2020 Tacoma TRD - Details for License Plate Disabling harness with Aux option

Hello,
I am interested in purchasing the "Tacoma 2016 - 2023 License Plate Light DIR (Disable In Reverse)" harness with the "With Aux Output" option. I would like to use the aux output line to power a single SSC1 Yellow Pro Flush Mount LED Pod. Before purchasing the harness, could you confirm if the harness would be able to provide the necessary 20 watts to power the SSC1 Pod LED without stressing the vehicle's reverse light circuits?

Is the Aux Output line providing power directly from the battery or is it sharing power from another circuit?


Thanks

 

Aux output is on the parking light circuits what no longer feeds the plate bulbs now feeds an aux weatherpack output. It’s meant for easy integration with a hitchpod or use as a relay trigger.

I generally use 1A as the max load to add within safety margins, so Sport would be there, Pro is a bit over at 1.5A. But that’s just a number I picked, no science or testing.

Bottom line, I’d probably want a relay and draw off the battery for this. But I also don’t think you will blow the parking light fuse with the extra load and if it’s only on for short periods while in reverse then I don’t think you’ll have major heat problems with the OEM wire to the plate light intercept. But it is technically more than I’d advise, more than I’d feel comfortable with.

 

I kind of thought that it might be pushing it with the pro model as well but wanted to get your two cents. I'll rethink my design, thanks for the details.

 

Thanks for sharing! Yeah, I recently changed the bulbs to LEDs and now they cause a bigger glare. I did come across the glare blockers in my search but I am more interested in disabling the license plate lights. It seemed a little more OEM solution to me. Since I was going to use the SSC1 light as a chase light and I already plan to work on the light circuit, i figured I minus well disable the license plates as well with daveeasa's harness.

 

OP, if you change all your TAIL lamps to LED then you'd have no issues for the added SSC1.

 

That’s a relevant / salient point. Changing the 4 reds to VLED LED and then the plate lights to LED as well should reduce current draw on the parking circuit. Which would then be usable for the aux load in reverse.

@Puppypunter has a nice option for that and I think knows the numbers for halogen bulb parking circuit current draw vs LED.

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/full-c-tail-light-conversions.828827/

 

@BlkTaco20 When the license plate lights are off, you have an extra 10W about there, so that will help for sure. If you really wanted to replace the (4) 7443 taillight bulbs, you’d gain over 20W of headroom with that, which puts you well into safe territory. Just be sure to select an LED bulb without built in resistors. They are usually advertised as “error correcting” or “CANBUS friendly” or something along those lines. You may need to add resistance back in to the turn circuit though.

 

@caribe makaira, I did not account for that, thanks for the heads up.

@daveeasa and @Puppypunter thanks for the details, this makes it much easier in that case.