Thread: 2013 trx500 light bar install help

Afternoon fellow hunters! I’ve just recently purchased a trx500 Honda quadbike for hunting and beach fishing and I’m in the process of installing a light bar… I’ve already mounted the light bar (22 inch bar from super cheap auto) and it comes with the wiring look kit… I’m hopeless with electrical stuff so was wondering if anyone is in the Bay of Plenty area that could help out with the wiring? Or if anyone can point me in the right direction… Cheers

Did you kit come with its own on/off switch? If so it should be as easy as running the cables to your battery and the switch up to the bar area wherever you want it to be. Cable tie everything up and job done. I know you can go real flash and wire it into your already existing headlight switch but I don’t really see the need. My LED light on my 420 is stand alone from the quad lights with a little on/off button and it works a treat.

if you are lucky they come with a piggyback plug that goes between the headlight plug and the bulb. That gives you an on/off with high beam. two wires to the appropriate battery terminals and mount the switch and done. When I did my Paj 6 years ago i took a terminal out of one of the headlights and did my own switching wire so i could wire it up classically to be only on when the high beams were on but that depends on WOF station.
On your quad, you can do as the previous poster mentioned and have it independent.

Originally Posted by stagstalker

Did you kit come with its own on/off switch? If so it should be as easy as running the cables to your battery and the switch up to the bar area wherever you want it to be. Cable tie everything up and job done. I know you can go real flash and wire it into your already existing headlight switch but I don’t really see the need. My LED light on my 420 is stand alone from the quad lights with a little on/off button and it works a treat.

Yeah it came with the whole loom for the headlight plug and relay, switch and fuse etc… can I run it without using the headlight plug bit as that dosent fit my headlight? Or does that need to be connected as part of the circuit? If not I’ll just do like you said and connect to battery then run the switch up under the fairing and mount it then connect light bar…

A stand alone circuit is the easiest way to go.
Battery positive to fuse, to the switch, then to the lightbar. Earth cable from lightbar back to battery negative, or earth to the bike chassis to complete the circuit.
I would consider running it through the ignition so you don't accidentally leave it on and flatten the battery.

Wire it up however you like - it's a quad after all. The advantage of wiring it into the high beam circuit is that when you turn the bike off it's already wired through the ignition switch so you aren't leaving lights on. Quads only have a very small lightweight battery and there is no real reserve capacity in them for leaving lights on even if it's an LED light bar.

If it was me, I'd snip a wire powering the high beam circuit and using a solder splice or a duraseal (the solder splice is a heat shrink tube with a couple of grommets and a ring of solder, the duraseal is the same but with an electrical crimp connection in it). Reconnect the high beam cable with a wire running back to the bars and your on/off switch, and do the same with the light bars earth wire.

Solder splice https://www.bunnings.co.nz/narva-1-5...nator_p4430677
Duraseal https://www.smartmarine.co.nz/produc...iABEgJChvD_BwE

I would suggest if possible wire up light bar separately from high beam. Handle bar mounted lights like the trx run are pain in the arse if you carry anything on the front of bike, as the light reflects back in your eyes. Hook it up to the low beam with a separate switch.

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or.....do what we all used to do back in the day for spotlights....get a ciggy lighter plug installed on bike or any half decent plug,heck one of extension cord works fine...and do corrosponding other end onto the light bar..plug it in when you want it,pull it apart when you dont.

its easy enough to do. i assume the bike has a battery to smooth the charge current thru other wise you will just kill the led bar.
flick me a pm and i will draw you a diagram.

Make sure the fuse is as close to the battery as you can get it.

That way if there's ever a problem the fuse blows and no power to anything then. the only live part is from the battery to the fuse holder.

Some of those Honda 4w bikes have a spotlight plug on the side of the headlight pod. Its power only, not wired to the high/ low beam switch.

Originally Posted by hunter Al.7mm08

I would suggest if possible wire up light bar separately from high beam. Handle bar mounted lights like the trx run are pain in the arse if you carry anything on the front of bike, as the light reflects back in your eyes. Hook it up to the low beam with a separate switch.

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I unplugged the handle bar mounted centre headlight on my 450 honda and used the wires to power 2 yellow spotlights. Fitted an extra pair of dual spotlights (motorbike lights that can be switched to either white or yellow) then used the wiring for the 2 guard mounted headlights. I can change color of the 2 bike lights by simply switching from low to high beam.... works great for night work on rabbits/possums as the yellow light is softer and they stare at it rather than turning away like they do with bright white lights....
......sort of like the toyota '2 moons' ad from a few years back....

I'd run it on a relay off the high beam

Yep, that's probably a missed opportunity on my part - I assumed the supplied loom for the lightbar would contain the relay and the fuses etc and the connections would be labelled as such.

Most of the ones I've seen have been like this when sold as a 'ready to fit kit', but you do get them with just two wires and you have to supply the rest of the setup.

Normally, it would be a supply connection of decent gauge wiring through the controlled/switched side of the relay which contains the right spec fuse, just connect that to the + and - on the battery. Then the only other bit is the control side of the relay which switches the light bar on and off - this from the kit looms I've used comes with a little push button switch for control of the headlight on/off and this can either be cut into the high beam + and the light module - to run off the ignition switch, or off a switched accessory feed off the ignition so that you can't leave it on and drain the start battery.

All sorted cheers guys! Used the loom that it came with and ran it from battery to new switch.. then joined it to accessories so turns off if bikes switched off…

Originally Posted by Ryan85

All sorted cheers guys! Used the loom that it came with and ran it from battery to new switch.. then joined it to accessories so turns off if bikes switched off…

Only just read this thread.I may be getting a bit cynical but you used one of two correct and logical ways to hook them up. Some of the cheaper lights supply the loom as an optional extra, worth it for those who don't fit this sort of thing regularly. You know the old saying: If all else fails, read the instructions.