Fog lights to follow high beam

[Heimdall]

Bought a second hand kit from a guy in this forum who had switched out the foggies for a set of Bike Viz Cree lights which is exactly what I was looking for since I wanted a more effective high beam.
Now I do feel it's a bit of a hassle needing to switch between high/low and on and off aux so I'm pondering just how difficult it would be to get the aux lights to switch on with high beam and switch of when back to low beam but still working in parallel with the pushbutton since I also want to be able to run the aux lights in day time.
I can get away with having them on riding in well lit conditions but come darkness they annoy the hell out of oncoming traffic.
I'm thinking it could splice in to high beam and use that as a trigger for the aux relay (with a diode to avoid frying it) but I'm not sure it's as easy as that.
Any ideas?

[JMc]

You  could splice into the wiring for the Hight beam lamps and use this to operate the coil of a NEW relay, then you would just mimic the operation of the handle bar switch through the relay contacts to turn the lights on and off, this way you have electrically isolated the 2 circuits from each other.

i.e. the high beam circuit just operates the relay coil, the circuit for the fog light switch goes through the relay contact in parallel with the handle bar switch, therefore either will bring on the fog lights.

[Dilbert]

Heimdall, how's it going buddy 

JMc is an electrical engineer, kinda like a mechanical engineer, but not as clever 

If you understand this, then you're doing better than me (wouldn't be difficult), but if not I'm sure Justin will draw out a circuit, or whatever it is these people do (just how do you draw electricity) 

[feetup]

Originally Posted by Heimdall

how difficult it would be to get the aux lights to switch on with high beam and switch of when back to low beam but still working in parallel with the pushbutton since I also want to be able to run the aux lights in day time.

Hmmm.  I'm sure it could be done; check the wiring diagram in the link below, then logically work out where to add another relay somewhere.

Hardest part is picking up the high beam feed.  I ended up running a wire into the switchblock, and soldering it onto the terminals in there. You could also pick it up at the globe, and run a wire out through the headlight housing. (I didn't because I didn't want to mess with the dust-and-water-proofness of that unit by drilling another hole.)

Check out this post for my build, which includes a dimmer so the LEDs can remain always on - dimmed on low beam, and full power on high beam.
http://www.advridermag.com.au/forum/showthread.php?249-Which-LED-Driving-Lights&p=1912&viewfull=1#post1912

[healdem]

what ever else you do do, make certain you protect the headlight circuit with adequate fuseing... no headlight fuse means no engine start from key off position..
  or carry a spare fuse or more for the headlight circuit just in case.

agree with JMC
a simple relay whould work

+12v power from battery pin 30
+12v feed to LED pin 87
'trigger' circuit splice into headlight full beam, pin 86
ground/earth pin 85

if you want to incorporate the dimmer idea (assumign you can find a suitable PWM dimmer, as opposed to a turn down the voltage type dimmer) then you could use a 5 pin relay
the only difference is an additional pin 87a which would be the +12v power for the dimmed light....

PWM is pulse width modulation.. a circuit that flashes at a constant voltage (more off times means dimmer LED), as opposed to a tradional rheostat/varistor which reduces the voltage which is fien for incandescent bulbs but not good for LED's

4 pin relays switch on or off, 5 pin relays switch from one to another.... horn is a 4 pion relay, headlight dip.full beam is a 5 pin relay
http://www.autoshop101.com/forms/hweb2.pdf

[T800XC]

See the attached PDF. It should be along the lines of what Justin (JMc) mentioned above.

Where & how you tap in to the blue&white high-beam wire is up to you, but the only additional load to the lighting circuit is the insignificant current drawn by the coil on the extra relay. The extra relay is connected to the grey wire between the fog switch & fog relay. The grey wire is the +12V output signal from the fog switch to drive the relay.

When the low beam is on, the fogs behave as normally and power for the fog relay is provided by the fog switch.
When the high beam is switched on (or the pass switch is triggered), the extra relay gets switched on, removing the connection between the fog switch & its relay. The fog relay is now powered from the 12V (purple) wire and the fogs turn on.

The wire colours are all based on a 2011 Tiger 800 and recent fog light switch changes 'may' use different colours. You'll have to check that for yourself.

Hope that's clear!

Originally Posted by Dilbert

....(just how do you draw electricity)  ....

Never worked that one out, but it must be the same as drawing current! 



p.s. Just seen Healdem's notes while posting. Now you have lots of info! 

[Dilbert]

Originally Posted by T800XC

Never worked that one out, but it must be the same as drawing current! 

Oh, that's easy then, I can draw a currant 

[T800XC]

A mechanical engineer friend of mine once told me there's no such thing as an electrical fault, and when you think about it, he was right!
 

[Dilbert]

Originally Posted by T800XC

A mechanical engineer friend of mine once told me there's no such thing as an electrical fault, and when you think about it, he was right!
 

Hmmm, clutching at straws like most EC&I "engineers", a mate at work's Ducati has just boiled its battery because the regulator died, mechanical failure apparently, a crack in the material no doubt, still if any of the components didn't have a mechanical part to them then they'd never work at all and sparkies would have to get off their collective rses and do some work 

[Heimdall]

Thanks for all the help guys, finally got around to it.
Thought I'd post how I did it, if I did it right someone might benefit from it as a reference and if I screwed it up I'm counting on you to save the bike (still in winter storage) before I fry it. 

This is how I wired the high beam triggered rekay:

Details

And this is how the standard fog light relay is wired.

Details

Could not find a better way so I spliced in to the white/blue high beam cable at the connector behind the headlights (removed them to get to it).

So now I can operate the fog lights (which aren't really fog lights at all but cree LED aux lights in OEM fittings and harness) in day time with the low beam but have the luxury of not needing to operate two switches to get maximum light output at night.
I'd say total cost of the entire project was < €10 so money well spent.