Heated Mirrors Kit - Interest / Update Thread (pic heavy)

Please sign me up. Thanks.

1) under AC
2) 15
3) amber
4) US

 

Okay I'll probably start up a list of interested parties. Like I said it might take a little while, I can be a bit of a perfectionist at times and really wouldn't want to release anything until things are just right. I'm still trying to track down one specific connector that seems to be a rare item... the couple of places I found that can offer it have a 500 quantity minimum which I just can't justify doing lol. But I'll keep working on it!

I think the first time is always the most rewarding after all the hard work of going through the install. It is great to just push a button and let the mirrors take care of business for you

Thanks to both of you for the orders! I'll put you up on the list now and send over a message.

 

Please add me to your order list.

Left of steering wheel
green
15 minutes
USA

 

Me too bro one of the best things so far I have done for a Mod

 

Thanks for the order! Adding you now and just sent you a message.

glad to hear it!

 

Please put me on the list for a set.

Left of Steering Wheel
Green
10 minutes
Canada, Vancouver, BC

Also, I've got a Amber LED in my fog light switch that I'd like to swap out with a green one, could you also provide an extra LED that at the same time as this order. I'll pay for it of course.

One last item. I'm going to install a Viper remote starter into the truck when I do this mod. Is it possible to have this come on by default when I start the truck remotely?

 

Nice Unchained!!!!! I live in Worcester and see your an Auburn man. It was awesome hitting that button and finally having the side mirrors be clear. Only could of used this a thousand times last winter. Watch, it will be warm this year all season

 

Subd. I think this morning is the first day of frost down in Bellingham, WA. I think I'll be jumping on this sooner rather than later. Sounds like a great product OP!

 

Ok I'll get you up on the list now... thanks for ordering! I'll send you a PM with some details. Extra bulb can be done, the remote start really just depends on the system you have and whether it has additional outputs built into it. The couple of people I know who have set up their heated mirrors to also work with command start have both had an aux. ground output from the command start that is able to trigger the heated mirrors relay.

Sure thing just let me know It is certainly a useful product in winter time!

 

Alright, so here's the rundown on my install.

On the whole, the install was pretty easy thanks to all the prep work Jaimes does with the wiring. I consider myself to have moderate experience working with vehicles; I have wired up a few stereos, including one from scratch, and do a lot of my own work on vehicles. I've also installed a fog light kit on a 4 banger 2nd gen Tacoma several years ago...because, apparently Toyota decided 4-cylinder peasants didn't need fog lights. The "so what" is that this wasn't my first time dealing with the dash, switch blanks, and tapping into power wires behind the dash. All-in-all this took me 5 and a half hours with prep and cleanup time.

So here's the good, the odd, the bad, and the ugly:

The Ugly - nothing to report here.

The Bad - I found the taps for the switch illum to be a real pain in the @$$. I'm not sure if they're on the cheap side, or if it was because I did my install mostly in the dark (who wants to wait any longer than needed to get this sweet mod on their truck?), but I played hell getting them screwed on without cross-threading them. It wasn't an issue with the instructions - they were top notch. Maybe part of the problem is this was my first time working with this style of tap. All-in-all, not a huge issue. It's really not even that big of a complaint, considering that everything else went completely fine.

The Odd - My passenger side mirror consistently gets warmer, faster, as compared to my driver's side. Both work, and both heat well above ambient, so I'm not too concerned. I don't have an infrared thermometer to test out whether or not driver's side catches up eventually (feels like no unless I hit heat a second time), and I didn't have a multimeter worth a crap to test circuit resistance, voltage, or amperage, so I really can't say why...but it works and I'll be more than happy as long as it continues to do so. I think the most likely case is that the power and/or ground lead(s) partially slipped off when I was physically hooking the mirror up to the housing on the driver's side. Another guess is that the driver's side mirror itself has higher internal resistance and thus takes longer to get to full temp. Anyway, if I had to pick one to be a little cooler, it'd be the one where I can roll down the window and wipe it off with my hand. I'm positive it will be warm enough, fast enough to melt frost/ice.

The Good - Literally everything else. The quality of the instructions and materials were top-notch. Overall, 10/10, would do this again.

TL;DR: Buy it now. I can't wait for more cold weather.

Edit: One other thing. If you're looking at your blanks left of steering, I think the 5 minute switch has to go on the lower row. I couldn't even get it to slide in to the top row, and it looked far too long to sit in there with the dash put together anyway. I'm sure that's probably been mentioned somewhere else already, but I guess it could be a problem for someone...wasn't for me.

 

Thanks for the detailed review! Also glad to hear you got it all set up, now you just need some frosty mornings to try them out

To address your concerns... Admittedly the PosiTaps are not as fast or convenient to use as the well known scotch brand, although I wouldn't say they are a pain to use by any means either. Where they will accelerate is in their longevity for this setup. The scotch brand isn't rated to tap a wire as small as the illumination wires, after much searching the PosiTap was the only product truly rated to tap a wire that small. The concern was that the scotch taps would work, but very likely over time would start providing an intermittent connection to the tapped wire (switch illumination would start to flicker). They were actually one of the most expensive tap options I could have gone with, but in my opinion the best suited for the job.

With the mirrors I would think a slight variance is normal, but I get the feeling the difference is noticeable from your description. If it bothers you or turns out to be a performance issue here are the things I would check.

- try swapping the mirrors. You won't be able to clip them in swapped but if you power it up and the passenger mirror (now switched to the driver side) still warms up faster then you will know it is a variance in the Toyota mirrors.

If the problem swaps mirrors and the driver side of the vehicle remains the slower heating side then it would be worth checking the connections.

- you had a good point about the clips being slipped onto the mirror prongs. Swapping mirrors would have corrected that issue and the heat test should have then became about the same heat up rate per mirror.

- the only other thing after that would be your ground points in the cab. There are a few good points that you can attach the ground ring terminal behind the kick panel. It would be good to try a different ground point on the driver side as it is easy to relocate and a "so so" ground would provide the exact results you are getting.

You could ask why everyone else had a good ground where the instructions state, and in a perfect world it would be the same for everyone. However the kit used to ground the mirrors in the door which seemed to work for about 80% of the Tacomas and yet for some reason 20% of them wouldn't get any ground at all.

Looks like I sent a TLDR right back at ya lol. If you do want to try and get to the bottom of the difference in heating rate I'd be happy to help. I think the checks listed above are where I would start.

 

Understand on the taps, I'm guessing it's probably got more to do with the fact that I was doing it in the dark and it was first time working with them. I did use the ones you mention on the fog light kit and had to learn how to solder in order to get a decent connection later on.

Thanks for the pointers on troubleshooting the mirrors. So far I ran the mirror full down and checked to make sure the connectors weren't half on or something like that, but everything looked good. Anyway, I don't think it will be an issue, but if it turns out to be an issue with defogging or defrosting I'll get a multi-meter and let you (and everyone else) know what I do and how it worked out. Maybe I'll take a grinding wheel or dremel to the mirror ground point next weekend.

EDIT: So I'm making good on my word and posting an update. I have literally done nothing to my mirror install since last Friday. As expected, the driver's side both defrosted and defogged fine once I got the chance to test it, despite the temperature difference as compared to the passenger's side (I found the driver's side to get slightly warm to the touch - maybe 100 or 105*F, while the passenger's side actually got hot to the touch. That persisted the first couple of mornings that I used the heated mirrors.

Unfortunately my son got really sick, so I wasn't able to go through and check things out according to Jaimes' suggestions. The silver lining to that, however, is this: After the first several uses, I found that the driver's side mirror is now also getting hot to the touch. Although it's still not *quite* as hot as the passenger's side, both mirrors feel slightly uncomfortable once I touch them after letting them run for 3 or 4 minutes. I used my son's infrared thermometer (designed for people mind you, not vehicles), and both mirrors read "HI", which means over 107.6*F, and I hit that temp around 2 minutes in on both mirrors. Based upon touching the mirror at the 3-4 min mark, I suspect they both get a good deal higher than that.

So the good news is that after a few uses, everything seems to have evened out. If anyone else has similar issues in the future, I'd suggest that they just give it a week before they get concerned and start tearing their install apart. I'm actually pretty glad I was forced to wait.

 

It might have been a combination of doing it the dark and also the fact that they are small plastic threads so much easier to cross thread then a bolt and nut.

As far as the mirror sounds good just let me know if you want any help troubleshooting.

 

Just updated OP... Mirrors are back in stock for Canadian orders however the 15 minute timer for left of steering is temporarily out of stock. I have a few pending orders in with Toyota so hopefully I'll have them back in stock soon.

I will also be receiving a couple of mirror adjustment switches with fold option towards the end of this week to check fitment on

 

Frosty mirrors suck. I need these. Great looking kit . I'll take a set.

Under AC.
Green.
15 min.
USA.

Looking forward to the install. Thanks for making it easy.

 

Frosty mirrors most definitely suck lol. Thanks for ordering I just sent you a message and will get you up on the list now.

 

Here is a little teaser pic for those who have been following. The first and most critical stage in getting an option that does not take away one of the existing switch blanks has been confirmed. It took a lot of searching but has paid off, I ordered two variants of a mirror adjustment switch with power fold option (which I'll wire up to trigger heated mirrors). One of them is standard and the other option the switch can illuminate the word mirror along with the arrows.

The good news is they both fit perfectly and keeping with the other options have an entirely stock appearance.

Still more work to do though, I've held off on ordering the terminals and connectors I would need until I could confirm the replacement switches fit properly. Also the illuminated switch option uses a different type of connector so that complicates things a little but is something I'm working on a solution for.

The good news is it looks like it is a viable option if you have all of your switch blanks already filled up. The bad news is these mirror adjustment switches aren't cheap so the price will have to be a little bit higher on this option. I'll probably only keep just minimal parts on hand for this as I don't expect it to be a high volume mover, but a great option if no other switch blanks are available.

 

Shoot I'd totally do that over taking up a switch blank!!! That's great!!!

 

Invoice me when you are ready please.

 

I'm in for this soon. Gotta wait for the bank account to refill.