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Installing roof lights

diablo007

NAXJA Forum User
I am about to put a light bar with 4 lights on my roof and I am looking for some hints/advice anyone has from experience. Were did you put the wires, how did you get them inside the car for the switches and most importantly, how did you wire them to come on? Does anyone use a distribution block for the power leads? Any insight will greatly be apprecited. I plan on having it down over the weekend. I am going to do this on a 96 Cherokee.

Thanks
 
I have 5 KC's on my roof. I ended up mounting mine to my stock roof rack. I ran the 10 or 8(not sure) guage power up and used a big connector to connect all the small wires to that one. I ran the power through the door jam and around the gutter on the side of the roof. From inside, you can't see the wire because I have it behind the trim. On the outside though, you can see about 6" of it(I'm kinda nervous about putting a hole in my roof). I think I will eventually run the wire through a hole in the roof though.

Hugecherokee.jpg
 
Mine are also attatched to the factory rack system. This actually works quite well becasue it flexes when caught on branches. I just wired mine to a toggle that pulls power from the fuse panel untill I take the time to properly install a block and relay.

37873139_591a0fae47.jpg
 
andrew2516 said:
I have 5 KC's on my roof. I ended up mounting mine to my stock roof rack. I ran the 10 or 8(not sure) guage power up and used a big connector to connect all the small wires to that one. I ran the power through the door jam and around the gutter on the side of the roof. From inside, you can't see the wire because I have it behind the trim. On the outside though, you can see about 6" of it(I'm kinda nervous about putting a hole in my roof). I think I will eventually run the wire through a hole in the roof though.

Hugecherokee.jpg

that's looks killer! what's the size on your lights?
 
Mine are wired in pairs and a hole was drilled thru the roof and sealed up. The wires lead to there stock setups with relays and inline fuses and just the 2 outter ligts and the middle are hooked up to one heavy duty switch in my center console.

j0ffb6.jpg
 
+1 for mounting to the factory luggage bar. I just yanked out the middle rubber strip then drilled into the bar. I ran the lights down the rack ond through the wire harness on the lift gate and along the upper trim on the inside. Kind of alot of work but it was real clean looking on the inside.
 
LittleAnthony88 said:
Mine are wired in pairs and a hole was drilled thru the roof and sealed up. The wires lead to there stock setups with relays and inline fuses and just the 2 outter ligts and the middle are hooked up to one heavy duty switch in my center console.

j0ffb6.jpg

you had to buy that extra light bar for those. i am going to look for a similar setup from somewhere.
 
Thanks, I think they are 6" round 150 watt KC daylighters. I bought them off of a friend for 30$. He thought they were bad because they sat on a light bar for a tj in a shed for four years. When I bought them they had the super faded yellow smileys on them. I used a little never dull wax, bought some new light covers for 35$ and 40$ in wiring and I'm surprised how good they turned out.

For everyone that has roof lights........you know the ladies love them.
 
Fantobacon said:
you had to buy that extra light bar for those. i am going to look for a similar setup from somewhere.

Well the light bar was on there when i bought it so your gonna have to look for one that holds 5 lights. Rockratz has a bar that holds 4 lights. The roof rack behind it was one of my favorite add-ons! Its an olympic top hat rack and it covers most the roof perfect with the body lines and tabs for rear lights and just enough space for the light bar and room for my hatch to open! The best thing is the bars running along the side that protect your roof in an off camber situation and my last run i tipped into a tree and the roof rack saved my XJ and has a slight indent and i used the rack to slide off the tree and get out of the situation!!!!!
 
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