Auto dimming mirror installation

Great that everything worked out for you!

i tried pulling the cover toward the mirror but it wouldn't come off... is there some kind of tabs or something? i'm hopeless here...

i tried this and it wouldn't budge... felt like i was going to brake the mirror and/or cover...

Try taking the plastic square that covers the mount off...once you do this, there is a plastic tab. Once you press the tab, the mirror will slide right off.

-m

i can't figure out how to remove the plastic square! was there a trick to it?

I just wiggled it back and forth and pulled back at the same time.

-M

You're not gonna break the plastic. You might have to pry it with a plastic lever (don't use metal b/c you might crack the windshield). But, really you should be able to pull it off with your hand. It will not be easy to pull off but, you can do it. Do not try to pull off the mirror until you figure out how to get the plastic off. You will not break the plastic and even if you do (which you won't), it is cheap.

I just ordered a used mirror from eBay and a wire pigtail... It dawned on me that I haven't yet ordered a wire cover. I'm wondering if anyone has any suggestions on where to by one. A quick eBay search brought up a couple results with different looking ends, so I want to make sure I get the proper wire cover.

What I did, I just ordered one from the dealership for around $10. They sell it as parts for liftback and the V and they have two different models for each pruis. The dealership I went to didn't have any on their stock, so I just picked the random one for liftback with rear view camera (I don't know how is it related to cover). When I've got it, its length was a bit shorter than the distance between my mirror base and the sealing cover; however it is not noticeable at all, since a) it's behind the mirror and b) you can't see it from outside, because of this shaded area on the windshield. I just glued the cover to the glass and I am happy ever since.

Well, I just installed my Homelink/Auto Dim mirror by tapping into the dome lights. The only draw back is that the dome light has to be set to the "on when the doors are open" position for the auto dim to work. Thats the position I want to leave it in anyway so not a big deal.

I did get a used Homelink Mirror, and the paint was worn off the first couple buttons. I didn't want to put the mirror in my car with ghetto looking buttons so I used and razor blade to flake off all the rest of the old paint and painted the buttons blue. I was lucky enough to find blue spray paint thats is a pretty damn close match to the blue highlights of the interior (pictured). It looks a bit darker with all the black surrounding it, but side by side they look the same.

Anyone know where I might be able to get some decals to throw on those buttons?

"Open doors position" has a relay for 20 or 30 seconds (assuming that all doors are closed), after that the power is gone, at least that's what I saw on my multimeter. Are you sure that your dimming function is going to work after the power is cut from the dome lights?

I agree w/ Mik1. I suggest tapping into the map lights (if you have them) or the drivers power mirror or... the 12V outlet. Otherwise, you won't have auto dimming functions that you worked so hard for.

Yeah, I made that mistake originally, tested functions with the door open (for air circulation) and then was bummed when things weren't working later and had to get the voltmeter out to fix things. The dome light has 3 wires, black, white/black, and blue. The mirror had wires marked ground, homelink, autodimm. I originally assumed the the solid black wire was the ground. After studying the internals of the dome light and using the voltmeter I wired the mirror in the following way:

Car - Mirror
---------------------
Blue -> Ground
Black -> Homelink
B/W -> autodim

The homelink buttons work weather the car is on or off
The autodim works only when the car is on but only if the lights are switched to "on with open door"
Neither are effected by the 20-30 second auto light timer

^^ As long as it works for you man. When I was checking my dome light, I found that the blue wire is the hot +12V, black is the ground and B/W wire is the one which has power only when the door is opened and the switch is in "on with open door" position. That is why personally I connected my switched +12V to the door mirrors switch.

Yeah, are you sure kj? Black is almost always ground. Especially when it comes to lighting.

Whatever happened to col127 (the OP)?

I know and thats how I originally had it hooked up, with black as ground. Perhaps someone at the factory mixed up the wire colors in my car and didn't feel like rewiring? Apparently no one should pay attention to my wiring descriptions

Back to the real reason I posted, since you guys are into modding things does anyone have a source for cheap custom decals? I really like my blue buttons but none of them are marked... Since I don't have access to any printers with white ink, and the buttons are dark blue, I can't just print my own.

haven't gotten around to it yet still - i guess i'm procrastinating this since i've had so much frustration with it already... such a simple thing but i'm so unhandy it's causing lots of grief...

so i finally decided to tackle this again today... maybe time away from it helped - mirror popped off easily, and i was able to remove the driver's door panel to the fuses, etc... however, i got stuck at removing the a pillar - i could kind of pry it off a bit, but couldn't figure out how to get if off the clip - it's like the clip is perpendicular to the tab - no idea how to remove .any ideas?

the other problem was w/ the pigtail i got from the guy on ebay... every so often there's a screw protruding from the wires so the wires are quite thick and i couldn't run it down the a pillar under the door gasket as a result

at least i made some progress! thanks for any help

yes, that top one is tricky. You need to push it on both sides a turn it to a 45 degrees. I will put a detailed description from Toyota soon.