another way. So far I have been unable to find a dealer that will let me try to scavenge pins off an old harness.

For those that are interested in doing this mod I have a collection of pdfs including key sections of this thread with pictures, TIS wiring diagrams and TIS Upper Instrument Panel removal and installation instructions. Just PM me and I'll get them to you.

 

Is anyone who can help around Long Beach? I read this tread, but still no BRAIN to do it~~

 

Unless you find a forum member willing to help you out free of charge, contact Tommy @ Music Box. He's in El Monte and his cell is 626-823-2853. He's installed turn signal mirrors, JDM steering wheels, suspensions, etc. for a few of us and can do pretty much anything.

 

I second that....

Tommy installed my JDM steering wheel, turn signal mirrors and my oem fog lights. He is a great installer !

 

32, Thanks for your information...

Can he handle my project? If he can do it, I will call him for an appointment....~~?

:cheer2:

 

Should be a piece of cake for him. Do text him and reference this thread.

 

O.K. I've got a new 2011 Prius IV with Sunroof & Nav

I'd like to install both the automatic lights and fog lights at the same time.
I've got the Canadian stalk on order from parts.com, and the fog lights on order from PriusChat. Any other parts I'll need?

I'm not sure I have the time or skills to do this on my own. Does anyone know of a good person / shop / dealer in the Cincinnati area that would do a great job with this?
My dealer (King's Toyota) seemed nonplussed about the idea.

Thanks in advance!