Rear View Mirror - Disable Electric Anti-Glare

[Mikzor]

So my KK's rear view mirror has that electric anti-glare that turns itself on every-time I drive home at night. It basically adds this annoying green tint to everything and for me makes it damn near impossible to see anything in it! :mad:

I'm getting tired of having to press the button every single day to turn it off and was wondering if anyone has figured out how to just permanently disable it....short of ripping the mirror off altogether next time it shits me :rolleyes:

[fairmont1998]

Disconnect the plug on the back of the mirror?

[Mikzor]

Disconnect the plug on the back of the mirror?

Ok now why didn't I think of that! :shock:

A better inspection of the back of the mirror revealed a neat little door you could open with a very easy to remove little power cable plug. *sigh*

Take that you damn little mirror!!!!
http://img41.imageshack.us/img41/269/mirrorplug.jpg

[fairmont1998]

Out of curiosity, are your windows tinted? I've noticed my auto mirror doing its thing, but not that frequently or getting too dark to be usable still. My windows are tinted and maybe this cuts the glare before it gets to the mirror sensor.

[Mikzor]

I was slightly incorrect in my original post calling it "Anti-Glare" as it's actually a "Auto-Dimming" mirror that apparently adjusts for headlight glare from cars behind you. I'm guessing the sensor in it simply turns it on whenever it's dark as it would come on at night regardless of if cars were behind me or not but never during the day.

My windows have the basic glass tint that comes standard from the factory but no aftermarket tinting or optional extras kind on it.

Anything you call it I'm just glad the damn thing has now been disabled :D

[agisfang]

I have a dark tint on my KJ....but the auto dimmer does not seem too dark to me....I hate driving the wifes car (no auto dimmer) at night
I wonder if there is any possibility or way your could be auto dimming darker than it should be?

[CibbyDoc]

As far as I'm aware that plug also runs the mike for your blue tooth phone through the Uconnect. Not 100% sure but if your phone isnt working I'd say it is.

[fairmont1998]

Isn't the mic up near the interior lights?

[redneckjeeper]

Do all KJs have this feature ??

[CibbyDoc]

Isn't the mic up near the interior lights?

No mate it's on the right side of the off button on the mirror.

[Mikzor]

Yep, CibbyDoc is right, unfortunately disconnecting the mirrors power cable also knocked out my uConnect microphone so I'm back to square one. :(

Fairmont1998 I also thought the microphone was that little round thing located above the mirror next to the interior lights but guess not... no idea what that's for now.

The manual refers to that "thing" to the right of the rear view mirrors off button as a "non illuminating sensor" so who knows....maybe that is the mic. There is also a large square "sensor" on the back of the mirror which might be the light sensor then.

Here's what it looks like from the front.
http://img839.imageshack.us/img839/6403/mirrorja.jpg

[fairmont1998]

Yep, that is a sensor to the right. It's what detects the cars headlights behind you and causes the mirror to dim. I can't see where the mic is located if it is in the mirror. The sensor on the windscreen side of the mirror would be an ambient light sensor so the mirror doesn't dim during daylight.
Maybe the microphone wiring passes through that plug and the plug just needs to be connected for the mic to work. Everything in these modern cars seems to be bloody connected.

As an experiment maybe try covering that sensor next to the on/off button with a blob of blutak or something and see if the mirror stops dimming.

[fairmont1998]

Looking at the mirror again there are two grilles on the top. One of them could have the microphone under it.

[agisfang]

Redneckjeeper.....not sure if all KJ have the KK mirror feature, mine is a 05 Limited that has it...but it does not have the bluetooth connect to the mirror.

[btalyor218]

The mirror does indeed have the Uconnect microphone in it - I can't tell you where, but it's in there. There are plenty of other Chrysler forums that talk about it (thanks to Google). There were even some Chrysler's that had the Uconnect Butons on the mirror, as well as the microphone

http://i782.photobucket.com/albums/yy105/DavidESchiller/uconnect.jpg

Here's one thing you can try to disable the mirror. (I'd try, but I have the boring Sports Version - my auto dimming function just consists of me squinting my eyes :p). Test to see what the wires in the harness do by carefully removing 1 wire at a time from the harness into your mirror, and document what the results are. See if 1 of them stops the dimming function, without stopping the microphone from functioning. My theory is only 1 of them would power the mirror itself, and the microphone would be on a loop.

I'd start with the RED one, cause in most cases RED = POWER - I'm guessing the green wires are the microphone loop.

http://img41.imageshack.us/img41/269/mirrorplug.jpg

Failing that, the Blutac in the light sensor sounds like a good idea....

Also FYI - the little Black thing near the interior lights is the cabin temperature sensor - for the climate control.

http://img839.imageshack.us/img839/6403/mirrorja.jpg

[fairmont1998]

I've never seen the cabin temp sensor located there before! Learn something new every day owning a Jeep lol

[Mikzor]

Thanks for all your help and suggestions guys, I've now got it fixed and finally understand how the mirror works. The rear sensor (as you sit) is the day/night sensor controlling whether the auto-dimming feature is even on/off. It will only turn on when it thinks its dark. The front sensor is the light sensor and dims the mirror auto-crappily whenever it picks up a cars headlights behind you..... which for me was pretty much constantly. Must be my eyes but when it happens I lose all road + surroundings and literally only see two glowing orbs of the cars headlights ><

btalyor218's simple solution of whacking some blu-tack over the front sensor fixed it nicely :rolleyes:

I too didn't know that the "little black thing" near the interior lights was the climate control sensor, thanks again btayler........ of course it doesn't help when my Jeep dealer specifically said to me on purchase "Oh that thing.... that's your uConnect Mic" :wall:

[btalyor218]

btalyor218's simple solution of whacking some blu-tack over the front sensor fixed it nicely :rolleyes:

I can't take credit for this one Mikzor - Fairmont1998 suggested it in a previous post;
As an experiment maybe try covering that sensor next to the on/off button with a blob of blutak or something and see if the mirror stops dimming.

I too didn't know that the "little black thing" near the interior lights was the climate control sensor, thanks again btayler........ of course it doesn't help when my Jeep dealer specifically said to me on purchase "Oh that thing.... that's your uConnect Mic" :wall:

It's always good to know that the dealers have had extensive training in the products they're selling :lol: There's so many little things about the car that is 'useful information', that the dealers don't even know about

I found this one out through experimenting - hold your finger over the top of the sensor & feel the temperature drop from the air con!

And another cool little experiment (if your up for some cheap thrills - which I am) in the middle of the day make sure your lights are on Auto, and cup your hands over the round dome in the middle of the dash near the windscreen, and after 8 seconds your headlights lights turn on! (I already knew this was the light sensor - it's just fun to do)

And the dealer had no idea about the window down feature (found this out from the manual) - for those that don't know, press your unlock button on the key once to unlock the car, then press it again and hold it - VIOLA!! your front windows will be going down! I asked the dealer for a 'window up feature' - so when you lock the car the windows go up, and they had no idea it had a 'window down feature'! :wall:

[fairmont1998]

Tried the window down feature. Didn't work :(
No mention of it in my manual either that I could find. I wonder if the dealer can enable it on a MY12.

[Mikzor]

I can't take credit for this one Mikzor - Fairmont1998 suggested it in a previous post;


Oops sorry, Thanks Fairmont1998!

And the dealer had no idea about the window down feature (found this out from the manual) - for those that don't know, press your unlock button on the key once to unlock the car, then press it again and hold it - VIOLA!! your front windows will be going down!

Awesome! I didn't know that one and It worked just fine on my '11 Limited. That's going to be a very handy feature when walking back to a hot car when shopping!

[CibbyDoc]

Fairmont1998 you might have the first key press set to unlock drivers door only. If you disable that, it should work then. My nephew had the same feature enabled on his 2wd model and this was the fix for it.

Hope it works for you.

Regs Doc

[fairmont1998]

Hey Doc, I have it set so one press unlocks all doors. Tried both settings when I tried the window trick just in case and it made no difference.

[KKnut]

I tried this remote window down trick when this thread was current with zero success, well blow me down its working now! My reaction was holy shi*! The KK still surprises or maybe the dealer finally loaded the function incidentally during a recent service???

[CibbyDoc]

Jeep.....the car that keeps on giving, really handy in summer, I use it heaps.

Sent from my GT-P6810 using Tapatalk 2

[KKnut]

The penny dropped tonight as to why it just started working - I had disconnected the battery over Sunday night to recharge it (battery is dying), so I'm thinking that has reset the vehicle's computer. Go figure that this would happen at the start of winter...

[CibbyDoc]

It must be one of those jeep things, now you just have to make sure you don't do it by mistake just before it rains, if its not one thing it's another ;-)

[jackaroo100]

Hi KKnut
How does remote window trick work?
Cheers
jackaroo100

[Mikzor]

Press the unlock door button once, then press and hold it a second time and the front drivers and passenger windows will wind down.

[banky]

This feature is not specific to jeep, 94 vr6 golf will down all the windows if you hold the key in unlock position on the door. Also years ago when I was working as an autospark, we used to enable windows up feature when turning the alarm on, although this was mainly with mongoose alarms. So stands to reason if there's an auto down function there must be an auto up function.