Hooking an LED light bar up to the factory fog light wiring
 

I have a light bar that pulls 8.2 amps. Since I removed my Hella fog lights, can I just wire it into the factory fog light harness? I had my Hella's wired into them and I forget what amps they pulled. Anyone know? The relays and fuses are already in place, so I don't want to buy a new harness.

Attachment 320238

LEDs tend to usually pull less current than halogen bulbs, but if its a rather large light bar then I'd check to see what the old lights pulled. You might burn something up running something that draws too much current. If the old lights pulled the same or more then you should be fine.

The old Hella's pulled about 4.5 amps each. My new light bar is a 20" and it has one output wire group red and black.. so I'm wondering if I just hook up one side of the previous fog lights or should I connect both of the positives from the left and right and go into the single red?

LED Lightbar
 

Tony,

I did exactly what you are considering. I have a 30" Rigid dual row bar on my '99. Hooked it directly into the plug from one of the factory fog lights, has worked fine many nights out in the dez.

Nice clean XJ by the way.

Kevin

Thanks Kevin.. do you remember what side wire you used.. drive or pass?

If you are worried about the draw just add one extra relay that is triggered off of the foglight wiring, and pulls power direct from the battery for the led bar.

Just to be on the safe I'd I'd definitely wire in a relay. You don't want to run the risk of burning up a wire in the OEM harness.

It'd be super simple to wire a relay triggered by the fog light harness. (Like Heydockyle mentioned)

I did that and found that I didn't like the fact that I couldn't operate the high beams and light bar at the same time.

I'm redoing all that install with a new light bar this weekend so I'll pull the OEM foglight switch and wire it so that it works on switched power rather than depending on power from the headlights.

I do like it being independent from the headlights so I could turn it on with having them on. I think its basically one red wire that I can undo from my headlight harness and connect that to 12v switched power.

I ran off my KC wiring harness when I installed my 11". Mine is on a relay and switch, but the voltage to the switch is triggered by the high beams.

On most vehicles, the running lamps and/or (depending on the logic) low beams are what send the voltage to the switch. From the switch it flips a relay and energizes the fog circuit.

I run almost everything off of relays...mainly because I've been going from incandescent or halogen to led.

Attachment 320237

LED Lightbar
 

Tony,

I picked up the drivers side plug. I just made a jumper with the plug to match the stock plug and one to match the plug on my light bar. Like I said lots of miles on this setup with no issues.

Wait till you see how much light these LEDs put out, there great.

Kevin

LED Lightbar
 

Also good point about being able to use the lightbar without the headlights. I have not had the need to do that, The stock headlights suck so bad anytime I am offroad at night the bar is on. Oh well I guess now I need to save for the Truck-lite LED headlights.

Kevin

The Putco harness and H4's helped mine out alot.. also helps that the harness is powered from the battery so I feel better about pulling 12v off of that vs the factory setup which runs through the headlight switch.

I've got the Olympus Off Road LED bulbs with H4 housings on mine. It definitely threw more light out there (I could actually tell the difference between high and low beams for a change versus the sealed housing that the Jeep left the factory with in '99).

I've always just ran my "driving lights" switched off the high beams. Never been bothered by DPS for running down the road at night with them on. My KC's on my old pickup would freeze a deer in the middle of the road 1.5 miles away.