Hella Lights wiring questions

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canuck37
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Hella Lights wiring questions

Post by canuck37 »

Help! I am not an auto electrician and need some help deciphering the instructions that came with a set of Hella lights I bought.

Here's the deal: I want to hook them up so they operate seperately from any other light circuit. The instructions only tell me how to hook them up either into the parking plus either the high or low beam circuits. Has anyone installed Hella lights as stand alone lights this way??

Can I just go straight to the battery for positive lead (including the inline fuse here) and ground them to the chassis for negative lead, with the switch on "hot" line and not use the relay?? Honestly, I have done this before on other vehicles when the light kit did not come with a wiring harness and not had a problem. I am unsure of the purpose of the relay.

If I have to use the relay, can anyone walk me through which leads go to which of the 4 pins on the relay? I realize you can't see the wiring diagram, but it basically has the fused hot lead from the battery going to 1 pin, 1 pin has 2 leads going to it - 1 for each of the 2 lights: 1 for either the high/low beam circuit line and the last pin goes to the switch. The other lead from the switch goes to the parking light circuit.

Can I just leave off the 2 leads for the other circuits and they will work, if I have the hot lead and lamp lead going to the correct pins as stated in the instructions? I would need to know which pin to run the line to the lights from and how to place the switch into this whole circuit arrangement.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!! Thanks,
stefan
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Post by stefan »

I would not run straight from the battery- for 2 reasons- #1- no voltage regulation (other than the inline fuse)- now this is not too important as the light are not gonna be a HUGE voltage drain- but I think you will notice a bit of decreased intensity when the vehicle is idling (vs up to speed). #2 Accidental battery drain- If you leave the lights on (or they accidentally get switched on) there gonna leave you with a dead battery (yea yea yea- but won't I notice them on?) I can't tell you the number of time I give free jumpstarts to people that leave their "hardwired" stuff on by accident-
I would try to tap off the fuse box- That way at least your lights would turn off when you shut off the vehicle- plus you should gain at least a little Voltage regulation (I think I would probably tap off that stupid Parking Light circut that runns to the steering column- and by taping in at the fuse box- you should be able to run the lights regardless of the parking light switch position)- Just my 2¢
canuck37
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Yikes.....

Post by canuck37 »

OK, well, after hours of Internet searching and seeing lots of other folks complain about the Hella wiring diagrams in various places, I am still stumped. I have accepted the fact that I should use the relay, in the absence of heavier gauge wiring, which I was going to use if I wired them directly.

Having said that, I have only found 1 posting anywhere talking about how to wire these lights without having to go through at least the parking light circuits.

It seems that most of these relays have common terminal numbers, which are as below:

#30 - Fused hot line (red) to battery + pole.
#87 - Line out (black) to lights - combined for the 2.
#86 - Line out (yellow) to one side of the switch
#85 - Line out (blue) to ground

The other switch line (green) goes to the parking light circuit. I guess this is where the relay gets its power from. One fellow stated that taking this green line and running it back to an always-on hot line someplace off the fusebox would make this setup work without using the other light circuits. Does this sound correct? Could I run it back to the (red) line from the battery instead?

Do any of you Subie pros have a thought on this? I don't want to fry anything. Adding to everything, I have 2 sets of lights I am installing, so I will have 2 switches and 2 seperate circuits to set up.

This stuff sure is confusing.......HELP!! PLEASE??
mbaksic
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Post by mbaksic »

Ok, here's how I would do it to use the relay, which is a MUST in my opinion to get everything to work correctly. One pin to the battery, hot all the time. One chassis ground. One that you can split to the two lites. Then the last one is a 12 volt input that actually turns the relay on and off. Hook up this wire, fused through a switch, to something that goes off with the ignition switch. You can use something like the power outlet wire. So you would run a wire from the power outlet, fuse it, then run it to the switch, through the switch and out to the relay. That should make it work fine, as the switch is only using a very small amount of current to control the relay. A relay uses a small amount of current to control a larger consumer of current. Thats why you see so many relays in a car now. That way you don't have to run very heavy wires all over, you can control heavy users with lite wiring. Then, if you forget to turn off the light switch, it will automatically go off with the ignition so you don't kill the battery. I have always used the relay when I hook up extra lites, and have never had a problem at all. I will use this method on my Baja someday when I figure out where to put the extra lites. Hope this helps, if you have anymore questions, don't be afraid to ask. [smilie=fixtit.gif] Mike
canuck37
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Thanks, Mike!

Post by canuck37 »

Wow, that's the best info I have received yet, Mike. I think that jives pretty much with what I found from the chap who advocated using the green line that is dedicated to the parking light circuit in the wiring diagram, and running it to a power source. Good to have confirmation!!

A further question - you talk about using the "power outlet" line. I have an 03 and no power outlet that I know of. Can you point me, in layman's terms, to a line I could easily access to tie into for power? I was thinking that I could go back to the battery itself directly, would that not work? Otherwise, being a noob at this stuff, I need pretty easy to follow directions to find a suitable line. Also, remember I am hooking up 2 sets of lights, so can I use the same plan and power line for the 2nd relay??

Thanks so much for your time and help on this and for bearing with me!

Fraser
mbaksic
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Post by mbaksic »

Fraser, by the power outlet, I meant the cigarette lighter. Its already fused, so its safe to use. And it goes off with the ignition, so the lights will automatically go off when you turn the key to off. You don't need to add another relay, just tie the two wires together before you hook them up to the relay. It should work just fine. Remember, when using a relay, you are powering the lights off of the battery when the switch and relay are on, so it won't draw too much power and fry the switch. I don't know about using the parking lite wire, sometimes the factory has power runnin to the lights all the time, and grounds them through the switch to turn them on and off. If this is the case with the Baja, and I haven't tried it so I don't know, you would have power at the relay terminal all the time, so the lights could always be on, even with the key off. Using the lighter to power up the switch should be an easy way to do it. And you will never have to worry about the lights being on when the vehicle is off. Mike
Even though I work on Dodges, I don't own one.
canuck37
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Followup

Post by canuck37 »

Mike - can I email you offline to discuss this a bit further? I would like to send you a schematic of what I am thinking of to look at (can do it in WORD or PDF).

My email is daloon53@yahoo.com......
mbaksic
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Post by mbaksic »

Yes, you can email me offline at mbaksic@hotmail.com. Just make sure that you put something about the Baja wiring in the title, cause I know that it will end up in my junk mail folder, and I will have to pick it out. I may not get back to you until Monday, I will be out of town for the weekend. Mike
Even though I work on Dodges, I don't own one.
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