Heated Mirror - on all the time (1999-323i)

On all the cars I've had with heated mirrors, they come on with the ignition. None have felt exactly hot, but they should certainly feel warm. Mike.

Yes, they are quite warm whenever the ignition is on. Maybe your old ones were malfunctioning.

Tom K.

Thanks Mike and Tom.

Maybe my old ones were not working properly, I agree. But now they're HOT, not "warm". Is this normal? I'm a bit concerned if there's a serious electrical problem.

I know on some cars, it is activated by the rear window defroster - I cannot say what method bimmer uses tho.

I wouldn't worry too much about it if they're both the same. If they are, I can't see that two new ones would have the same fault, so perhaps they are supposed to be warmer than one would expect. As long as they don't blow fuses or melt the mirror housings...... :-) Mike.

BMW heated mirrors are typically turned on automatically based on outside air temperature. Same goes for the heated door locks. However, as another poster suggested, the heating elements in some cars are also activated by the defroster button. I'm not sure of which models do that.

If it's 80 degrees outside and the heating elements are active something is wrong. Have a tech (preferably one with a GT1 analyzer) look at it.

-Doug

On the OP's early E46, the mirrors are heated whenever the ignition is on.

Nope - that was the BMW design. Hopefully the E90 and other newer models have some sort of temp sensor, but the 1999 E46 didn't.

Tom K.

And I'm amazed they're still working. ;-)

Thanks all for your comments.

I've detached the mirrors and saw two wires for each mirror. I wonder, if I can wire either a switch for it or somehow wire to the rear window defog switch. Do you think it's dangerous? I don' really understand why it's so hard for BMW to have such switch, and that's why I think my initial mirrors got bad spots within a few years and must be broken -- they weren't even warm. And it's really unnecessary when it's 90 degree outside and these mirrors are heated -- and hot.

No problem Dave, I just switch off the ignition when going downhill to save the mirrors. :-)

Tom K.