Help! Rear fog light and MOT

[Redline]

Got the MOT tomorrow (I foolishly missed it running out a few days ago ).
No problem I thought. Everything is good.

Even so, Just did a quick check of lights etc. Everything fine, except.....

The near side rear fog light isn't working. Unit out, bulb removed and that is OK.
Off side is working fine.
So, fuse is the likely culprit. But, which fuse are these lights on and are both on the same fuse?
The fuse diagram is zero help as far the rear fogs are concerned - not mentioned anywhere!

If its not the fuse or the bulb, anybody any experience of where the problem is likely to be?

If it isn't a bulb or fuse, I'm not going to have any time to fix it before it goes in tomorrow, so, if the near side isnt working, is that going to be a fail?
I know the law as far as rear fogs are concerned is that if one is fitted it has to be on the right hand side.

 

[hard top]

I know the law as far as rear fogs are concerned is that if one is fitted it has to be on the right hand side.

Just take the other bulb out of the other fog light for the MOT.

 

[t-tony]

You won't get the n/s rear fog light to work, it never did. The M.O.T. only requires one rear fog light to the offside of centre of the car. Panic over.

Tony.

ps. My car only has two rear fogs because I modified the light units.

 

[Redline]

You won't get the n/s rear fog light to work, it never did. The M.O.T. only requires one rear fog light to the offside of centre of the car. Panic over.

Tony.

ps. My car only has two rear fogs because I modified the light units.

WTF has it got a bulb in it? How confusing is that?

Thanks Tony. That's a panic over for the morning!

Was aware that only one was required and that it had to be off-centre on the off-side. Am sure most of the cars I've had have had two rear fogs so with it having a bulb n/s I was expecting it to be working. I guess the loom simply doesn't wire out to the connector that side.
Can only assume that the light units were pre-built and populated irrespective of territory but the loom is targeted for which side the wheels is. Or is it a configuration option somewhere.

How did you mod yours?

 

[Redline]

Just take the other bulb out of the other fog light for the MOT.

That would be perverse - two working bulbs is OK, one is a fail and none OK. I feel a Victor Meldrew moment coming on

Thankfully our dependable chief engineer has come to my rescue.

 

[t-tony]

I fitted a right rear unit from a LHD car so I had 2 reversing lights (I like things to look symmetrical) and two of everything else too.

https://zroadster.org/threads/rear-light-alterations.10345/page-2#post-162660

Tony.

 

[ppavuk]

it is enough to have just one fog light. The second one has bulb, but it is disabled by light management system. On Z4 there is different rear light clusters for rhd and lhd. And by design you only getting one fog light, unless you have swapped as @t-tony did, or if you have clear light clusters like myself - then you can mod a car to have 2 foglights and two reversing lights. But by default - the only foglight illuminated is a driver side one. In my clear units, soursed from usa there was clear bulbs in both left and right sockets, as Yankees dont have fog lights per se, so both a reversing lights. When i plugged in clusters - they worked UK way, so left if reversing and right is fog. So i replaced clear bulb with red one and job done. The wiring is exactly same on rhd and lhd cars, the lights are managed by light management unit, so you can reprogramm it to lhd and have clear fog light on the left, and red reversing light on the right

 

[Redline]

it is enough to have just one fog light. The second one has bulb, but it is disabled by light management system. On Z4 there is different rear light clusters for rhd and lhd. And by design you only getting one fog light, unless you have swapped as @t-tony did, or if you have clear light clusters like myself - then you can mod a car to have 2 foglights and two reversing lights. But by default - the only foglight illuminated is a driver side one. In my clear units, soursed from usa there was clear bulbs in both left and right sockets, as Yankees dont have fog lights per se, so both a reversing lights. When i plugged in clusters - they worked UK way, so left if reversing and right is fog. So i replaced clear bulb with red one and job done. The wiring is exactly same on rhd and lhd cars, the lights are managed by light management unit, so you can reprogramm it to lhd and have clear fog light on the left, and red reversing light on the right

The problem is that both sides are described as fog lights. Both have bulbs so it's not unreasonable to expect that both work.
The fact that only one works without that fact being described anywhere is unhelpful.

On most things the MoT expects things like lights to work if configured.

I don't really care about fog lights front or rear because they never get used. We simply don't get fog bad enough to warrant their use. I don't want an MoT failure. That's all.

As my LR and previous cars all had two and having two bulbs in the Z4 is it not unreasonable to expect that they work as a pair. Instead, the software jockeys down rate the capabilities to meet minimal legal standards. Technolgy gone mad. Technology intervention for the sake of it.

 

[ppavuk]

Yours z4 is facelift, right? i can't comment on it, as on pre-facelift there is no second fog light per se. Not sure what's on facelift...

 

[Redline]

Yours z4 is facelift, right? i can't comment on it, as on pre-facelift there is no second fog light per se. Not sure what's on facelift...

Yes -its a 2007 facelift model. The rear lights are symmetrical in design but clearly not operation.