El Cheapo Heated Mirrors

Awesome write up. Nice detail. Great pictures. Here in SoCal I dont really need heated mirrors. Still, very nice write up. Keep up the good work and enjoy the heated mirrors.

 

I've been looking at this http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/SMAL...ptZMotorsQ5fCarQ5fTruckQ5fPartsQ5fAccessories what do you think ? Also, how hard is it to break the OEM mirror while you are trying to take it out? When you take the sticky off the back of the mirror does the silver stuff come off too making the mirror look holy ? If I break the glass I would have better off buying new glass with the heat element already on it. I'm just rambling, this would be a big project for me. I've done some mods but they weren't to complicated. Seat belt beeper, Cabelas (Weathertech) floor liner gray, Covercraft Seat Savers in Taupe, Protecta Heavy Duty Rubber Truck Bed Mat, Pop n Lock PL5200, Pace Edwards Full Metal JackRabbit, Wolverine oil pan heater, Scangauge2, afe pro dry s filter, Remote Underbody 4 Piece LED Light Kit (White) used as Bed light, DIY Washable Cabin Air Filter, PA15-TOY Thanks, Curious George

 

I woudn't worry about breaking the mirror taking it out. Just take your time and work the scraper inbetween the tape and the plastic backing.
Having said that, I paid $42 per mirror with the heating element already installed. The connectors are in the correct place (may require a little bt of trimming).
For an extra $20, to me it's worth it, and if I did happen to break the stock mirror, I had the new one to replace it with.

Shawn

 

Thanks. I'm going to reread the whole post. I'd like to try this but I know I'm going to need help especially with the wiring. Thanks again.

 

What do you think of this ? http://www.discountautomirrors.com/catalog/?N=0&uts=true&Ns=price8|0&Ntt=toyota+sienna+2004+mirror+&+=+&gclid=CJ-Dx8OEiZ0CFeFM5Qod2keqaw

 

Great price, but the outer casing mount will not mount to the Tacoma it is different (my neighbour has a 2005 Sienna, I looked), however the glass is the same.
The wiring is quite simple thanks to the great schematic CtryBoyInMT provided (Thanks again for the help and encouragement).

As I added above, I added the add a circuit to the fuse panel underneath the dash, and used a screw near the kick panel for a ground. The dimmer wires are easy to find as there are connectors behind each of the blanks in your dash, you just have to tap into the green/green white as shown in the schematic.

Shawn

 

Thanks. If it's too good to be true etc, etc. Thanks for checking. I sure would have no way to check it out.

 

Hoping to do this mod soon if the heaters I ordered last week show up before the snow settles in. Been waiting over a week, found out they had to be shipped from somewhere else, and it's been in the 30's the last few days. Little bit of snow last night too so I'm wondering if it'll warm up enough for me to dare to try taking the mirrors apart to do this.

 

Just pop them out of the housing, then bring them in the house to take the glass out.
Tha hardest part will be staying warm while you do the wiring in the truck!

Shawn

 

Tell me about it.... I'm not looking forward to the wiring either. Broken too many plastic things in the cold here. I could pull in my barn if I can make room and turn on my salamander. Might take some of the chill off. Was hoping to get it done before I needed to do that. Need to do an oil change too. Half tempted to just pay someone else to do it at this point.

 

Yay! They finally arrived! Now to install them...

 

Well, they're in, but it's hard to tell if they're working.... Mirrors didn't seem to get warm after a couple minutes of being on.... Guess I'll turn them on some colder morning and see what happens. After that it's rechecking the wires... Why oh why couldn't Toyota have done this at the factory?!

 

Mine get hot to the touch. Not sure why yours don't. Which mirrors did you use?

Shawn

 

Factory mirrors, but the pads are the Kimpex ones like bk1 used. How long does it take yours to get hot?

 

About 30 to 45 seconds

 

hmmmm..... guess I'm checking the wiring again. I was sooooo hoping to not have to pull everything apart again.

 

ok, I need some help here. I'm racking my brain trying to figure out why these aren't working. I have 12v run from the battery to a lighted switch. Switch grounds through the mirrors and lights up so I know the mirrors are getting power. Without the mirrors connected I get 12v from switch to ground. With the mirrors connected I get about .4v from switch to ground. I'd expect to see 12v if I shorted something, or 0V if I didn't have the mirrors connected right. I get around 480ohms from the switch to ground with the mirrors hooked up. I get the same results with either mirror connected and with both connected (I separated the mirror leads to check each one).

So, it seems I'm getting power to the pads, but even after 20+ minutes whichever mirror I have connected is still cold to the touch (it's 46 here so there's nothing else to warm the glass).

Does anyone have any ideas?

 

piercedtiger hope U can get all the bugs out so I can learn from your experience. Good Luck

 

lol Me too! I'm in no mood to take the mirrors off again and pull them apart to replace the pads. So I just put everything back together and said F-IT! Will see what happens when they frost over and I turn them on. On the way out of my barn I blew a fog light bulb too so I'm done for the weekend.


On a side note, I emailed the company I bought them from to see if they have any suggestions.

 

How did you wire them up?
+ve from the battery to the switch, then 2 +ve's (one from each mirror) to the switch. Then -ve's (ground) to a solid grounding point. Is it possible that you hooked the mirrors's up in series?
What is the resistance of each heating pad?
Do you have 12volts going to the switch, but then it drops going across under load?

Shawn