Wiring Aux LED light bar directly into the hi-beam on Matryx

[mxz900]

I'd like to hook up my aux light bar directly into the hi-beam wiring. Is this possible with a Rigid that uses the Deutsch connector that normally goes to a switch with 3 connectors like this?

Instead of using this rocker switch it would be nice to tap into the hi-beam switch, but that would only be one wire (I assume). One of the 3 must be a ground so just find an ideal location for that one. How do I connect the other 2? And which wire is the hi-beam under the hood?

 

[OnlyPolaris]

There is only 2 wires on the light bar that you need to hook up, one power, one ground. Do you have e-start? If so easiest would be to wire up a relay that is triggered by the high beam switch. Light bar would be wired direct to battery. You could just splice into the high beam wire but I don't think the wiring and circuit would be heavy enough to support both the headlight and a light bar.

 

[Fosgate]

3 post switch, should be 2 travelers (positive, negative) and a ground. The switch itself is the dimmer by each position within the switch being of a different resistance to the electrical load. You can find a wiring diagram in the service manual. If you don't want to buy the manual you'll want to buy a multimeter with decent test leads that will allow access to the shielded connecting points in the wiring harness. In all honesty for the cost of the manual or the multimeter and leads you need, it would probably be more cost effective to have a competent dealership do it for you if you can't find the diagram for free.

 

[chevy_man]

3 post switch, should be 2 travelers (positive, negative) and a ground. The switch itself is the dimmer by each position within the switch being of a different resistance to the electrical load. You can find a wiring diagram in the service manual. If you don't want to buy the manual you'll want to buy a multimeter with decent test leads that will allow access to the shielded connecting points in the wiring harness. In all honesty for the cost of the manual or the multimeter and leads you need, it would probably be more cost effective to have a competent dealership do it for you if you can't find the diagram for free.

That's the most wrong thing I've read this month. You should take your sled to a competent dealer for wiring if you think that's how it works.


Switch is all positives. Power into switch, high out and low out. Grounds all just go back to the chassis.
Switch should have zero resistance, you get high and low beam by the lamp/reflectors in the headlight.


I would suggest a relay, and using the high beam to trigger the relay coil.

 

[wolf]

That switch should be controlling the coil (low power) side of the relay. One terminal is power in from a battery (highly recommended) or regulated stator power. The second terminal is power out to the relay and the third switch terminal is a ground that allows the switch to illuminate when on. I wired mine up with the switch. My brother in law uses the high beam switch. Pick your poison. Again I would run a lithium battery as a surge protector if you don’t have electric start. Find the wire that is going to your high beam bulb that has 12 v when high beam is on and wire that to the pull in side of the coil on the relay. Should be a diagram printed on the coil.

 

[Sheetmetalfab]

The only time I have run into an issue with triggering the relay off the high beam is some vehicles have ground running through the switch instead of power.

Fairly rare but worth being aware of.

 

[Fosgate]

That's the most wrong thing I've read this month. You should take your sled to a competent dealer for wiring if you think that's how it works.


Switch is all positives. Power into switch, high out and low out. Grounds all just go back to the chassis.
Switch should have zero resistance, you get high and low beam by the lamp/reflectors in the headlight.


I would suggest a relay, and using the high beam to trigger the relay coil.

He's not talking 1970's closed headlights that have 3 post connectors (1 neg, 1 high, 1 low)


And your absolutely wrong that twitches are simply all positives. You can pretty much make it do what you want but you have to know which wire is what. You can even wire in a slide dimmer with disco lights if you want (you know, a variable resister switch). All switches are NOT the same simple all positives. Many incorporate resistors and relays in the switch. (coming from a 2 year electronics degree and 4 years military tactical communications and electronics maintainer and made nationals twice at IASCA for building my own kick azz car audio system compete with neon and liquid cooling system).

Again, go buy a $90 manual, $40 plus for a decent ohm meter and leads, put your time in for whatever it's worth to figure out how you want to wire it, understand what you have...or just go drop it off and let someone wire one in for maybe $15-30. I've got the tools and know how to do it myself, but even then, I have better things to do with my time vs how cheap it should be to just drop it off and have a shop do it that has probably wired several of them and can have it done in 10min.

Again to the OP, let someone else make sense of this and save your $$. Did I mention I'm not only good with electronics but I'm good with basic math/accounting and time management too?

 

[mxz900]

I have electric start so access to a battery for power. I am swapping this light bar between my SXS in the summer and my sled in the winter thus the reason I am using a larger than needed 10" E Series Rigid bar. With the larger light I am concerned about pulling too much power from anything I tap into and causing issues. Is this something I need to be worried about? I can wire this using the toggle switch that will come with a new wiring harness I am going to need since I am not pulling that off the SXS, but was hoping it was a doable exercise to just tap into the hi-beam instead of cutting a hole in my dash and having a separate switch. I am not schooled in electronics and actually hate working on anything electrical, but am mechanical enough to do it with a little direction from an expert. I am going to search for a manual and expect I will just buy one as I just got this sled and expect to be wrenching on it for a few years. At least I will have the wiring diagram and can go from there.
Thanks for everyone's input.

 

[chevy_man]

He's not talking 1970's closed headlights that have 3 post connectors (1 neg, 1 high, 1 low)


And your absolutely wrong that twitches are simply all positives. You can pretty much make it do what you want but you have to know which wire is what. You can even wire in a slide dimmer with disco lights if you want (you know, a variable resister switch). All switches are NOT the same simple all positives. Many incorporate resistors and relays in the switch. (coming from a 2 year electronics degree and 4 years military tactical communications and electronics maintainer and made nationals twice at IASCA for building my own kick azz car audio system compete with neon and liquid cooling system).

Again, go buy a $90 manual, $40 plus for a decent ohm meter and leads, put your time in for whatever it's worth to figure out how you want to wire it, understand what you have...or just go drop it off and let someone wire one in for maybe $15-30. I've got the tools and know how to do it myself, but even then, I have better things to do with my time vs how cheap it should be to just drop it off and have a shop do it that has probably wired several of them and can have it done in 10min.

Again to the OP, let someone else make sense of this and save your $$. Did I mention I'm not only good with electronics but I'm good with basic math/accounting and time management too?

Yeah, and he wanted to know about the factory switch. Which is a simple spdt. Specifically how to not use the one in the picture.

In case you hadn't noticed, every headlight is still a 3 wire, ground/high/low.


You've overcomplicated it by a lot.

 

[chevy_man]

I have electric start so access to a battery for power. I am swapping this light bar between my SXS in the summer and my sled in the winter thus the reason I am using a larger than needed 10" E Series Rigid bar. With the larger light I am concerned about pulling too much power from anything I tap into and causing issues. Is this something I need to be worried about? I can wire this using the toggle switch that will come with a new wiring harness I am going to need since I am not pulling that off the SXS, but was hoping it was a doable exercise to just tap into the hi-beam instead of cutting a hole in my dash and having a separate switch. I am not schooled in electronics and actually hate working on anything electrical, but am mechanical enough to do it with a little direction from an expert. I am going to search for a manual and expect I will just buy one as I just got this sled and expect to be wrenching on it for a few years. At least I will have the wiring diagram and can go from there.
Thanks for everyone's input.

I myself would wire it on a relay, but with an override switch to turn it off if it's not needed.

Tap into the high beam wire behind the headlight, run it to a toggle, then to relay coil. Skip the toggle and run right to the relay if you have no need for independent control.

Ground other side of coil.

Run fused power to one side of relay contact (common).

Run power from other side of relay contact to light (normally open/ NO).

Ground other lead from light.


This will allow you to turn the LED on/off with high and low beam, while also allowing you to run high beam without the led by turning off the second toggle.


If you use the red backlit toggle from your first picture you'll also need to ground the proper switch terminal if you want the backlight to work.

 

[OnlyPolaris]

I have electric start so access to a battery for power. I am swapping this light bar between my SXS in the summer and my sled in the winter thus the reason I am using a larger than needed 10" E Series Rigid bar. With the larger light I am concerned about pulling too much power from anything I tap into and causing issues. Is this something I need to be worried about? I can wire this using the toggle switch that will come with a new wiring harness I am going to need since I am not pulling that off the SXS, but was hoping it was a doable exercise to just tap into the hi-beam instead of cutting a hole in my dash and having a separate switch. I am not schooled in electronics and actually hate working on anything electrical, but am mechanical enough to do it with a little direction from an expert. I am going to search for a manual and expect I will just buy one as I just got this sled and expect to be wrenching on it for a few years. At least I will have the wiring diagram and can go from there.
Thanks for everyone's input.

So I just looked through my manual and there is no wiring diagrams. But I can tell you the high beam wire is the yellow/red wire. Like said before you will want to wire a relay to your battery and use the high beam wire to trigger the relay. This will allow you to turn the light bar on and off with the high beam switch. If I knew how I would make a diagram and show you.