LED help!!! Almost lit my truck on fire

Im going to, just making sure. The gauge wire on the fuse holder doesnt have to match the gauge wire I'm using does it?

 

I am curious, did you connect the LEDs in series, or in parallel?

 

correct.

 

I only connected one before it screwed up, but Im planning on running them using the wagos

 

lol don't get him started on that lol

 

Not necessarily, but I personally wouldn't use less than 16 gauge wire in a vehicle. Most fuse holders are going to have 14 or 16 coming out of them and will be fine for what you are doing. I would use 16 gauge wire and a 5 amp fuse. A 3 amp would be even better if you could find one. Can't imagine these leds are going to pull more than an amp.

 

Depending on how many he has wired up.

Parallel wiring you add the current.
A blue LED drive current is typically 30 to 50ma.
10 of them will only be a max of 1/2 amp... how many does he have? That's a key piece of information.

Personally, I won't use anything smaller than 18ga in a vehicle simply because of durability. Yes, the factory uses 22 and 24 gauge wire, but the factory harness is not draped over parts, zip-tied to brake lines, and hanging free across 2ft of engine compartment.



On the switch... ya, it is lighted, so the switch needs a ground. Of course, from the eBay listing, we don't know which terminal is which.
I'd have to attack it with my multimeter to figure out which terminal is supposed to be what.
OP definitely ran a direct short... hopefully it didn't fry the switch, but if the wire continued burning even after he flipped the switch, it likely welded the contacts and blew the switch.

 

So on the switch wire the wire from the positive on the battery to the +. Wire the positive from the leds to the A. And wire the negative from the battery to the ground symbol. Then ground the leds somewhere on the frame. Using a in line fuse holder thing on the positive wire in between the battery and the switch??

 

The whats?

Please tell me that you aren't planning to run these as wig-wags.

Please... find someone local who knows WTF they're doing to help you out before you damage something major.
It is not hard to blow the ECU in these trucks.

 

yes. There is no reason to go all the way to the battery with either the ground wire from the switch or with the led's ground wire. Any clean metal body part will do just fine. The negative terminal of the battery is connected to the trucks body and frame already.

 

These: http://www.oznium.com/quick-wire-splice-connector

Should I not use these?

 

You made a heater with that wiring job. Always always use a fuse. Never wire anything to your truck without fusing it.

 

Positive on the battery DIRECTLY TO THE FUSE HOLDER!
The fuse should be as close to the battery as possible to prevent a repeat of what just happened.

Fuse holder to the input on the switch, output of the switch to the positive on the LEDs.
Negative of the LEDs to the frame or battery ground.

Test the system like this to be safe. If it works, then connect the ground on the switch to the frame or battery ground... but I seriously suspect you frakked your switch when you shorted the wiring.

 

Okay...
I thought you were referring to a cop-styel wig-wag circuit.

No, those terminal blocks are fine. We actually use Wago products on traffic signal communications equipment. This is the first time I've heard a consumer refer to a Wago product.

 

Thanks, so using a ring terminal connect the fuse holder to the positive on the battery first

 

Yeah, me too. I'd pickup another switch before trying this again. Not worth the hassle.

 

I don't care about the switch, ill gladly get a new one thats not lighted just to make it a little easier. Im just glad I didn't destroy my truck.

 

All the stuff you are using is fine. The wire is fine too. This is a dummy-proof drawing of how it all needs to be wired. I only drew 4 led's in the schematic... if you have more or less thats fine it wont make a difference, just wire them identical to how this shows and it will all work fine. Your switch may be fried though but we wont know that till you re-wire it and see what happens. Worse case you blow the fuse and you know something is wrong.

 

Wait I thought you wire the A pin on the switch to the positive of the leds?

 

the "a+" and "A" on my drawing might be backwards. If the light on the swith lights up when the switch is turned off, the switch the wires connected to a+ and A. I dont have the switch to test so im just going off what people are saying. Dont worry, if it is backwards, nothing bad will happen except the light on the switch will act weird. Whatever you do though, DO NOT connect either of those to ground, and MAKE SURE that the gold pin or that third one with the ground label is connected to ground. Your fuse is THE MOST IMPORTANT PART of this. It will prevent a repeat of what already happened.