HAWAIITALKS!

WARNING: LONG POST, BUT INFORMATIVE

I thought I would share my experience on how to connect the wiring on a pair of '06 "turn signal" mirrors to a '05 Forester wiring harness.

A friend of mine asked me if I could do this for him and being mechanically inclined, I thought to myself . . . no problem. Well, after about 18 hours of brain racking, and frying the controller once ($40), I finally succeeded. Of course, with the information you are about to read, it wouldn't take you folks no where near as long as it took me. The most important info is which wires goes where. The wiring harness and plug on the '05 chassis is very different than the plugs on the '06 mirrors. Before coming to me my friend checked with some local dealerships when searching for the mirrors and they told him that it would not be a simple plug in, which didn't surpise him that all of the dealerships he contacted did not recommend the swap. Dummy me I said "just buy them, I'll make them work"

The '06 mirrors fit fine as far as mounting to the car. As long as you know which wires goes where, the conversion is very doable. *disclaimer* The car that I was working on did not come with heated mirrors, so I cannot give you information on that, sorry. *thinking to one's self . . . I live in Hawaii, he he*

Anyhow, here's how to connect the wires that actuate the mirrors. Note: left mirror is slightly different than the right mirror.

(C) is for chassis or body and (M) is for '06 mirror.

Left mirror:C-red = M-pink / C-blue = M-purple / C-green = M-yellow / C-black = M-blue

Right mirror: C-light green = M-yellow / C-white = M-purple / C-blue = M-pink / C-green = M-blue

Okay, that will make your power mirrors move in the right directions. Next you'll need to hook up the turn signals. The turn signals lights on the '06 mirrors are LED and I had to learn several lessons here: 1). you need a 12 volt DC power supply (I used a 6 volt camera battery to test the motor actuation for the new mirrors and got stumped while testing the lights). 2). you cannot reverse the polarity (LED's don't work if you do). I was taught these valuable lessons when I brought in a electronics engineer friend.

On the turn signal mirror side, the green wire is negative (-) and the white wire is positive (+). Now since the chassis does not have these wires built into the harness, you'll have to tap off of one of the turn signals on the car. I chose to tap into the front corner lamps (because it was the closest). I know what you're thinking; everyone's going to tell that you installed these mirrors yourself because they can see the wires when you open the doors. Well, if you follow the way I did it, it will be unnoticable.

By now you should have had the inner door panel off (probably for quite some time now). What I would suggest is to feed the new wires through the rubber insulation boot that connects the door to the chassis (where the original harness is routed through). I will explain how to accomplish this later. You will have to take some interior body paneling off to expose the hareness by the foot area. You'll see how it goes outside the body through the inner fender well. Yes, you will have to put the car on jack stands and take the front wheels off (and plastic inner fender lining). Just follow the wiring harness to the front of the car and you'll get to the lights. There's not much space up front, so don't get confused with the parking lights and the turn signals like I did.

Now tap into the wires how ever you wish and tie strap your wires to the original harness for a tight fit. The trick to getting the wires through the boot that connects the door and chassis is to use a long screw driver. Attach the wires to the tip (I used the electrical tape I used for wrapping the connectors) and shove the screw driver up the insulation boot. The boot is very flexible *thank god*, but there is an inner boot. I elected to make an incision on the top of the inner boot where the screw driver wanted to exit. You do the same thing for the passenger side. I might have to add; on the passenger side, you'll have to remove the intake baffle thingy. I'm kinda slim and it still required me to be somewhat of a contortionist to remove this unbelievably bulky part. Once out of the way . . . no problem.

Welps, I hope this helps you folks that have been contemplating this really neat conversion or introduced to it for the first time (my friend loves it and thinks it's safer). I think the total spent on parts was around $400 (except for the additional controller) . . . not bad.

BEFORE . . .



AFTER . . .



COMPARISON . . .



CLOSEUP . . .

Much...MUCH...nicer. I can see why he wanted to swap them out. Good stuff, Tom!

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Yeah definitely nicer and more functional too! Nice write up for those with this application.

Since it wasn't your own car, I bet you were like when you fried the controller! Glad you figured it out and it turned out nicely.

Yeah, the controller fried in the very beginning of this experiment which was one of the reasons why it took me so damn long. For the longest time I couldn't get the left mirror to move up or to the right. When I checked the right side, it had the same simptoms and that's when I said ****, the controllers fried. So, I took apart the controller and sure enough.

Hey Mike, do you want '06 Forester turn signal mirrors on your WRX?

No. Thanks.

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sweet looking swap out!
great write up!

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Thanks. If you guys like this kinda stuff, I'll be willling to take the time to do writeups on racecar rebulding and most recently, rotary engine rebulding and trouble shooting . . . my current project . . . what a nightmare!