Protect Your Electrical Circuits When Fitting Auxiliary Lamps
If you spend a lot of your time driving in rural areas during the hours of darkness, then you need to have your wits about you. Critters of all shapes and sizes can jump out in front of you, and you want to avoid any dramas and associated costs. In this case, you should take steps to illuminate the path in front of you and may be thinking about adding some powerful, auxiliary lights. What should you bear in mind before you think about wiring these up, however?
Fitting Auxiliary Lights
In the aftermarket, you can find many different manufacturers who can provide you with spotlights in all configurations. You need to ensure that they are mounted correctly and in accordance with state or federal regulations, but you want to make sure that they work, of course.
Avoiding the Overload
It's not just a case of bolting these lamps to the front of your vehicle and then connecting them to your lighting circuit. While this may work for a short space of time, you risk overloading the circuit in question and causing complete failure. If this were to happen when you were out at night in a remote location, you might lose all the vehicle lights, rather than just the 'spots'.
Relays Take the Strain
To make sure that you avoid such catastrophe, make sure that you introduce a relay in between the main wiring loom and the spotlights themselves. This can be an in-line switch that will only provide power to the lamps when necessary and will help to avoid any overload. As the existing circuit may not have the capacity to deal with the required current, the relay will only open or close when absolutely necessary.
Multiple Options
It is possible to add more than one relay if you introduce more than a single pair of lights. These can then act to isolate a separate circuit and help to deal with a number of different functions from a simple activation.
Simplicity Itself
Relays, by themselves, are very straightforward and are electromagnetic. When activated, the magnet will attract a hinged armature from one position to another, either closing or opening the circuit.
Getting Professional Help
As you look for spotlights on the market, make sure that you talk with an auto electrical contractor at the same time. They will help you to wire everything up so that you can venture into the night with full confidence.
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