Install advice for Baja Designs Fog Lamp Kit

[Randy2400h]

Thanks for the great write up! How do you aim the lamps?

You don’t aim them, you just mount them flush against the opening. They’re wide-beam cornering lights so they just need to be pointed in the general direction. But even if you went with the lenses that are half cornering / half projection, I think mounting them flush would do the trick, because they are aimed parallel to the road.

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[ACon99]

This is probably a rookie question, but I'm trying to remove the plastic air dam covering the foglight assembly and having a heck of a time. 2 bolts are easy to come out, but even after loosening up the crash bars completely, i don't have enough room to slip in a standard wrench (socket wrench won't fit) to loosen the third 10mm bolt that's directly behind the crash bars.

I've even flipped the wrench to get that last little bit of angle possible between the bolt head and crash bar, but I'm afraid I'll just strip the bolt if I keep trying.

Anyone else have this problem or am I just completely missing something? I haven't heard anyone else have this challenge and so I'm just thinking I need to remove the whole bumper to completely take out the crash bars...

Appreciate any input anyone can give as I'm completely new to this world.

EDIT: Looks like I might need to use an offset wrench to be able to create the angle I need for that particular bolt. Anyone else find this was necessary?

 

[Randy2400h]

This is probably a rookie question, but I'm trying to remove the plastic air dam covering the foglight assembly and having a heck of a time. 2 bolts are easy to come out, but even after loosening up the crash bars completely, i don't have enough room to slip in a standard wrench (socket wrench won't fit) to loosen the third 10mm bolt that's directly behind the crash bars.

I've even flipped the wrench to get that last little bit of angle possible between the bolt head and crash bar, but I'm afraid I'll just strip the bolt if I keep trying.

Anyone else have this problem or am I just completely missing something? I haven't heard anyone else have this challenge and so I'm just thinking I need to remove the whole bumper to completely take out the crash bars...

Appreciate any input anyone can give as I'm completely new to this world.

EDIT: Looks like I might need to use an offset wrench to be able to create the angle I need for that particular bolt. Anyone else find this was necessary?

I can go take a look a my truck in a few minutes. I don’t remember having to use any special tools with the exception of the 1/4” drive torx bit combined with the rachet to remove/reinstall the lamps.

 

[ACon99]

I can go take a look a my truck in a few minutes. I don’t remember having to use any special tools with the exception of the 1/4” drive torx bit combined with the rachet to remove/reinstall the lamps.

Much appreciated. I just bought some offset wrenches from Autozone and it worked like a charm. The combination of the bolt being inset + the crash bars made it a pretty small space.

 

[Randy2400h]

Much appreciated. I just bought some offset wrenches from Autozone and it worked like a charm. The combination of the bolt being inset + the crash bars made it a pretty small space.

Ok, great. My wife ran off with my truck otherwise I would have had your answer right away.

 

[ACon99]

So I did another rookie mistake and figured I would share. The plug and play adapter requires you to match black and brown wires to the black and brown wires of the fog light. Of course, me being me, I matched the wires, put the supplied plastic clip on, and then realized that i put the clip on upside down with how it connects to the wiring harness from the truck. Needless to say, I tried pulling the wires out to reposition and found they are stuck in there because of the arrowhead shape of the wires.

Turns out, if someone were dumb enough like me to do this, rather than having to find another adapter, you can order a cheap $10-ish wire removal tool on Amazon. I couldn't find them on the big box store websites. The one I ordered is made by a company called Lisle and is their "Lisle 56500 Terminal Tool" but there are definitely other varieties. I'm pretty sure it will work but will have to report back on Monday when it comes in. Good news is that one of my fog lights is in and working great!

My point being, if you did this mistake like I did, there's still hope.

Also, aside from having to use the 10mm offset wrench, the OTHER problem area I had was assembling the mounting bracket to the fog light. It requires inserting some spiny lock washer between the tab of the mounting bracket and the housing of the unit. This was an absolute PITA to do and I ended up having to slightly bend the bracket to get it to work. Probably took me about 20 minutes per light because of how tight they were. Luckily all the scuffs are covered up by the tab of the bracket. I had to use a thin flat head screwdriver to drive the lockwasher in place from all angles as well as play with pivoting the bracket. A complete nightmare for me, but would love to hear any success stories of others who found it easy.

As an aside, I love how the Baja paper instructions begin with "step 1: remove crash bars" as if that's something you can do without cutting them away or completely removing the bumper. They should change it to "loosen crash bar bolts" as it's completely decieving.

I've got the Baja Designs Squadron Sport Complete Lower Bumper Kit (4 more lights) coming sometime soon and am NOT looking forward to that install. Unfortunately, I haven't found a guide online for that set yet, so I can't even prep myself.

Definitely learning a lot from this, which should be so simple.

 

[P. A. Schilke]

So I did another rookie mistake and figured I would share. The plug and play adapter requires you to match black and brown wires to the black and brown wires of the fog light. Of course, me being me, I matched the wires, put the supplied plastic clip on, and then realized that i put the clip on upside down with how it connects to the wiring harness from the truck. Needless to say, I tried pulling the wires out to reposition and found they are stuck in there because of the arrowhead shape of the wires.

Turns out, if someone were dumb enough like me to do this, rather than having to find another adapter, you can order a cheap $10-ish wire removal tool on Amazon. I couldn't find them on the big box store websites. The one I ordered is made by a company called Lisle and is their "Lisle 56500 Terminal Tool" but there are definitely other varieties. I'm pretty sure it will work but will have to report back on Monday when it comes in. Good news is that one of my fog lights is in and working great!

My point being, if you did this mistake like I did, there's still hope.

Also, aside from having to use the 10mm offset wrench, the OTHER problem area I had was assembling the mounting bracket to the fog light. It requires inserting some spiny lock washer between the tab of the mounting bracket and the housing of the unit. This was an absolute PITA to do and I ended up having to slightly bend the bracket to get it to work. Probably took me about 20 minutes per light because of how tight they were. Luckily all the scuffs are covered up by the tab of the bracket. I had to use a thin flat head screwdriver to drive the lockwasher in place from all angles as well as play with pivoting the bracket. A complete nightmare for me, but would love to hear any success stories of others who found it easy.

As an aside, I love how the Baja paper instructions begin with "step 1: remove crash bars" as if that's something you can do without cutting them away or completely removing the bumper. They should change it to "loosen crash bar bolts" as it's completely decieving.

I've got the Baja Designs Squadron Sport Complete Lower Bumper Kit (4 more lights) coming sometime soon and am NOT looking forward to that install. Unfortunately, I haven't found a guide online for that set yet, so I can't even prep myself.

Definitely learning a lot from this, which should be so simple.

Hi Acon99,

Thanks for sharing...Refreshing to share your schooling of hard knocks for the benefit of others. Kudos to you and I hope your new tool and leaning will result in a satisfactory outcome!

Best,
Phil Schilke
Ranger Vehicle Engineering
Ford Motor Co. Retired

 

[Baja Designs]

So I did another rookie mistake and figured I would share. The plug and play adapter requires you to match black and brown wires to the black and brown wires of the fog light. Of course, me being me, I matched the wires, put the supplied plastic clip on, and then realized that i put the clip on upside down with how it connects to the wiring harness from the truck. Needless to say, I tried pulling the wires out to reposition and found they are stuck in there because of the arrowhead shape of the wires.

Turns out, if someone were dumb enough like me to do this, rather than having to find another adapter, you can order a cheap $10-ish wire removal tool on Amazon. I couldn't find them on the big box store websites. The one I ordered is made by a company called Lisle and is their "Lisle 56500 Terminal Tool" but there are definitely other varieties. I'm pretty sure it will work but will have to report back on Monday when it comes in. Good news is that one of my fog lights is in and working great!

My point being, if you did this mistake like I did, there's still hope.

Also, aside from having to use the 10mm offset wrench, the OTHER problem area I had was assembling the mounting bracket to the fog light. It requires inserting some spiny lock washer between the tab of the mounting bracket and the housing of the unit. This was an absolute PITA to do and I ended up having to slightly bend the bracket to get it to work. Probably took me about 20 minutes per light because of how tight they were. Luckily all the scuffs are covered up by the tab of the bracket. I had to use a thin flat head screwdriver to drive the lockwasher in place from all angles as well as play with pivoting the bracket. A complete nightmare for me, but would love to hear any success stories of others who found it easy.

As an aside, I love how the Baja paper instructions begin with "step 1: remove crash bars" as if that's something you can do without cutting them away or completely removing the bumper. They should change it to "loosen crash bar bolts" as it's completely decieving.

I've got the Baja Designs Squadron Sport Complete Lower Bumper Kit (4 more lights) coming sometime soon and am NOT looking forward to that install. Unfortunately, I haven't found a guide online for that set yet, so I can't even prep myself.

Definitely learning a lot from this, which should be so simple.

Hi ACon99,

Sorry to see you had some hurdles during the install of the fog pocket kit. We appreciate your insight and taking the time to share your thoughts. I reviewed the instructions and saw that our model ranger didn't have the crash bars in the pictures. I spoke to our engineering team and it looks like we used a vehicle from Icon suspension. They had previously removed the crash bars for a R&D suspension kit before we got the vehicle and explains the confusion. I apologize for this discrepancy, we're getting this updated ASAP. I also attached the instructions for the Squadron Grill kit, this should be a pretty straight forward install but please let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you!
Paul M.

 

[ACon99]

Hi ACon99,

Sorry to see you had some hurdles during the install of the fog pocket kit. We appreciate your insight and taking the time to share your thoughts. I reviewed the instructions and saw that our model ranger didn't have the crash bars in the pictures. I spoke to our engineering team and it looks like we used a vehicle from Icon suspension. They had previously removed the crash bars for a R&D suspension kit before we got the vehicle and explains the confusion. I apologize for this discrepancy, we're getting this updated ASAP. I also attached the instructions for the Squadron Grill kit, this should be a pretty straight forward install but please let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you!
Paul M.

Thanks so much for the reply! I did get the initial install complete (The wire removal tool worked just like I thought it would), and I have to say, the lights are awesome. If someone wasn't a novice like me, I think it would be a very simple install. I did the second light in about an hour compared to my first light, and I'm sure most could do it faster than me since I'm very careful and like to look at all the pretty things.

Very excited to install the lower grill kit as I just got it in the mail this morning!

 

[daniel3507]

I've also had a hell of a time with the splash guard. I've really struggled with the bolt around the crash bar. I tried tackling it from the other side and getting at the nut but couldn't break it loose even after applying heat with a torch. May have to try the offset wrenches. I haven't even found the other bolts yet. At this point I'm tempted to cut the dang thing out

 

[ACon99]

I've also had a hell of a time with the splash guard. I've really struggled with the bolt around the crash bar. I tried tackling it from the other side and getting at the nut but couldn't break it loose even after applying heat with a torch. May have to try the offset wrenches. I haven't even found the other bolts yet. At this point I'm tempted to cut the dang thing out

No, don't cut! Seriously, just get a set of metric offset wrenches from Autozone, Napa, etc. It is exactly what you need. Takes a pit of patience, but it's not difficult. I've already found other uses for the offset wrenches when detaching the sway bar end link to provide some wiggle room to install new shocks.

 

[CC_The_Aussie]

This is probably a rookie question, but I'm trying to remove the plastic air dam covering the foglight assembly and having a heck of a time. 2 bolts are easy to come out, but even after loosening up the crash bars completely, i don't have enough room to slip in a standard wrench (socket wrench won't fit) to loosen the third 10mm bolt that's directly behind the crash bars.

I've even flipped the wrench to get that last little bit of angle possible between the bolt head and crash bar, but I'm afraid I'll just strip the bolt if I keep trying.

Anyone else have this problem or am I just completely missing something? I haven't heard anyone else have this challenge and so I'm just thinking I need to remove the whole bumper to completely take out the crash bars...

Appreciate any input anyone can give as I'm completely new to this world.

EDIT: Looks like I might need to use an offset wrench to be able to create the angle I need for that particular bolt. Anyone else find this was necessary?

I am glad I wasn't the only person who had this issue! Came close to kicking the shit out of the crash bar in frustration haha but the 10mm offset spanner tip worked a charm! Thanks for posting this mate!

 

[BC_Express]

Just finished installing my Baja designs sae fog lights...Thxs for the installation tips...it was a huge help...and yes the far bolt on the fog lights is a bitch to get
in /out but the 1/4 socket with a t25 torch bit and extention did the trick.

 

[bobafetske]

I just ordered the amber SAE kit. Looking forward to installing them. I'll be referencing this feed for sure

 

[daniel3507]

The 10mm offset was helpful but I still struggled. I had to use a pry bar to give myself enough room. The actual light install was simple. Getting the stupid splash guard off was the most difficult part.

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