RETROFIT GUIDE FOR NMD AUTOLIGHTS jon@wendzina.com

One of my friends recently said I should start a new show called Convenience my ride. I love making my car more

convenient, so alas, on that note heres my latest guide.

Installing an automatic headlight system.

PLEASE NOTE: THIS GUIDE IS FOR THE SKODA FABIA ONLY. THAT SAID, IT PROBABLY APPLIES TO MOST VAG CARS

(VW, SEAT, AUDI, SKODA), THE DIFFERENCE BEING THE WIRE COLOURS/LAYOUT. USE A HAYNES MANUAL TO

CHECK YOUR WIRE COLOURING.

The kit used in this guide was NMD Autolights from steelmate.co.uk. I decided to use this kit as it was about the only

one I could find in the UK.

Here is the car I will be working on. My little beauty!

The first thing to do is to disassemble a few elements of the interior. You need to remove various elements of the

dash in order to get to some of the electrical areas.

First, pull the upper trim of the wheel towards you.

This will reveal a screw to the right. Remove it with a Torx 25 screwdriver. Under the dash are a further 4 torx

screws. Remove. Pop off the cover to the fuse box (on the right hand side of the dash), to reveal the last screw.

Remove.

Gently lower the lower panel, making sure you dont pull any cables. Before entire removal, you must open the

small storage area and pull out where you will reveal a diagnostic socket. Push this out. Also, you need to remove

the aircon hose from this storage area, and release the headlight cables. The trim is now free for you to put to one

side.

The Skoda Fabia uses a Positive lighting arrangement. This means that the system relies on a dual wire 12V+ system

(one pre 12V+ and one post ignition 12V+). There are 9 cables from the provided loom that you have to connect. The

easiest ones are the earth/live cables. The large black cable needs to be earthed to the chassis, the best point I found

is by the fuse box (see below)

Next, wire in the first live cable. This is the large red cable thats hardwired into the ECU for the Autolights system.

This is just above the ECU, and you need to just remove a faceplate hiding the wires. I borrowed an image from

DanGB again, so thanks!

Next you need to wire in the second live cable. This is the thinner red cable (paired with a thin black cable). This one

needs to go into a switched power source (i.e. no power until the car is turned on). I used the cable from the back of

the radio as theres easy access. There are other points you can use, just grab a multimeter to assist your search!

There is a second earth cable (this is the thinner of the two black ones paired with the thin red which is in the back of

the radio). The purpose of this cable is to turn off the headlights and just keep the parking lights on once the

handbrake is applied. This is a bit of a palaver to reach, but if you follow this guide, its not too difficult. So the first

step is to remove the centre console.

Remove the oddments tray by pulling it up vertically

You will reveal two torx 20 screws (this is the same throughout the car), remove them

Prise out the small cover beneath the handbrake.

Pull out the front tray and reveal 3 more torx screws and remove them. Pull the gear gaiter up over the stick.

Prise the plastic surround out from around the gaiter. Before you pull it off make sure you unclip the small LED lamp

(see below)

The whole unit can be raised (from the back). MAKE SURE WHEN THE CONSOLE IS HALF RAISED THAT YOU REACH

UNDERNEATH AND UNPLUG THE CIGARETTE LIGHTER CABLE. Once the cable is out, continue raising the console

until it begins to un-clip from the plastic cover at the front. You may want to remove this also but my guide doesnt

cover this as it is not necessary.

Now we can finally wire this thin black cable in. Follow it up from the front of the car and along to the handbrake.

Beside the handbrake you will find this cable.

Theres an earth (brown) and live (blue). Unplug this by pushing the small black tab away from the plug and pulling it

out. Then solder/tape/splice your black cable into the BLUE cable.

Finally with all this done you need to replace centre console again. Just reverse your steps.

With your two lives and two earths in place you need to wire the sensor in place. Place this at the top right hand

side of the windshield or above you rear view mirror. Then chase the black cable around the trim, down and to the

fuse box, through one of the small holes in the chassis and down to your ECU box. Plug this in.

The last stage is to take your existing light switch cable and splice in 5 wires. You will have already revealed this cable

during the removal of the dash. You need to splice these cables in and you will get a cable that looks like this.

Now the way the Skoda is wired is so that you can switch on your main beam unless the light switch is in Position 2.

Therefore we need to alter this NMD kit. Take the green pre-wired cable and split it into two. I have used a splitter

and then wired the green into one end and then two red cables of a similar thickness into the other. You then need

to solder one red cable into the thick BLACK AND WHITE cable and the other into the thick YELLOW AND GREEN

cable. That will sort out your headlights.

Next are the number plate lights. This is the BLUE CABLE on the NMD Kit. This needs to be soldered into the GREY

AND BLUE on the Skoda plug. Please note that there are two grey and blue wires next to each other. To clarify, the

one you want to solder into has a darker grey colour of the two and is the second pin in (not the one on the outside

of the plug).

Next you want the right hand light-set. This is the YELLOW CABLE on the NMD kit. This goes into the Skoda BLACK

AND GREY cable.

Finally the left hand light set. This is the PURPLE CABLE from the NMD kit and this goes into the GREY AND RED cable.

Brilliant! Once this is done you just need to reassemble the car. In terms of box placement you can put it in the top

left near the backside of the fuse box or somewhere more accessible i.e. in the oddments box (although you would

need to make a small hole in it for the cables.

FURTHER NOTES

Solder/Splice/Joining Box/Tape? Whats the best way to wire cables into the existing car system? Well it

depends. Some cables in the car are big, easy to access and have lots of give. Use a splicer, its easiest. If

theres not so much give you can use a joining box (as I do). Soldering is the most reliable method but a bit of

a pain because you have to reveal the metal pin at the end of a cable. The most unreliable method, but good

if you have little space is by using tape. You literally push the wire into the socket and tape it just above the

plug (tightly to prevent slippage). I actually prefer this method as youre not tampering with the cars existing

connections.

Make sure you clean your glass before mounting the light sensor.

The ECU for this kit has a sensitivity adjuster to define when it thinks the lights should be triggered or not. I

found the best place is right in the middle. Please please please make sure you have tested the sensitivity

before you put all the trim back in place. If you are unsure then install the ECU in an accessible place so you

can change the sensitivity without having to remove the trim every time.

Please ask if you have any questions.

Jon