Auxiliary driving lights.

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dirtautoguy

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I drive my truck in the dark fairly often, and in nasty weather. It’s a wt model with the sealed beam headlights. I have replaced them with units from headlight revolution and 55/100watt h4 bulbs. I have also ran a wire harness so that the headlights draw power directly from the battery instead of through the switch.

They are better than stock but they still do not hold a candle to my 2011 Silverados headlights. So I found some led driving lights that have a hi/low beam that I want to mount on the grill guard tabs.

In my head I had this idea that I could use a add a circuit fuse to the hi/low beam fuses and use them so that I could use the factory dimmer to switch with my headlights. I also wanted to run a switch on the negative side and use as a override function to turn them off.

As a preliminary investigation I don’t believe my truck has seperate fuses for hi/low beams. I know I could wire them up to two seperate relays and put them on a 3 way switch but I would like them to just work with my headlight dimmer.

I absolutely hate those scotch lock clip deals. If there was a weatherproof way to T off the harnness I added I would be ok with that.

Does anyone have any other ideas for hooking these up?
 

98chevy2500SS

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AuroraGirl

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Why not get LED replacement headlights? I got these Auxbeam ones for my W/T grille swap: www.amazon.com/Auxbeam-Headlights-Headlamp-Headlight-Wrangler/dp/B07MRB4R3D/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=auxbeam+5x8&qid=1640929530&sr=8-2. Nice cut off line so they won't blind people, and wide light spread. I don't think you'll need any aux lighting by the time you get these. ;)

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your light appears too heavy in foreground 1) is it the only light on low or.. 2) if thats an H4 plug did you convert 9005/9006 wiring to h4 or did you have H4 harness (IM not sure what the 1 bulb fixture per side gmt 400 had)

If its high beams I think youre looking at aim or possible upside down maybe or both bright and low are illuminated. The foreground being bright like that is detrimental for far away
 

Frank Enstein

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Wire the new light's relays off the relays you already have.

I make the assumption that your relays terminal 30 sends power to the current (no pun intended) headlamps.

Terminal 30 from headlight relays feed power to terminal 86 of aux lights.

Terminal 85 from aux lights to ground through override switch.

Terminal 87 to aux bulbs

Terminal 30 to self resetting circuit breakers then to 12v+

Terminal 87A ignore. That one is connected to terminal 30 when the relay is not activated.

Favorite relays: VIA-80238 from Summitracing.com I usually send a link but the website is down.
 

Caman96

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I drive my truck in the dark fairly often, and in nasty weather. It’s a wt model with the sealed beam headlights. I have replaced them with units from headlight revolution and 55/100watt h4 bulbs. I have also ran a wire harness so that the headlights draw power directly from the battery instead of through the switch.

They are better than stock but they still do not hold a candle to my 2011 Silverados headlights. So I found some led driving lights that have a hi/low beam that I want to mount on the grill guard tabs.

In my head I had this idea that I could use a add a circuit fuse to the hi/low beam fuses and use them so that I could use the factory dimmer to switch with my headlights. I also wanted to run a switch on the negative side and use as a override function to turn them off.

As a preliminary investigation I don’t believe my truck has seperate fuses for hi/low beams. I know I could wire them up to two seperate relays and put them on a 3 way switch but I would like them to just work with my headlight dimmer.

I absolutely hate those scotch lock clip deals. If there was a weatherproof way to T off the harnness I added I would be ok with that.

Does anyone have any other ideas for hooking these up?
These Posi-Taps are SAE certified.
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dirtautoguy

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so i did some investigation. I rediscovered that the harness I used to convert it to draw power from the battery only used one headlight connector as a trigger for the relays that provide power to the headlights. that means that I had a connector on the driver side not being used. so today I wired the lights hi/low beam into the vacant headlight hook up with spade terminals and inline fuses.

I did not run the ground in to the cab yet because I don't have the switch Id like to use and I had a new years dinner with my family. so that will be a next week deal. I'll probably get a h4 male pigtail and wire them that way as I think it will give a better connection overall.

I think i will really like the lights it was to light outside to really see what kind of light the put out so I still need to aim them too. they have a 2 wires for hi/lo and then one ground. I am playing with the idea of putting a relay in so that when its on hi beam it powers both the low and hi circuits on the aux lights. I havent sat down and thought about how it would work but I like that idea.

when I replaced the harness, bulbs, and headlight housings I looked into LEDs pretty hard but had a hard time going with them as DOT ones were pretty spendy and I was afraid cheaper ones would not perform well. and as the primary light source I needed them to be dependable. the other thing that steered me away from led housings was that from what i researched they did not get as warm on the lense side. right or wrong in Wyoming we get lots of snow and I had read that people had issues with them getting plugged with snow especially because they are recessed into the grille. thats why I went away from led housings.

I have never seen those positaps maybe Ill try them sometime.
 

df2x4

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the other thing that steered me away from led housings was that from what i researched they did not get as warm on the lense side. right or wrong in Wyoming we get lots of snow and I had read that people had issues with them getting plugged with snow especially because they are recessed into the grille.

Just FYI, some of the more high end manufacturers now offer 5"x7" LED housings with heated lenses to eliminate this problem. Here's some from JW Speaker for example. You can see the heater grid in the lens, kind of looks like a defroster in a car window.

https://www.jwspeaker.com/products/led-headlights-model-8910-evolution-2/
 

4L80

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I have the JW Speakers in my '93 Cheyenne, super easy install, look as close to stock as you are going to get, light is fantastic especially high beam, unique DRL, and the lens heater works great this winter in Ontario, Canada.
 

98chevy2500SS

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your light appears too heavy in foreground 1) is it the only light on low or.. 2) if thats an H4 plug did you convert 9005/9006 wiring to h4 or did you have H4 harness (IM not sure what the 1 bulb fixture per side gmt 400 had)

If its high beams I think youre looking at aim or possible upside down maybe or both bright and low are illuminated. The foreground being bright like that is detrimental for far away
My phone's camera kinda exaggerates the light distance of the low beams. I cut my 9005/9006 plugs out and wire in the H4 connectors. The headlights will include new H4 plugs so I just used those instead of using the old plugs off the donor truck.
 

AuroraGirl

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My phone's camera kinda exaggerates the light distance of the low beams. I cut my 9005/9006 plugs out and wire in the H4 connectors. The headlights will include new H4 plugs so I just used those instead of using the old plugs off the donor truck.
So you have a single dual filament bulb type?
 
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