I've got a front bumper that has fog lights in it, but my truck never came with the factory fog lights. What's the best way to wire these up? I had thought about wiring them in with the headlights, but I don't know what to do about when I kick on the bright lights. I have to assume that it doesn't kick the voltage up when you turn on the brights, but it's like every other truck and simply kicks on the second element in the bulb itself, right? If that's the case, then it shouldn't be too much of a problem to wire the fogs into the headlight circuit unless it will draw too much amperage on that particular rail ... or would it be easier just to wire up a switch and put it in the truck on an ignition only power feed?

Also, does anyone know what the ground lead/power lead wiring colors are for the headlights/fog lights? I looked at the service manual, but it just tells me what colors are there, I didn't see anything about which is ground, etc. Unless it's getting really late and I over looked it, lol. Does it even matter on these lights which is ground, etc? I think on some aftermarket bulbs if you hook it up wrong bad things happen ...

 

if I installed factory fogs in the bumper, i'd would spend a few more $ to get the factory fog switch to complete it. If you want you could wire them up with a toggle and a relay if you just wanted to make it work. Or you could do like you suggested and tap the low headlight wire as the trigger wire for a relay. For my pushbar lights, I just did the toggle because I like to keep them on with highs & lows.



The right way should involve a relay, and a fuse wouldn't be a bad idea either It is up to you however you want to do it.

 

Get a Cirkit Boss from Painless Wiring. It is basically an auxillary fuse block that is on relay, and has various number of circuits (depending on which model you get), some are hot only when the ignition is on, some are hot all the time. It is super easy to install. With it, you can safely wire up anything you want, and not have to worry about overloading one of the factory circuits by trying to splice lights into them.

For aux lights, I recommend installing a dedicated switch, that way you can have them on with both low and high beams if you want. There are plenty of places to mount a switch in the cab, or you can even hide it somewhere. Another option would be to just buy a factory light switch that has the fog light on it (i.e. one from a truck that had factory fog lights - can be found on eBay), and replace your factory light switch with it. Then wire up your fogs to that switch so they basically come on and off like the factory fog lights would do. I had my aux lights wired that way for awhile, but ended up putting my light switch back because i wanted the capability of putting my aux lights on anytime I wanted.

I'll look around and see if I still have that factory fog switch assembly laying around since I don't use it. I think I tossed it out though.

 

I like the idea of being cheap with it, I looked at the cirkit boss and the cheapest I could find it was about $38.00 + shipping. What's the reasoning for using the relay? I assume it's so I can run power straight from the battery and use the headlights to switch the relay, instead of using the power from the headlight feed? Only problem I have with that idea is that I'll have to find somewhere to mount a relay. You don't think the headlight feed has enough power to supply the headlights & the fogs at the same time? I don't really like doing anything cheap, but this is just a temporary fix until I can get my fender/headlight fixed in a few months.

 

I have a factory fog light switch if your looking for one.

 

Wire them in to the parking light crkt, using a relay.

 

Now that's thinkin..., clever

 

That's how I did them on my 98. I have the whole setup still.

 

How should I hook my wires to my switch?

 

The right way includes a fuse. It is a must. And tying to healight circuit without a relay may include a risk from what I have seen about the headlight switch overheating.