The LED SAE J583 Fog Pod & Fog Light Review

Very happy with my Rigid 360 SAE fog kit + Rigid SAE 6" fog bars on a separate switch for those New England blizzards. Fit was perfectly and WOW those 6" SAE bars are BRIGHT!

 

I hadn't checked in a while, but the comparative specs for the SS3 fogs in yellow (including max) are here. Based on the numbers I'm not sure I'm interested in taking the leap from pro to max. I suppose there is an advantage in the sharper cutoff and being able to aim them further, but the intensity is not that much higher due to the color filtration.

 

Is there a way to flatten the curve of light from the SS3's, or is this just how the design of the housing is? I was wondering if adjusting them side to side a little would affect the "line" at all. Also, do you think mine are still aimed too high according to this picture? I haven't been flashed yet, but I'm trying to find the right balance of forward light combined with road illumination.

 

I aimed mine 2-3 inches low from the height of the center of the pod, at 25 feet.

 

you have a bit of wiggle room on the brackets to fine tune that outer upward curve. if this doesn't work then you can check the holes on the bracket that attaches to the bumper holes and see if you can fine tune that.

also aim the fogs 25ft from the wall. the beam should be aimed 4 inches below the height of the fog in your bumper.

 

Perfect, thanks! I will try the side adjustment next free day I have off and see if that helps with the curve. I will also properly aim them using the 25' rule of thumb instead of guessing at what I'm doing.

 

on second thought not sure if my method would work with the kit specific bracket.

lol. works for metal universal one

 

Well I'll give it a go anyway and see. It does have a little bit of four-way adjustability so I'll chime back in later and let you know.

 

I thought I saw in @crashnburn80 write-up that the second gen tabs are slightly off and it matters which hole you bias the mount installation onto.

 

Yea, the holes don't line up to the factory mount, so you can only get one screw in. I thought it was weird that it's like this and maybe there is a reason for it, but they're on the best I could figure out.

 

Check the install here, maybe you can switch the bias.
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads...og-light-review.554813/page-137#post-22622437

 

Forgive me if this is a stupid question, but if you're supposed to align the fogs at 25 feet out, 4" lower than the height of the fog light center, can you do the same thing at 12 feet out, or 6 feet out, and reduce the distance down from center line from say 4" down to 2"? I don't know if it works that way or not.

 

For the install on 2nd Gen, only use the upper screw mount (this is how 3rd Gen does it, and the fogs are designed for 3rd Gen but compatible with 2nd). If you try and use both screw mounts, then you end up with the tilt as shown, fogs should not be tilted like that.

 

Used this idea on my FabFours Matrix bumper with a Diode Dynamics’ SS3 Pro and Max pairing, @se7enine - thanks so much for the idea! Attached a couple mock up pix - I think the Max is upside down, but you get the idea.

 

Aw, man, you don’t have those fond memories of trigonometry class?

Yes, in layman’s terms if you halve the rise for the same angle/grade you would halve the run. So 25 to 4 is the same angle as 12.5 to 2. I forget if it’s SIN or COS on the calculator but that’s one quick Google away to confirm the same angle.

EDIT: I do remember SOH-CAH-TOA so based on that, since we aren’t doing hypotenuse measurements, I think it may actually be TAN on the calc.

EDIT2: I was all curious about how much I had forgotten so I did a little refresher. The arctan function gives you the angle when you know the tangent with tangent defined as opposite over adjacent (TOA) or rise over run. In our example of 4" at 25' it comes out at 0.7639 degrees which is probably as close as you're going to get to a 1 degree drop with rough numbers and imperfect cutoffs / non-level grades.

For those who might prefer pictures, you can draw any right triangle (think of the shape of a wood shim if it helps) and then draw the biggest rectangle you can make inside that triangle where the length of the rectangle is one half the length of the triangle. By drawing the rectangle you make 3 triangles out of 1 and all 3 triangles have the same angles because the two small ones share one angle with the big one and all 3 angles sum to 180 for any triangle.

 

Ok so I just went out and took a closer look at the mounts on the SS3's. Everyone has said that it's the top screw that you need to use for the 2nd Gen's, however when I moved the screw to the bottom location, the whole light adjusted to level and now the light line is flat. Maybe this is a redesign or possibly something is different on my truck, but using the BOTTOM screw only fixed the level problem. I tried to aim the height best I could for now at a shorter distance, but I'll double check it later tonight when it gets dark at 25 feet.

 

Possible that the mounts are flipped?

 

The way I have it mounted is the two even length tabs on the fog mount go into the retention holes of the bumper, and the other side is where the screws mount. The longer one is on the bottom I believe. I really don't see how they could mount the other way because the tabs go into the retention holes just like the factory fogs do. It's all leveled up and fitting snugly now, so I don't know.

 

This is the driver's side. The even tabs as shown butt up to the side of those holes giving it an even mount. If I were to flip it, then I wouldn't be able to do that.

 

Here is a copy/paste from my review post mounting the SS3s on a 2015 2nd Gen. If you can verify your mount is level, that is all that matters. Using the bottom mount for me cause significant tilt.


Since the screw mounts don’t both align, you need to use a single screw to mount, like 3rd Gen. Even though the stock 2nd Gen used 2 screws, 1 should hold fine.

The lower screw is not the right one, this results in the light not being level left to right.


The upper screw is the correct one.


So for 12-15 Tacoma’s installing the SS3, be sure you only use the upper screw mount on the bracket for the SS3s. Using the lower screw location or attempting to use both will result in a non-level light pattern.