retro fit auto dim mirror

M

mdelling

New member
Hi Guys,
I am sure this has been asked a lot of times but I could not find a thread for the e85 model. I have a 2006 3.0i Z4 that had the manual rear mirror. It became really loose in the sun and following this forum I purchased an autodim rear mirror on ebay. Swap was really easy and it is super tight. I also connected the plug when I installed the new mirror. Last night I noticed that the autodim function does not seem to work. Guys with high beams on was driving behind me. Question is whether the mirror itself is broken or whether I missed anything when installing the autodim. Is the autodim mirror plug and play on 3.0i models without the autodim function or do I need to change more stuff?

Thanks a lot

Markus
 
I have a feeling that if you car is a build date later than Oct 04 and didn’t have auto dim spec you’d have to retrofit and code it?

That’s certainly the case with dimming wing mirrors
 
Not sure on BMW, as i am new to this platform myself, but maybe your car isn't equipped with the light sensor for the auto dim?
 
Without looking I'd say you are short of a couple of wires to power the dimming. You'd definitely need a 12v positive and likely a ground for it to work.
 
I don't remember this being a coded option. The mirror logic/control is all self contained - it just needs power as Usel said above.

The two sensors needed are embedded within the mirror, so no link to the auto headlight sensors.
 
It is triggered automatically by the light sensor circuit board in the interior mirror, it is a standalone system and no coding needed. Cover the front sensor and use flashlight at the interior mirror and see if it dimms, when it dims it sends signal to left and right mirror to dim. My interior mirror dimmung liquid is dead so I retrofitted a e60 mirror, works perfectly and triggers dimming to outer mirror too. I have shared the wiring on the forum about the retrofit I think
 
@mdelling - this won't exactly help you, as your car is later so wont have all the loom in place, however:

My daily 04-plate 2.2i had a basic mirror where you had to twist the clown nose to 'dip' it when there were lights behind you.
I rummaged in my garage and found one auto-dimming mirror.
So, I removed the basic mirror and found that the plug in the mirror had only four pins/wires. The dimming one had all ten pins/wires.
Because my car is an early one, all the loom was there already, so ten wires going into the car half of the plug.
Plugged it in and fitted the new mirror and hey-presto! No coding needed, all works as a proper dimming mirror should.

I suspect, as my car has all the loom in place, including the plug for the dimming door mirror module, that some of the wires from the rear view mirror are for that, and that to just operate the mirror itself you don't need all those.

Now off to see if I can find a wiring diagram.

I suspect the most difficult part to retro fit in a later car will be routing the wires and pinning them into the plug.
In fact it may be easier to source that length of loom from a breaker and splice the whole thing in somewhere where it becomes more accessible like possibly behind the glovebox??
 
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So it looks as though it's just like @Usel said: power to Pin 3 (5A Fuse) - possibly from one of the spare ignition lives (F3, F4); and an earth from Pin 10.
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Late to this thread, but on my April ’03 3.0 it was plug and play to add the auto dimming rear mirror.

It was one of the (few) options my car didn’t come with, one that I had in earlier (non Z) cars. Was really missing it, especially in winter months when more of your driving will be in the dark.

And nice to know that the early build loom also supports auto dimming wing mirrors, might be a nice upgrade!
 
Bolle said:
Late to this thread, but on my April ’03 3.0 it was plug and play to add the auto dimming rear mirror.

It was one of the (few) options my car didn’t come with, one that I had in earlier (non Z) cars. Was really missing it, especially in winter months when more of your driving will be in the dark.

And nice to know that the early build loom also supports auto dimming wing mirrors, might be a nice upgrade!
Click to expand...

Just a 'heads up' that whilst the chassis of early build cars have all the wiring the doors can be hit and miss. I've had one door with full wiring and the other door with wires missing on 2 different cars.
 
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