harness for aux lights

[Alaskamike]

First of all I want to thank those who have given me wiring advise recently , its really helped.  I am almost done but want one final bit of advice if possible.  Bear with me, as wiring is sometimes difficult to describe exactly.

I have a universal wiring and relay kit from Kuryakyn, and am using it to hook up PIAA driving lights.  My intent is to have the lights function only with an on / off switch, so I have complete control of when I use them – with high or low beams.

I already have an auxiliary fuse panel (eastern Beaver, SC-8) installed.   This is what I intend to do:

 - on the new harness, I’ll put in the headlamp, there are the 4 wires for the lamps, and a hot red to hook to a switched hot (I’m using the running light hot) that goes to the switch on the handlebars.  This side seems easy
-  at the battery end (where my aux fuse panel is) they have a relay with white wire,  instructed to go to the hot battery terminal
- and two black ground wires, one comes from the relay, the other from the lights themselves (the 2 negs from the lights hooked together). 

On the battery side of the harness,
The instructions say to hook the ground wires to neg on battery and the white to Pos on battery.

However, since I have an aux fuse panel, with two always hot hookups (it has 2 unswitched (hot) and 6 switched circuits), I plan to hook up the aux light harness there on the unswitched circuit.

The grounds; I was going to hook the ones from the lights to the auxiliary fuse circuit board, and the one from the relay to a ground on the bike.

Now, I THINK this is right, but would like any input if someone with more experience thinks I’m missing something here.  I hate to do wiring over….

[shortleg]

  If I am reading this right, I think that if you hook the two hot leads to
the unswitched terminals they will always be on. That being said I may be wrong
if the fuse panel only works when the engine is on.
   I think they donot know you have a fuse panel and are
getting to hook it up the best way they know of.  You have the fuse
panel hooked up with a relay useing the aux for a trrigger for the relay right?
                Shortleg[Dave]

[John Schmidt]

You ARE hooking them up to operate separate from the headlight circuit....right? Couldn't tell exactly from your explanation, but sounds like it, which is a good approach. That way if your headlight goes south for some reason, you still have your aux. lights to get you home. Murphy's Law requires that if anything will quit working, it shall do so at the most inopportune time....such as headlights going out.  It will happen at night, in the middle of nowhere, and a long way from help or home. Hence the need to have the extra driving lights on a totally separate circuit.

[Alaskamike]

yes they would be on a seperate circuit from the headlights, but I am not sure if they would go off automatically when key off or not, I think so, since the hot tot he switch is off aux light wire.  I may just have to try it and see how they work.  If I have to turn switch off even with engine off, that is okay too.

Long as my memory doesn't leave me and run down the battery!
   

[MacDragon]

Sounds like a good set-up... One exception.   Check with your local laws... I put a Cobra lightbar on my bike and hooked it direct so I too, could switch it on and off at will.  I went to get my bike inspected and the law states that any auxillary lighting has to be installed with the high beam curcuit... and must go off "automatically" when the high beam is activated. ???  Like most automobile  foglights setups.  It is a dumba$$ law... but is enforced here in Mass.   
I told them I would just disconnect them for the inspection and the losehole cited another law that states that any installed lighting on the MC must be in "Working order"    I couldn't win with this... I won't say it.

In any case... Just wanted to give you a heads up in case you run into this snag as I did.

[Alaskamike]

Thanks for that heads up.   You know , I had a aux light bar hooked up by a shop on another bike awhile back, and I do remember now they could not hook it up the way I wanted due to that law.  To me it's a little rediculous.  I like being able to use the aux lights when I want - with high or low beam.  And having them on a seperate circuit helps with Murphy's law.  Its like the muffler laws and emissions junk that are constantly assulting custom builds.
  
There are times (like on remote roads, at night with Moose and deer possible) when I want to have all the light I can get!
Here in Alaska where I live there are no vehicle inspections, but I realize as I travel that I will need to be aware of the laws  

I'm going to go ahead and hook them up the way I planned and see how they work.  Just waiting for switches to arrive.
Mike.

[Alaskamike]

got'em hooked up, they work great and do go off with key since I have a relay to keyed hot.   
Just have to remember to be legal!

[Madmike]

You can pick up control power off of the existing headlight wires (either high or low beam) to switch a 5 pin relay (terms 85 and 86), and then hook fused power to terminal 30 and use either 87(normally open??) or 87A(normally closed??) depending if you want to turn the lights on or off with whichever circuit you pick.  I may have 87 and 87A backwards but you can check them in an unpowered state with a multimeter to verify.  If you use this setup on the low beams you could use a second relay controlled by a toggle switch to control whether the driving lights come on in high beam - 2 relays should fit in the headlight bucket.  If you ever do have to do a safety check it will be easy to make it so it doesn't work on high beam.