did anyones ebay foglight harness ever melt or catch on fire?
im curious as to how often this happens.

 

Not really but that starting to scare me.

 

I usually never come into this forum, but I saw the thread title from the main page...

This happened to me with my 2000 Civic hatchback. I started to smell an "electrical fire" type of smell and immediately began to look for the problem before anything serious happened. By the time I found it, the fuse was completely destroyed and the fuse holder was showing signs of melting, as well. The wierdest part was that the foglights still worked before I cut the fuse out of the circuit.

I have a few pictures, too, but they are blurry phone pictures.

 

i wouldn't be surprised if it happened...

imo, if anyone buys the ebay foglight kit, they should replace the following:

1) Fuse - You want its calibration to be accurate so that they break current in a timely manner when something goes wrong w/ the circuit. The calibration of cheapo aftermarket fuses are often so bad that they won't blow even if current flow exceeds their rating by a huge margin. Certification isn't required for automotive fuses but I've seen some manufacturers sell automotive fuses that were CSA or UL approved. Those are the ones I'd try to buy.

2) Relay - The ones that come w/ the ebay foglight kit are poor quality. Go buy a new Bosch one for $4.

3) Switch - There have been reports that the ebay foglight switches can short out causing the switch to burn up.

4) Light bulbs - If quality control is horrible and you end up with a bulb that's higher wattage than rated (ie. 75 watts instead of 55 watts), the bulb will cause excess heating which could burn up surrounding parts such as the foglight harness. That's why simple incandescent light bulbs for home use have to be certified to north american safety standards.

 

i bought fog lights from ebay but they are made by DEPO, no problems yet. but after reading this i am gonna double check everything tonight after work

 

good call kyle

 

depo is crap but still better than the typical noname made-in-asia stuff sold on ebay

btw, how did you know yours were depo ones? did the seller just tell you that to make the sale or did it actually come in Depo packaging?

i remember emailing robearracing about their replica fogs. i asked them whether theirs were certified fogs. their response was that foglights are not regulated components and certification is not required. that was completely false info. genuine oem ones are SAE approved and certification is required where I am located.

 

I got my foglights from ebay but nothing like that has happened try putting a bigger fuse on the harness cause on mine the fuse kept blowing up and I placed a bigger and it's working fine

 

i have a stock 03 civic Lx...i want to buy OEM yellow foglights do i have to do anything to my bumper to fit them on!

 

yes you do bro you gonna have to cut the space for it but is not difficult cause the space is like right there you cant miss it....

 

oh iight yeah i see it..i just didnt know if i had to cut that off or it came off ..but good **** thanks man

 

what about ebay harness with oem fogs and switch from handaccessories.com?

 

As a rule of thumb, that's usually a very bad idea.

 

i agree...that's a horrible idea...

like i mentioned before, cheap bulbs might have very inaccurate ratings...the bulb might say 55W but the quality control is probably so bad that it can be anything.

H11 fog light bulbs are supposed to be around 55Watts each but those ebay ones could be much higher that the specified rating hence why the fog lights keep blowing the fuse. Too much heat from those bulbs can cause problems such as melting of wire insulation

 

yes, this has happened to me. scary...

 

If the fogs say OEM and it certifify. Will i still have problem with the harness, relay, and bulbs?

 

likely not

 

yeah my harness melted on mines, so i had to split the wiring and sodder and elect. tape it together

 

Never had a problem with mine.

 

This just happened to my ej I bought fogs from a website "don't remember which" it was a "yashuo" relay so I assumed if make in Japan on a Japanese tuner it'll be a good buy 2 days later it rained and the relay and fuse harnesses were fried so everyone be careful with these aftermarket fogs if I didn't have water in the car could've been a lot worst