My waahf [pause for laughter] is still very much enjoying the '09 Mazda 5 we bought last year. I am, too. Nice little ride, but it's silver and does not have daytime running lights. I would like to add DRLs to make it more visible to other drivers. My preference is to run the high beams at reduced voltage. High beam bulbs are conventional 9005 halogens.
I've done a little digging around the interthing this morning and found very little actionable information. It looks like Mazda fitted DRLs to Canadian market cars only, and I can't find where anyone has documented the difference between US and Canadian wiring, so adding them with OEM parts may not be a real viable option. Or maybe it is child's play, but nobody took the time to figure it out or document it.
Apparently a company called Hamsar once offered a neat kit (#45035, FWIW today) that ran high beam lamps at reduced power, but it's no longer on their website, so that may be a dead end. Wiring in some relays to run the high beams in series, rather than parallel, would be possible, but time-consuming.
The easy answer is to simply turn on the headlights, but Mrs Monohue is a creature of habit and not likely to remember. I'd probably forget to do it myself. Automatic DRLs are much more appealing from that perspective.
Before I start digging for relays, does anybody have any suggestions for currently available ready-made kits to streamline the operation, or any insight on enabling OEM operation?
Please forgive me if this has been covered before. If it has, I sure couldn't find it.
I'm going to preface this with the fact I know nothing of the stock mazda wiring but would it be easier to swap the power to the headlight switch to a circuit that's ignition hot and leave the switch on all the time?
Personally, I'd be inclined to go to (for example) Hella or somebody and get an LED solution, but you've got me wondering if Mazda really used two different headlights just to satisfy the Cdn market, which after all is smaller than California's.
For what it's worth, if I ask RockAuto to show me 2009 Mazda5 headlights it gives me the same five choices whether I ask for prices in $CDN or $USD, but the system probably knows I'm searching from Canada.
Let me call my friendly local Mazda dealer's parts counter tomorrow and see if they have any insight.
How about just automatic headlights? Kits look to be packaged and not terribly expensive.
It would be totally possible to simply run the headlights all the time, but I would much rather run high beams for the pattern (more visible to oncoming traffic) at reduced voltage (far longer bulb life, and much less obnoxious to oncoming drivers) than run low beams at full throttle.
ST, thanks for the help! It seems unlikely that the headlamps would differ in any meaningful way. More likely, Canadian cars have additional circuitry that runs the high beams at reduced power whenever the headlights are not switched on.
EDIT: I hadn't considered aftermarket LED add-on DRLs. That might be an option.
Does your Mazda5 have fogs?
Could the fogs be wired to ignition hot wire thereby having the fogs be the DRLs?
If your car does not have fogs:
There are aftermarket fog kits or OEM kits. But, if no fogs, in the area of that top rib of the black fog blanking plate, I would add some vertical LED strips and have those LEDs be the DRLs
Cheapo sample found on Amazon but there are probably similar out there, maybe better made.
DRLs were law in Canada long before US.
1990 Miata's in Canada had different front bumper turn signals to accommodate a small, white DRL
Before you spend a bunch of money on Chinese modules, check whether the Mazda dealer can just go into the body module and enable them with a scan tool. That's been a thing on lots of cars for quite a while.
John Welsh said:
DRLs were law in Canada long before US.
1990 Miata's in Canada had different front bumper turn signals to accommodate a small, white DRL
They used the turn indicator filament for DRLs. The turn signals and housing were identical, the difference was solely wiring.
In Europe, there was sometimes a corner light added. The housing is actually the same, there's just a knockout that needs to be knocked out. Moss Miata sells the kit, they call it a "twilight" kit.
You can retrofit Canadian DRLs to a 1994-97 Miata by simply removing a blanking plug and attaching the DRL relay. Nice upgrade.
In the case of a 2009, it may all be done in software. I'll take a look.
From the factory wiring diagram for a 2009 Mazda5 - there is a wiring difference on DRL cars. There are a couple of extra wires running from the low beam bulbs to the body control module to allow the BCM to turn the headlights on and the normal ground point is removed. Looks like the BCM takes full control over running the low beams at that point.
Interestingly, the BCM is also responsible for turning on the headlight relay so it probably could turn the low beams on, cars with auto headlights have the BCM turning the high and low beam relays on. I'm not sure why this extra wiring is here unless it's running a PWM duty cycle to keep them from running at full brightness.
It's unlikely a dealer could just turn it on, Mazda's software would assume those two wires are already there.
The headlight relays run off unswitched power, so if you wanted to have them come on with the ignition you'd have to use a relay to ground out the trigger wire to the high beam wire that's triggered by switched power, then run a PWM ground to run them at decreased intensity. Then you'd have to put some logic in there to turn off the high beams when the low beams are on, and to go to 100% PWM when the high beams are requested via the switch. All doable, but it's probably a heck of a lot easier to retrofit some fog lights.
+1 for aftermarket LED DRLs. I've seen people add LED strips/tubes into older car's headlights to give them a more modern look, often ends up looking cheap and clearly homemade, but these would be ideal for homebrew DRLs.
Im more for the running the headlights as it also runs the taillights. My issue with deals is people don't turn on their headlights in dusk/dawn/rain situations so you don't see them from the rear until you are on top of them.
There are no fog lamps on the van. Adding them is certainly an option, though not an especially attractive one. OEM-style fog lights tend to be more of a dress-up device than an effective lighting unit and I'd probably be out about $200 to add them. And, as with the low-beam headlamps, fogs don't really have the distribution I am looking for.
Keith, thanks for digging up the information! From that, unless there's something else I'm not aware of, it looks like there's at least a remote chance that we could enable DRLs by rerouting the low-beam grounds from the body to the appropriate terminals on the BCM. Hard to be certain. And maybe outside my comfort zone.
I guess it's worth the time to sketch up a homebrew circuit and see how feasible it is to engage high beams in series. Either it's a good idea or I can rule it out and move on.
If you want to try rewiring, I can get you the pin numbers and all the details. But I suspect you'll also need the BCM programming tweaked, and that may not be something the dealer can just turn and off.
If you set up a relay to ground the yellow wire on pin 3L when the power comes on, I think you'll get low beams at full intensity with ignition. The lows would stay on when you turn on the high beams unless you get clever. You can do this at the headlight switch or the BCM. With some clever repinning, I'll bet you could make it 100% reversible.
Well, there's zero chance my friendly local Mazda parts guy knows more than Keith, so colour me "superseded."
I have to say the standalone aftermarket option is looking better and better (assuming the Internet doesn't send you something made of pot metal & scotch tape.)
Stealthtercel said:
Well, there's zero chance my friendly local Mazda parts guy knows more than Keith, so colour me "superseded."
I have to say the standalone aftermarket option is looking better and better (assuming the Internet doesn't send you something made of pot metal & scotch tape.)
It's the internet. It's just as likely to send me something made of pot, metal, and Scotch tape as it is something made of pit metal and Scotch tape. But somebody did leave this laying around, and it's a pretty good representation of what I was thinking of:
Keith, I sure appreciate the effort, but you've probably gone far enough. Anything involving the BCM is looking more intimidating and less likely all the time. I'll try to study this a little more later on and see if I can at least wrap my mind around how the lights are controlled, what gets switched when and where, etc.
Rons said:
I came up with this
https://mazdas247.com/forum/t/adding-drls-to-your-mazda-5-how-to.123771292/
Yep. That is where I learned of the elusive, discontinued Hamsar 45035 DRL module.
There are Hamsar DRL modules, though not that part number, for sale on eBay. Maybe tonight I can rifle through archived versions of the Hamsar website for clues.
In reply to DarkMonohue :
My last suggestion wasn't messing with the BCM, it's spoofing the headlight switch without turning on the tails.
I once had a 2005 Ford Focus that I added HID projector headlights to, which eliminated the possibility of a low voltage high beam DRL and I didn't want to just run the headlights all the time.
What I ended up doing was re-wiring the DRL circuit to the marker lights on the front turn signal bulbs on the marker light side (dual filament) and I replaced the bulbs with some Morimoto "switchback" LED's, which activated white while in DRL duty, then when the turn signal was activated, the white would turn off and it would flash amber only (not amber, white, amber, white). I also added a resistor to the turn signal circuit to prevent the so called "hyperflash". You could pretty much do the same thing with by wiring switched power to that same circuit.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
Copy. I'm sure it's simpler than it looks, but I'm kind of a luddite, and when I see the BCM in the diagram, I get pretty nervous. Anything beyond tapping into or interrupting a 12V hot or ground is way outside my comfort zone.
In reply to RX8driver :
Not a terrible idea, although I have no DRL circuit to tap into. Again, I'm outing myself as a luddite here, but I really prefer a dedicated lamp for each function rather than a DRL that drops out so a turn signal can flash.
If it is any help to you (or if not you, another GRMer reading along) I have a module I bought from Daniel Stern Lighting which does what RX8driver describes. I was going to use it on something 80's/90's like an AE86 or Cappuccino, but never installed it, and no longer have plans for it. Pick it up in Portland, or $15 to cover shipping and it is yours. Daniel Stern side markers as DRL
In reply to ae86andkp61 (Forum Supporter) :
Perfect, thanks! I'll take it just on the off chance it makes it's way onto either the 5 or the AW11. Will be in touch tomorrow.
In reply to RX8driver :
Did something similar to my NB Miata when it was a street car. Retrofit HID projectors, blacked out housings, knocked out the yellow reflectors in the housings, and switchbacks. I think I had to grab switched power from somewhere since I had no DRL circuit, if I remember. Looked great and worked well. Seems like the easy button in this case.
Switchbacks were from vled.com. A bit expensive but well built and bright. Had an input to dim them when the regular headlights came on to avoid nighttime glare. Ran them for years without issue.
