130W in place of Factory fog lamps?

[ActualReverend]

I picked up some Hella 130W 'ers at a garage sale and was thinking about replacing my Factory fog lights with them. Can the wiring support the wattage? Anyone else done this before? I also thought about just mounting them with the fog lights, but then I have to get a new bumper or somewhere to mount them.

--Bryan

[neZZr]

I wouldn't recommend it. If you want to put them in the stock fog location and use your existing switch, just wire up a relay and a short lead from your battery.

[shaggy914]

I wouldn't recommend it. If you want to put them in the stock fog location and use your existing switch, just wire up a relay and a short lead from your battery.

dont wire it directly to the battery if you can help it.
on a battery you dont really want to have anything more than absolutely necessary.
when you add stuff like that you increase yous chances of having parasitic drain problems.

whats the amperage?
W(wattage)=A(amperage) x V(voltage)
therefore
A=W/V
your wattage should be 14v with the engine running but for the sake of safety lets assume 12v(saftey in the sense that amperage and voltage and indirectly proportional in the wattage equation; that is to say if you have lower voltage you have higher amperage draw)

so 130(w)/12(v)=10.833(a)
so you need a 15a fuse or a 12a if you can find it.
then you need to determine your wire size.
http://www.rbeelectronics.com/wtable.htm
this site has a wire gauge selection table.
you are using 12v 11a and your distance is your choice.
lets sat 10 ft.
so at 10 ft with 12v and 11a you need 16g(gauge) wire.

relative to hooking it up i would make a separate fuse block.
mount it right beside the original. youll have to make a jumper form the stock bus bar to the new bus bar then just run your circuit.
mount a switch in the cab.
use a relay.
standard 5 pin
pins 30 85 86 87 87a
hook power in and out of your switch then run that switch line to pin 85.
pin 86 goes to a body ground.
pin 30 should be the power side of your light circuit after the fuse(remember a fuse only protects whats after it)
87a will be empty and 87 will be go to the lights themselves.
lights dont have polarity so you cant hook them up backwards but always try to observe the polarity because it will make trouble shooting easier in the future.

this will give you a relay controlled light set up with proper power, fuse and wiring.

your circuit will be normally open so when you close the switch the lights will energize.
if you need help pm me and ill shoot you my phone number and talk you through it or help you if needed.

[rubicontrail]

I am using a Painless Cirkit Boss auxillary fuse block. The wires coming off it aren't that heavy of a gauge... if I need to power something of higher wattage, is it best to cut the wires as short as possible and splice in a heavier gauge wire?

[shaggy914]

no.

it might make you feel better but it would be a waste.
what i would suggest is rewire.
basically if you run too much current through a wire it will burn out.(same theory as a fuse)
so be changing only part you dont complete the job and only that part will burn out.

there are very few things to remember with wiring.
1. fuses only protect whats down stream
2. w=va
3. use the charts! thats why theyre there dont try to guess. dont try to memorize them.
they are a tool. after wiring enough stuff youll get a feel for it.
4. when in doubt go bigger. wastes money and in some cases it may make the job harder
but you can never go too big, and too small will always burn out.
-it is a common misconception that increasing the wire gauge will increase the amperage flow. this is not true a circuit will draw(or at least try to draw) full amperage through any wire. using a lower gauge(thicker) will reduce the amount of line loss.
line loss is the comparative difference between source voltage and the voltage at the end of a wire. that is, the amount of voltage consumed by the internal resistance of the wire. this of it this way:
5:30pm on the 202 heading to the 51 mini stack.
traffic is all backed up.
then take that picture and add 2 more lanes.
more flow right?
less resistance right?
the same theory can be applied to wire.
thicker(lower gauge) wire has less resistance.
but this will not cause more current to flow to a designated load(light motor ect.) it will only allow a load that draws more current to use that wire.
clear as mud?
let me know if you dont understand ill try to explain it in another fashion.

[ActualReverend]

Amperage, wattage, current are all pretty familiar terms to me (I live off the grid and had to tweak a few settings in my solar-wind system). The real question is, can the original factory wires handle twice the current? Has anyone else done this? Surely I am not the first one to ask this question.

Perhaps I will just need to find another bumper and wire them to another switch and keep my current fog lights to be legal the other 6 days a week.

--Bryan