300E rear foglight- have I or haven't I?
 

Trying to work out why the rear foglight in my '91 300E doesn't work.

It has the orange bulb in the light selector knob for the foglight but doesn't light up when I pull it all the way out (saw there was a tiny bulb in there, not sure if it's burned out though).

On inspection as suggested on the forum I do have the extra fog light bulb in the left (drivers) side rear cluster which appears to be fine.

Any ideas?

My bulb on the headlight switch was burned out too...

And you pull out two clicks to activate the rear fog. A single click activates the fronts only.

If you pull two clicks, the orange light on the switch should glow, and the rear fog bulb illiminates.

I pulled it out 2 clicks- the orange light does not come on and no rear fog light on.

I don't think any US bound Mercedes had this rear fog light feature installed. although the switch has 2 detents like the European cars do.
No legal in America in those years.
jackD

weird- the bulb is even installed.
was anything useful legal in those days?

I have a 1991 300E and the rear fog works and so does the switch light.

Haasman

the plot thickens...

i don't suppose the bulb in the switch being burnt out has anything to do with the operation of the actual fog light?

I guess I'll mention it to my tech as I'm in for an oil change soon.

Yes, the US 300E's have the rear fog light. So did the S-Class of that era. The 190's did not have it. This is a valuable safety feature when driving in the rain. It makes it easier for the guy following you to see you. Too bad everyone doesn't have it. I think it's mandatory in Scandinavia.

Nope. Should still operate despite a burnt-out bulb...

300E rear fog
 

'91 was the first year for the rear fog light in US model 124. Prior to that the wire for them was not in the harness.

This is just a guess.. But is there a specific fuse for the rear fog light? And if there is, could that be the culprit?

It is mandatory in Scandinavia. And it's a great thing when your driving in very hard rain or fog with 30 ft. visibility.
But it's NOT great that everybody turns these annoying lights on whenever they see a slight mist in the distance, so when driving in heavy traffic you get blinded by them and have much harder determining if the cars in front of you is braking or not..

When we've had foggy weather you always see wrecks of 'rear-enders' parked roadside. And a common theory is that it's the fog lights that are causing most of the accidents -not the fog!

Freestyler