Hella 4000 wiring (1 Viewer)

[YOTAFAN]

Ok, can someone please give me a layman's explanation on how to wire my hella 4000's on my rig without the use of their harness kit so that I can use the lamps regardless if the headlamps are on or off and so that the lamps turn off when the vehicle shuts off? I know I need a relay, but I was reading somewhere that if the vehicle is ground switched (which I believe the LC is) you have to modify how you hook up your wires to the relay. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Waggoner5]

The relay pins are numbered.
85 to gnd
86 to ign side of fuse block
30 to battery +
87 to lights

If you want to be able to manually turn lights off and on, interrupt the wire going to the ign side of fuse box with a simple on/off switch.

 

[YOTAFAN]

Great! Now the Hella 4000 has 3 wires coming out of the back of it, yellow, blue and brown. The colors described in the directions do not correlate with these colors. Anybody know which is positive, negative and ground? Once that's figured out, do both the positive and negative wires from the 4000 connect to pin 87 on the relay?

 

[airlaird]

Funny..I just called hella about the wiring. Yellow is the "City light" wire. BLUE is Power. Brown is Ground.
airlaird

 

[YOTAFAN]

I guess I'm way off on my wires then. What in the world is the city light? I wonder if that's just a wire I cap off. So I'll send the power to the relay and ground the other wire to the frame.

 

[airlaird]

Well there are several kinds of Hella 4000's. I have the Hella 4000's with a small interior bulb that stays on with the parking lights on. The City light serves as a "daytime running light"...you must have the plain Hella 4000 without City light. If there is no tiny bulb at the bottom beneath the main bulb, you don't have it.
airlaird

 

[Critter]

Buy the Hella harness, its 40 dollars and well worth the investment.

Trust me I had a set of 4000s on my Tacoma, the harness is worth its weight in gold and you know all the guages are correct and that the wire/relay are atleast equal quality. Making your own is more than likely going to save you little (if any) money if you buy decent wiring/relay/switch and cause a whole lot more frustration compared to the plug and play hella harness. Plus it has been a while but I think it had a fuse in the relay and multiple ground wires. Its worth it, trust me.

 

[IdahoDoug]

Critter,

The factory harnesses often are designed so the aux light cannot come on unless the headlamps, or the low beams are on. This is often undesirable, as when wanting to use fogs in serious conditions and not wanting the glare of uncontrolled low beams. Or wanting to use the driving/euro beams with high beams only and automatically shutting them down with the dimmer. The basic harness is often inflexible though I agree they're generally of good quality.

DougM

 

[YOTAFAN]

Critter,

The factory harnesses often are designed so the aux light cannot come on unless the headlamps, or the low beams are on. This is often undesirable, as when wanting to use fogs in serious conditions and not wanting the glare of uncontrolled low beams. Or wanting to use the driving/euro beams with high beams only and automatically shutting them down with the dimmer. The basic harness is often inflexible though I agree they're generally of good quality.

DougM

That's the main reason I wanted to wire it myself so I have the flexibility of turning them on as desired and so I could use a Toyota OEM fog light switch. I think I will be tapping my wires into the parking lights so I can still use them regardless if the headlamps are on high or low.

 

[Landpimp]

easy, take the wire(that would have gone to low beam) and run it direct to the battery, now you can turn the lights on/off when ever you want. Or better yet, run it to the parking lights......now as long as the parking lights are on you can turn the lights on/off whenever and when you turn the parking lights off......the AUX lights go off.

Critter,

The factory harnesses often are designed so the aux light cannot come on unless the headlamps, or the low beams are on. This is often undesirable, as when wanting to use fogs in serious conditions and not wanting the glare of uncontrolled low beams. Or wanting to use the driving/euro beams with high beams only and automatically shutting them down with the dimmer. The basic harness is often inflexible though I agree they're generally of good quality.

DougM

 

[Critter]

Critter,

The factory harnesses often are designed so the aux light cannot come on unless the headlamps, or the low beams are on. This is often undesirable, as when wanting to use fogs in serious conditions and not wanting the glare of uncontrolled low beams. Or wanting to use the driving/euro beams with high beams only and automatically shutting them down with the dimmer. The basic harness is often inflexible though I agree they're generally of good quality.

DougM

I am not sure what harness you have been using but I know for a fact that the Hella harness that I bought is wired completely seperate from the factory wires. The only thing controlling turning them on and off is switch you connect to the relay. You can wire them into the factory harness but the way the directions have them set up makes the power only controlled by the switch you attach to the relay. I know KC's harness is this way too.

 

[IdahoDoug]

Yep - good call in that you can wire a prefabbed harness your way sometimes and avoid the setup where they only work with the lights on. I've never seen a Hella diagram that showed anything but wiring them to work with the parking or low beams and assumed it was some kind of US regulation. I don't use them because they are often unwieldy in terms of having too much wire here and too little wire there. By the time I get done cutting off a connector to run them around the engine bay where I want them, then resplicing, etc I could have simply run my own wires exactly where I want them, plus no connectors to stuff through openings, etc as you tuck the wires where you want them to run. In addition, I can use bulk wire of a larger guage for next to nothing in price, which gets me better voltage. Finally, the switch for the dash isn't always something I'd like on my dash or it may not be a good shape for the spot. Currently I'm using nice marine grade illuminated LED switches that are available in 5 colors for a neat dash appearance for the 3 different aux lights, for instance.

So, I guess for a lot of reasons I run my own wires and end up with heavier guage wire neatly zip tied out of sight where I want them and a nice looking row of matching dash switches. I've played with the nicer Hella harness that comes with the big lights like the 3000 and 4000 and simply ended up getting my own stuff several times over the years. To each their own, I say!!

DougM

 

[Montana Cruiser]

I have an OEM Fog switch (atleast I think it is, came with the truck) and am wondering about he wiring for my OEM fogs. There are 3 prongs on the back of the switch, assuming +,- and ground, but how do you know which is which? There are 6 areas (labeled 1-6) on the back where you could have prongs, on this swtich, the prongs are at spots #'d 2,3 & 4. Is this trial and error here or is there something simple I'm missing?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Beowulf]

MC,

A SPST switch, like the one you describe, will have an "In" and a "Switched out". You can hook +12v to it or -12v, depending on what you plan to switch. Most Toyota SPST switches also have an "on" LED or lamp. If you are switching -12v then you'll need +12 to the pole for the "on" lamp. If you are switching +12v, then you'll need to wire the pole for the lamp to ground (-12v) If this "on" lamp is an LED instead of a lamp, then you can only wire the switch 1 way unless you reverse the polarity of the LED. Typically, this would mean you are switching +12v and the other connector goes to ground (-12v)

If your switch is back-lit then there will be a +12v to the lamp via the rheostat (usually white/green in the dash) and a -12v (ground). It does NOT sound like the switch you are describing is back-lit.

To figure all this out you need to test continuity between the connectors on the back of the switch; both in the "off" position, and in the "on" position. That way you can figure out how you need to wire the switch.

Hope this helps.

-B-

 

[Montana Cruiser]

MC,

A SPST switch will have an "In" and a "Switched out". You can hook +12v to it or -12v, depending on what you plan to switch. Most Toyota SPST switches also have an "on" lamp. If you are switching -12v then you'll need +12 to the pole for the "on" lamp. If you are switching +12v, then you'll need to wire the pole for the lamp to ground (-12v) If this "on" lamp is an LED instead of a lamp, then you can only wire the switch 1 way unless you reverse the polarity of the LED. Typically, this would mean you are switching +12v and the other connector goes to ground (-12v)

If your switch is back-lit then there will be a +12v to the lamp via the rheostat (usually white/green in the dash) and a -12v (ground). It does NOT sound like the switch you are describing is back-lit.

To figure all this out you need to test continuity between the connectors on the back of the switch; both in the "off" position, and in the "on" position. That way you can figure out how you need to wire the switch.

Hope this helps.

-B-

-B-

Thanks for the explanation, I "think" I am following what you are saying. It's a rocker swtich with an amber lamp embedded in the switch which I would assume is the "on" lamp you are referred too, not sure if it's an LED or not how though.

Much appreciated - Nate

 

[Beowulf]

Nate,
What is the p/n of the switch (or a pic)? If it is the one that I am thinking about then it has an amber LED. You will need to switch +12v (+12v in and +12v out) and the other side of the connector to the LED goes to ground. I have one of those switches on the bench so if you want me to post a pic of how to wire it then let me know.

-B-

 

[Montana Cruiser]

Nate,
What is the p/n of the switch (or a pic)? If it is the one that I am thinking about then it has an amber LED. You will need to switch +12v (+12v in and +12v out) and the other side of the connector to the LED goes to ground. I have one of those switches on the bench so if you want me to post a pic of how to wire it then let me know.

-B-

-B-

If it's not too much trouble, a pic would be great! The only # on the switch is #0302 on one side and the other side reads "21 AMP AT - 14 VOLTS DC"

Here is a pics of what I have;

 

[Beowulf]

Black to -12v (ground) This is for the LED.

Blue to +12v. This is input to the switch.

Red to component. This will be the +12v output of the switch.

-B-

 

[Montana Cruiser]

Black to -12v (ground) This is for the LED.

Blue to +12v. This is input to the switch.

Red to component. This will be the +12v output of the switch.

-B-

-B-

Thanks for the help!

- Nate

 

[Beowulf]

You're welcome Nate.

FYI, that switch is sold by Toyota dealers but I wouldn't consider it an OEM switch. It is a cheaply made switch (also low cost...) that was made in China. If you inspect it carefully you will see the finish is different than the switches made in Japan that were original equipment. Look at the switch pivot and you'll see a plastic nub or something. The Japanese made switches have a tiny rolled steel pivot. Test the "feel" of the Chinese switch and compare it to the quality Japanese switches. Much different. The cheap switch also is not backlit. The white "fog lamp" marking is on the surface of the switch. On the quality Toyota switches the marking is underneath a clear plastic "window" on the switch surface. That way the marking doesn't come off after many years of use. None of this stuff is a big deal, especially for a switch used infrequently, but you can really see a quality difference between the $60 switch and the $10 Chinese switch.

-B-