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MG MGA - MGA lighting modifications

Since it is the time of year when many of us are using lights more often, I finally got around to adding relays for the headlights and at the same time eliminated the traditional dipper switch, since my foot likes to rest there, and made the unused fog light switch into the new dip switch. It is much more convenient as it is right at my finger tips and was very easy to do as it uses the same wiring that the old dipper switch used. I just re-routed the small harness that went down from the heater shelf the other way from the firewall following the main harness toward the lights and to a small plate I attached two relays to. (see picture) Then I pulled the fog light wire (red/yellow) out of the harness at the relay mounting and attached it to a single pole double throw relay that switches the beams from high to dip just as the old switch did. Power is switched on with the lighting switch just as normal which is routed to another relay that gets 12v power via the starter switch and is fused with a 15 amp fuse. (see wiring diagram) This all keeps high current away from the old switches and alters the wiring minimally(only the fog light wire gets cut and is easily reversible. Also your lights are bright and fused. The other alteration I did was to make a trunk-mounted LED third brake light with integrated running lights and turn signals. It is very bright and shows up better than the original lighting, but may not be for the purists. I did try to model it after the rear cabin roof vents I have seen on a few E Type low drag coupes.



M Grover

Wiring Photo


M Grover

More wiring


M Grover

Dash switches


M Grover

Nice and bright!


M Grover

Third brake light


M Grover

Brake light


M Grover

other view


M Grover

Last one


M Grover

Love the car and it's modifications. Interested in the screens..what are they off? Also, the passenger cover looks great.
Gary Lock

Thanks Gary, the screens were made from scratch, machined out of aluminum and with .250 Lexan for glass. Also the third brake light is showing the running lights on. The brake lights are the center 5 LED's and the turn signals are the outer 2 amber LED's on each side.

Matt
M Grover

Matt..want to make another set?...these are the best I've seen.
Gary Lock

Gary, I never went into making the screens with the intention of reproducing them as I had an idea in my head and the design evolved as I fabricated them. The outer handles were turned on a lathe then welded to small disks, then re-machined, drilled and threaded. The outer channels/frames and other machining was done on an ancient Bridgeport with manual controls pretty much by eye and feel and no drawings were ever done, It was just a fun project. I could give you some close up pics if you know an ambitious machinist/fabricator that might want to reverse-engineer them. Lots of time involved in these but were done just to see if I could, much like a lot of the things we do with these somewhat impractical but fun little cars.
M Grover

Beautiful, tasteful, love it!
Gene Gillam

This thread was discussed between 08/10/2018 and 09/10/2018

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