Stealth Light bar

Thanks. Yeah I want to move that direction as well but $$$.

Hm, I guess I'm not following. I feel like moving the light further off the mounts would make it worse. Like for example, If I removed the front bumper completely, I think there would still be light bounce. Not sure the issue is with the bumper or little grill in front of it. Seems like an issue with the bracket, needs a redesign.

 

Take a flashlight, and bounce it every so slightly. The light moves but doesn’t flicker.

Now put something small in front of that flashlight, and bounce it again. Anything in front of the light is going to cause more interruption to the light output than just the light moving around.

I agree the bracket sucks, I went through two of them before I got one that allowed a level install of my light bar.

 

Ahh I see what you're saying. Makes sense.

 

I had to make my own brackets since I have a 2006. I havent done much driving with the light on but I only got it like a week ago

 

Question.

How do I wire this so it actuates with the fog lights on and off and not drilling holes in my fire wall or mounting a gaudy switch in my brand new truck.

 

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/lightbar-wiring-to-fog-lights.383072/

 

Beauty! Thanks!

 

That link only shows you how to substitute your light bar for your fog lights. What I'm looking for is a way to wire the light bar such that when the fog lights turn on the light bar actuates at the same time. I DO NOT want to substitute nor do I want a cheap looking switch installed in my cab. I also know that the light bar pulls alot more power than the fogs so they can't be run on the same circuit. Is there a signal wire that i could splice in to to initiate the light bar but still run the power off the battery as per the installation instructions. TIA.

 

Simply hardwire the relay trigger/signal wire to the fog lamp circuit. However, you *Should* install a switch in that circuit, and there are reasonably close to OEM switches available from several vendors.

 

Why would you want to wire a high beam product to the fog lights? In cases when you need your fog lights for poor weather, you don’t want high beams as they will be blinding to yourself in fog. Instead I would wire it to the high beams.

 

Simply, hah, all things relative to the user. I'm not an electrician... if you have pictures that would be swell.

Side note; does this require drilling through my fire wall AND can it be wired to a switch but still turn on and off with the automatic lights BUT also stay off if the switch is in the off position (not sure why I'd do this outside of driving around the city where it doesn't serve the need to have it (light bar) on).

 

Can't argue with a good argument... how does this change the wiring question?

 

The trigger wire just needs to tap the high beam positive instead of the fog positive.

 

Do you have a diagram of this wire or can describe which one it is. I've looked on a few threads on this website and no one has good explanation or diagram (just chicken scratch on lined paper).

 

Get you a test light. Cheap and easy to use. You can find the positive wire this way

 

my teachers always said, "there's never a dumb question," well lets test that theory. So I used my multimeter and some fancy wiring, with low beams on the "red" & "white" wires both show 12V (11.84V on the "white") running through them and with the high beams on "red" "pink" & "white" all show 12V (11.84V on the "white" again).

So, question is, am I making too many assumptions that its as easy as splicing the signal wire on my light bar to the pink wire (and the power lead on the light bar directly to the battery)?

 

There's a few easy ways to tap into the highbeam (or lowbeam) headlamp circuit. You can use either a "T-tap" to tie directly into the pigtail nesr the highbeam plug, and use this as your signal/trigger wire lead (which you should add a fused link to, then run a wire to a switch in reach of you in the drivers seat, e.g. in an unused facotry switch filler plate, and then return the other side of the switch to the relay [you want the fuse before the wire goes through the firewall to protect the headlamp circuit if the wire gets chafed at any point]). Or you can do the same thing in the fuse box with an "add-a-fuse" pigtail. The relay trigger circuit does not need to be heavy wire, 22ga is sufficient, and it does not need to be as large a fuse as the headlamp circuit fuse it is piggybacking on. Relays typically need less than half an amp to switch and stay closed, so a 2.5A fuse is fine for this purpose and should protect the headlamp circuit. Then you need to tie in to the positive terminal of the battery, and run a fused link before the power-in leg of the relay with sufficient enough wire gauge and fuse size for the intended light bar, then run the ground side of the switching terminals of the relay to chassis ground, and then run your power/switched lead to your lightbar, then the ground leg of the lightbar either back to the batteries negative terminal, or to a good chassis ground.

Having a switch in the circuit is always a good idea. You don't always want your auxiliary Highs to come on with the highbeams (e.g. courtesy flashing in traffic) and depending in your state, it is likely not legal/able to pass your vehicle inspection.

You can choose to drill a new hole in your firewall if you really want to (and make sure to use a grommet to protect the wires passing through the sheetmetal from chafing), or you can look to see where the OEM harnesses do this, and when you find a suitable exiwting one, can use a soft piece of plastic, like weed whacker line (I would cut it, then hit the end with a file or some sandpaper to round off any potentially sharp edges) to carefully feed through the wire harness. Then whe you see it on the inside of the footwell, you can simply attach your two small gauge wires to this with electrical tape, and pull them through. Get your switch arrangement figured out, leave a small amount of wire as slack, tucked and secured out of the way, and then run the rest of the wire where you find safe and convenient in the engine bay.