Wiring reverse lights - thought I had it right

Help me out guys - wired up my lights as shown in the picture, but can't get any light power.

 

If you have have the 7 pin trailer connector you can tap into the wire for the middle pin. I did this with no problems or relay

 

Yea that's what I'm planning to do, except I want to have the ability to turn them on and off without putting the truck in reverse. Thanks!

 

If you are wiring them in to existing wires on your truck make sure to use a diode. It's hard to make out that pic on my phone

 

For that all you need to do is run a positive wire from the battery to a switch then to the positive on the lights you are using. You will need a diode between that wire and the wire you tapped into from the harness so your stock revers lights don't come on

 

As of now, I have everything wired except for the wire from the switch to the reverse lights. Outside of this, does anyone see anything that could be incorrect. I am using a temporary switch I picked up from Advanced Auto while I wait for my SPDT switch from Otrattw to come in.

The only other thing that I can think of is the switch cannot handle the load?

Another question I have is should I change the wire to the switch to be directly from the power source, or can I leave it coming from the inline fuse as shown?

Appreciate the input so far guys!

 

Still not sure why you would tap in to your reverse lights with all that jazz, you don't need to. Either run it standalone or tie the lights directly in to your reverse lights, if you want to use a switch and not have your OEM lights come on (which idk why since it would give you more output) just add a switch in the cab and put a diode in line to the OEM wiring.

 

Well lets start from the begining - tinted my tails, looks great but cant see shit in reverse at night. So no big deal - wire up some reverse lights directly to a switch. So then I pop it in revers at night, then throw the lights on and am good to go. I got to thinking, how convenient would it be if I had them come on when I throw the truck in reverse automatically. Then even more so, how much better would it be if I could put them on like that, but also whenever I wanted to - loading a trailer, the bed, etc.

Browsing TW this is the wiring plan that other people were getting good results with so I thought hell yea let's get 'er done.

Wired her up and dud - no lights. Ran out of time and havent been able to tinker with it since.

So long story short, plan is to be able to throw them on at any time, as well as automatically come on with reverse.

 

Do the lights come on with the switch on? Also are you using a spdt switch? If you are then it would need to be in the bottom position for the lights to come on in reverse and the top for them to come on whenever you want them to.

 

The lights do not come on at all. If you go back to the original diagram I uploaded, i started to think that maybe because I am going directly to the inline fuse and not to the source I may be messing it up (like I said I'm not expert).

When i get off tonight I think I'll try running straight from the on to the battery to see if I get power. If not, I'll be tracing all the wires looking for bad connections.

Any one else's input is appreciated as well!

 

Your relay appears to be wired incorrectly. Try switching pins 30 and 87.

Im on my phone so getting a picture is hard, but on this link there is a picture.

 

The fuse is fine unless you blew it already, but I doubt that.

 

Your battery needs to be in 30, and your rear lights need to be in 87.

do you have the right switch? I would imagine there should be Three wires going into the switch:

Power in from battery for "lights on demand"
Power out
power in from the reverse lights
power out

and there should only be two toggle positions... "on" and "reverse".
that leaves you with:
single pole, double throw switch

unless you want an OFF position too, then go SP Triple throw, your diagram seems to have an "off" position on it but states SPDT. You wont have this "off" position on a SPDT.

 

So turns out running two wires out of the inline fuse is not the way to go. Once undid the splice in the fuse and gave the on position in the switch its own power it works.