Hi guys,

My rear fog light decided it was going to fall out the other day, and it wasn't as straight forward as you'd like to think, so I thought Id share this issue with other 99 - 03 owners....


The reason the thing fell out in the 1st place was because Honda decided to use 2x brackets to hold the thing in made out of monkey metal, in a place where salt and rain water colate, so over 10 years it is held in by rust.

To help matters Honda decided to use nuts and bolts made out of the same stuff which seize and break off leaving you to drill the hole thing out.


To get the fog light out you must 1st drill out 2x cross heads screws (If rusted) under bumper see pic




Then undo 2 plastic clips next to them to give you access to whats left of the brackets. Then unscrew/ drill out 2 remaining bolts inside the bumper and disconnect the connecter and pull whole thing free.

Once the fog light is out, you will probably find you cant undo the screws as the remainder of the bracket is seized to the back of the foglight, meaning you will need to drill the screws out, see pic



Drill very carefully as when the screw gets hot it will start to melt the plastic, so stop every 30 secs or so, see pic



Once youve drilled the screws out it will come apart see pic



Finally, scrape the remainder of the bracket off, so the new one will fit, see pic




Now, get down to Honda and order a left and a right bracket as they come in 2 pieces and will cost around £21 , but keep all your old damaged screws and get them from a hard ware shop as Honda will ask for another £6

Fitting is the reverse minus the drilling, and is really easy as the brackets are marked left and right.

A PITA job, but all we will have to do at some time with our poor weather.

Thanks to Rob at Garage R for his help.


Cheers

Jon

 

Thanks Jon for details! Would you have the diagram on how you connect the fog?

 

i sand blasted mine and welded the parts together, then painted, and used rivets to fix it to the bumper

 

I dont at the moment, but I'll try and find one for you.

In the mean time look at this pic, I know its a poor picture, but you can see the brackets left and right, and where they broke off

 

Yeah, I can see, any way to prevent that from happening after 10 years beside cleaning it every so often. I have the brackets and they're quite rusty too and I was thinking of just giving it to a shop that will re-coat it.

 

replace them with stainless or alloy items

 

Look aqll over the net and cant find a diagram only for US/JDM cars which dont have them.

If you could get someone to fabricate some from stainless steal that would be good, but they look a little tricky.

Best thing would be to spray them with underseal to protect them maybe.

 

Yeah I will probably go with respray and all, fabricate them may cost too much as it doesn't seem that easy.
By the way, can you still order those brackets from the dealer where you are? What's the price? Maybe I can get new ones and spray something to prevent and they can look good forever lol.

 

Rob at Garage R got them for me, your best call him on 01226 295555 , I think they only came to £21

 

I just finished doing this to my MY01 as the MOT is due this month.. after drinking a bottle of wine. What a pants job to do.

Thank you to the OP.

I used an angle grinder to remove the screws under the rear bumper as I didn't trust the scissor jack when using a drill under there.

With a bit of improvisation and a lot of rust to remove.. Plus almost being run over 100 times by moronic drivers and getting shards of broken bottles stuck in my kidneys, it took me about three hours start to finish. I reckon next time around I could do it in under an hour.

If you do this yourself, remember that the plastic will melt VERY quickly when grinding any fixings!

If anyone would like any advice or indeed help doing the job in exchange for a cup of tea, give me a shout.