Basically I installed a 01 Lincoln gentex in my 2000 ss and the map lights stay on unless I click the dimmer switch all the way up or if I open my door, but as soon as I close the door or click down on my dimmer switch, the map lights come back on the rear view mirror. The rear hatch light is operating normally, can anyone tell me what I’m doing incorrectly?

Ps I have ign #1 going to radio yellow wire
grd#2 same as on car
#6 I have going to white wire (same)on car
#7 going to blue 12v on car

 

You didn't connect the lighting ground to the white wire. The courtesy lights in f-bodies serve dual duty as dome lights and map lights so they get constant power to allow them to be turn on at any time. The courtesy light function is controlled by the BCM by varying the ground through the white wire. That allows it to turn them on and off as necessary as well as provide the "theater dimming" effect. The switch in the mirror simply switches to a standard ground (black wire) to turn on the lights to be used as map lights.

 

Excuse me if I don’t understand correctly, do I need to put the white ground(car) and black ground(car) together ?

 

No, two grounds are provided in the car harness to handle the separate functions of courtesy lights (controlled by the BCM) and map lights (controlled by manual switches on the mirror). You must not connect them together.

I'm not familiar with Lincoln mirrors. If it has two ground wires (one for courtesy and one for map) then you would connect the courtesy ground wire on the mirror to the white wire in the car and the map light ground wire to the black wire in the car. If it doesn't have two ground wires - perhaps it doesn't use the mirror lights as map lights - then you would connect the ground wire from the mirror to the white wire in the car and leave the black wire in the car unused.

 

Ok I will try this when I get home tonight and report back, Thanks for your help also

 

So I connected mirror ground #2 to white and pin# 6 for door lights to white wire on car and pin 7 to blue wire now my mirror only gets power if I click the dimmer switch all the way up or if i open the door WTH is going on here

 

I'm not going to try to figure out what connections you made. There are only three wires in the car's mirror connector. There are no other connections so I don't know what you mean by the pin numbers.

• dark blue/white is power that is on at all times except when the BCM goes to sleep about 15 minutes after the car has been shut off (battery saver mode).
• black is ground that is available at all times.
• white is ground which is controlled by the BCM. It is only available when the courtesy lights should be on.

I have no idea what wires you have on a Lincoln mirror. Does it have two ground wires? If so, presumably one is for map light use and the other is for courtesy light use. Connect the map light ground wire to the black wire in the car harness. Connect the courtesy light ground wire to the white wire in the car harness. If the mirror doesn't have two ground wires then connect the only ground wire to the white wire in the car harness.

If that still isn't enough of an explanation, perhaps you could post the list of wires on the Lincoln mirror.

 

I also recently bought this same mirror (Gentex 221 Map Lights & Compass ) I haven’t installed it yet. Since my Trans Am 00 engine is getting rebuilt. So I don’t have the car to mess around with this yet.

Figured I do some research and get ahead of it.

So here is a picture of the wires coming from Gentex 221





Ebay seller said that the wires are the following:

Blue/white - 12v

Black/Green - Ground

Yellow - dome

Pink - map lights



From what I gather from your post.

I should connected them like this:


let me know what you think?

 

I have done a little research on these Lincoln mirrors which suddenly seem to be so popular. Although they are all designated as Gentex 221 mirrors, there are a number of different versions with different features, and hence different wiring. You can get them with just auto-dimming and map lights, that plus compass, or that plus compass and temperature in single line and 2-line configurations. There may be other available configurations as well.

I couldn't find any wiring schematic that matched your mirror but I did find information that included wires for the three center positions in the connector (missing in your mirror). I would assume that the connections are the same for the four outer wires you have but I would test it before installing. The information I found indicates that the blue/white wire should get ignition switched power for the auto-dimming function but I suppose there's no reason you couldn't use the factory dark blue/white wire - it will stay powered until the BCM goes to sleep but I guess that's not a problem. The black wire should indeed go to the factory black wire for constant ground. The pink wire is supposed to have battery (constant) power so you should connect it to the factory dark blue/white wire along with the mirror's blue/white wire. Finally, the yellow wire is supposed to be connected to the door switch so that it gets ground when the door is open in order to turn on the courtesy (dome) lights. You don't have that option with the factory wiring but I imagine the factory white wire would be a close-enough substitute. I don't know how well the mirror will handle the theater dimming effect... you'll just have to try it and see.

If you have the mirror and access to a 12V power supply - or even just a car battery - I would test those connections before trying to install in your car. Connect both the blue/white and pink wires to 12V positive. Connect the black wire to 12V negative. Check the compass. Test the map lights. You may be able to test the auto-dimming using a flashlight but it might be difficult to see the effect. Then test the courtesy lights by touching the yellow wire to 12V negative and see if the lights turn on. Then take the yellow wire away from the 12V negative and check that the lights turn off.

If all of that works then you have the correct connections and can wire them into the car. You may find that the compass loses calibration all the time because it has no power when the BCM goes to sleep. The mirror was designed to have constant power not power that shuts off 15 minutes after the ignition is turned off. I don't know if that will happen or not... you'll know by the display showing C or CAL. You have to drive the car in at least three circles at less than 5 mph to calibrate - the C or CAL indicator will turn off when it's successfully calibrated.

 

so I have taken another stab at trying to make this work again. So I connected it the exact way your explaining and the problem is that the mirror is working opposite then the car, if you open the doors it turns the mirror lights off (compass has power at all times) then when you close the door and the rear light goes off the leds on the mirror come back on. Same for the dimmer switch if you click it to the top to turn on the interior lights it turns off the leds in the mirror until you click it down again.

update**
So after about 15 mins the mirror lights turn off is there anyway around this ?