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ROAM Side Steps light wiring (or any step lights with door open illumination.)

smklaw

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What color LEDs are people going with? I see green on green jeep, amber on yellow jeep, etc. Mine is red and debating on whether just doing the Oznium in cool white to sort of match the other lights all over the jeep, or red! I welcome opinions as I am terrible at this part and my son is out of town and the rails get here tomorrow so I need to order the LEDs asap.
Just after switching wheels:
IMG_8891[1].JPG
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CarbonSteel

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Completed my installation this afternoon. It took 1 full day (2 half days). I spent a lot of time installing the wiring in split loom tubing, heat shrink wrapping all of the connections and routing the wiring through the frame. I tapped into the footwell light power and removed the passenger seat to make it easy to push the wire through the firewall boot and make the underdash terminations. I used marine grade 16/2 wiring to make the harness and double heat shrinked all of the connections under the vehicle. I added a 10AMP waterproof fuse into the battery feed and a 5AMP waterproof fuse into the trigger wiring along with a roadmaster diode.

Very pleased with how it turned out and no job would be complete with some thanks -- @TTEChris and @Twistedfab many thanks indeed for your efforts and sharing of knowledge, it made the job so much easier.

A photo of the underhood relay and aluminum relay heat sink (I ordered another Jeep branded bolt to take the place of the silver bolt shown here):

HH3VAF.jpg
 

thundermuffin

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What color LEDs are people going with? I see green on green jeep, amber on yellow jeep, etc. Mine is red and debating on whether just doing the Oznium in cool white to sort of match the other lights all over the jeep, or red!
I went with the warm white, but I’m already thinking about switching to amber or red. Just ordered the Baja designs rock light kit in red, gonna tie it into the same circuit and add a diode to tie it into an aux button for manual triggering.
 

Midding

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I went with blue on a Granite Crystal. Me like.
 

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D5grvty01

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Any idea how much it would cost to have some install these?
 

BRC10

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They are bright
I don’t have the roam steps, but I have the regular step sides on my JLU Sport. With the help of this post, I tapped the footwell lights and stuck some led strips to the bottom of the step sides (3m auto body double sided tape). So far, so good.
 

crackrk

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I read through all 15 pages and couldn’t find my answer. @TTEChris in your write up you call out a 25a relay. Would 10a be enough?

Thanks in advance
 
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TTEChris

TTEChris

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I read through all 15 pages and couldn’t find my answer. @TTEChris in your write up you call out a 25a relay. Would 10a be enough?

Thanks in advance
A 10amp should be plenty. I went with the 25amp so that I could wire rock lights to the same circuit in the future.
 

Tritonman

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Quick question..I am looking for a way to separate the courtesy lights on my rails with the internal lights in the rubicon that light up the floor while driving. I tapped in to the courtesy light and the rail lights function as normal, however, when i go to enable to floor lights, the rails light up. I want to be able to utilize the floor lights at night while driving but not have the rail lights on obviously.
 

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wibornz

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I am thinking of adding LED light were the ROAM logo plate is. Something like this

61-4VySD3ZL._SL1500_.jpg


That will shine out the through the Roam cut out in the side step. This would help light up a campsite around the Jeep at night. Anybody done this?
 

jlewissystem

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I am thinking of adding LED light were the ROAM logo plate is. Something like this

61-4VySD3ZL._SL1500_.jpg


That will shine out the through the Roam cut out in the side step. This would help light up a campsite around the Jeep at night. Anybody done this?
that would be a cool idea, but I’d be curious if you have enough room to fit lights behind that cutout portion. You might need something more flush or a different location?
 

BRC10

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Quick question..I am looking for a way to separate the courtesy lights on my rails with the internal lights in the rubicon that light up the floor while driving. I tapped in to the courtesy light and the rail lights function as normal, however, when i go to enable to floor lights, the rails light up. I want to be able to utilize the floor lights at night while driving but not have the rail lights on obviously.
I'm not 100% sure that this will solve your problem, but i have a Sport which only has the footwell lights, and they are tied into the dome light. Y'all fancy folk have footwell lights AND an ambient light package. So that little module under the dash at your feet has two different lights, so your module has more wires. Mine only has one light, but it sounds like you want your step lights to be tied to the dome like mine. That wire is in there, but i dont know which one for your jeep. I think you just tapped the wrong one.
 

crackrk

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So it's been about a month and a half since I installed the rails and lights. I thought I'd put in my experience so far with the lights wiring.

I installed the lights before installing the rails on the jeep. Like others have said I'd highly recommend doing this. I did not swap out the LED lights with new ones like others have suggested mostly because I was feeling like a cheap ass and didn't want to drop yet another $70 on lights. As others have stated the wiring is very thin for the provided lights, but I had no problems stripping them. I made a make-shift wiring harness using 12g wire to connect everything with flex tubing around everything. I solder all the connections and used pig tails on each rail along with a pig tailed wire going up under the hood. My idea is if any section of the wiring goes back I can easily swap out that section without ripping into the whole setup. I'm guessing I have about 30 to 45 minutes per rail, plus about another hour or so connecting the rails plus running the wiring under the hood.

I'm running everything through a 10a relay connected to the passengers side foot panel light. The lights works great and provide tons of light. My wife was very impressed with the setup, which says as lot as she normally has a "I don't care" attitude about jeep things. I take my Jeep through the car wash at least once a week (free car washes.. yay!) and I have had no issues with any of the lights.

I've attached a few photos of the setup.

IMG_4392.jpg


IMG_4418.jpg
 

DonBindas

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If I were to do this a second time I would probably change things around a little, and most likely make a full wiring harness rather than purchasing one off Amazon and cutting it up.

If you see some things that need to be changed feel free to let me know so I can alter the list. I am by no means an electrical/wiring expert, and had to learn a few things along the way.

Attempt at your own risk :like:

Parts Needed:
  • LED light harness (Or wiring to make your own.)
  • I purchased this harness with relay off amazon(I ended up having to get rid of the relay, I will explain why later) https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00EZ9Y33W/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
  • Wires to extend the harness from one side of the Jeep to the other (I had 16 gauge wires in the shop, so that is what I used.)
  • Shrink Tubing for covering the soldered wires
  • Weatherproof Connectors(Optional)
  • Conduit to cover the wires going from one side of the Jeep to the other(I used long shrink tubing.)
  • Electrical tape
  • Tie Wraps
  • Quick splice connector(to tap into interior lights unless you prefer to solder that as well.)
  • Solid State Relay (Mechanical relay included with the harness will not work with the dimming lights without modifications.) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01M1RSU48/ref=cm_sw_r_em_api_i_oZB9AbB4V862N

Tools Needed:
  • Basic wrench/socket set
  • Soldering iron (Or crimp connectors, but I'm not a big fan of those.)
  • Solder
  • Wire Strippers
  • Scissors, or something to cut the tie wrap ends/wires.
  • Heat gun or lighter for shrink tubing

First off my Roam steps came with pigtails for each individual light, so I removed them from the vehicle and set them upside down so I could easily work on wiring them together. You will want to have all the wires come together close to the middle mounting bracket so that you can pass the wires through from one side of the Jeep to the other. This was probably the most time consuming part. Be careful with the wires on the LED lights, they are very thin and I found that it was easier to strip the conduit off with my fingers rather than the actual wire strippers.

I had enough slack in the cable to tie the three rear most lights together. I then soldered my 16 gauge positive/negative wires to those and ran them to the front where I tied the front most LED, 16gauge wire, and my weatherproof connections together. I had the weatherproof connections from a previous job I did, and I wanted to be able to easily disconnect them if I ever had to remove the steps for other work. The LED harness comes with butt connectors that you can use instead.
I used shrink tubing on all my solder points to keep it as water tight as possible. I zip tied all the wires to the posts on the steps so that they wouldn't move around.

I also put electrical tape/conduit/shrink tubing over any loose wires so that they could not easily be seen(Red wire is an eyesore if you don't cover it up.)


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Once you have the wires for the steps run you can now re-install them on the Jeep(In the pics below the steps are still off, but I would put them on so you have a better idea of how to run the supply wiring).

With the steps installed you can now focus on running the LED harness or wires from the battery terminal to the steps.

I pulled the fuse out of the harness and first connected the positive/negative to the battery terminals so I could figure out how much slack I would have without the possibility of shorting something out.

The harness will have 3 separate sets of wires that all come together at the relay. You can leave the set with the switch up top for now and run your wiring harness with the red/black connections (Should be 4 total wires) close to the fender and drop them down behind the fuse box. If you have a second person lay down behind the front tire and lightly push the fender liner forward. You should easily be able to see the harness being dropped down.

Gently pull it while the other person feeds the wire down making sure it doesn't catch on anything. Leave a little slack up top and tie wrap the harness so that it doesn't move around too much behind the fender liner.

Run the harness towards the center of the Jeep where you have your wire ends that you previously made for the steps. Try to keep it as high and out of the way as possible. I ran mine above the step mounting brackets and tie wrapped them in place. Once you get to the middle mount you should be able to use to short end of the harness to make your connections(The harness comes with butt connectors, but I chose to use the weatherproof connectors I had.)

If you have excess wire just tie wrap it together and out of the way.


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7.jpg 8.jpg


Now you will need to extend the longer portion of the harness to make it to the other side. I cut the connectors off, and soldered the 16 gauge wire I had to the ends. I then took a rough measurement of how much wire I needed to make it to the other side and added a foot or two.

Before I ran the wires through the cross member I used heat shrink tubing to compress the wires together proceeded to feed them through the cross member. There are a few spots where the wire can hang up, but most of those spots have small openings where you can manipulate the wires. Once you get to the other end you should be very close to where you terminated the wires for your steps. I now cut the wire the length I needed and soldered on my connector(Or use the included connectors.) You can now connect it to the steps you have mounted on the other side.

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Now for the tricky part, that took me some time to figure out. The factory dome light circuit has a dimmer anytime you open/close the doors. This increases the voltage as they illuminate and causes the included Relay to "chatter" and the lights to flicker as they turn on/off. After some research I decided to get a solid state relay which fully activates at a much lower voltage and doesn't have the mechanical parts inside to cause that "chatter."

I ordered the 25amp solid state relay from Amazon(Link above.) It's overkill for the current setup, but if I ever decide to wire in some rock lights it gives me the flexibility to do so.

So if you got this far like me without making your own harness and running all the wiring you will have to take off the relay and cut the wires going into the connector.

Before cutting any wires make sure you have the fuse pulled from the relay harness. At this point you could actually disconnect the positive/negative leads since the rest of the wiring is already run and you know you have enough slack.

On the switch portion of the harness you will only need the blue wire. You can cut the connector off that goes to the switch, pull the conduit off and just leave the single blue wire that used to go to the switch(The others are for the illumination of the button which we won't be using here.)
This should leave you with 5 total wires. One positive from the battery, a ground from the battery, a ground going to the lights, a positive going to the lights, and your blue "trigger" wire which we will run/wire in the next step.

You can mount the relay any way you like. I happened to have a bracket that fit it perfectly laying around and I mounted it next to the battery.

You may need to pull off a little of the black conduit that surrounds the wires to be able to extend them to each side of the relay.

If I were to do this again I would probably make a whole harness, but that would be even more involved. It would however offer a "cleaner" finished product.

For the Relay
#1 + Red wire going to your lights
#2 + Red wire going to your battery/fuse
#3 + Blue trigger wire that will get power with the interior/door lights
#4 - Two black ground wires, one from the lights and the other going to the battery

If wired correctly in the next step when we connect the blue wire the relay will illuminate red when activated(Doors open/Dome light on.)

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Now for the trigger wire I chose to go to the light in the passenger foot-well that illuminates when you open the door.

Your blue wire has enough slack to reach this point without needing an extension. To get through the firewall I pushed a coat hanger through the inside rubber portion of the main wiring harness that comes in to the Jeep. You have to get through two layers. Make sure you do it far enough towards the outside so that you do not get into the actual harness.

I pushed the coat hanger from the inside while my wife was watching on the outside(pull back the fender liner where you ran the wires earlier and you will see it). Once I had the coat hanger through I dropped the blue wire down like we did with the other wires and used electrical tape to secure it to the coat hanger. I then slowly pulled the wire back through the rubber grommet. From there I used a splice connector to connect to splice the blue wire into the light in the footwell.

On my wifes Sport she only had two wires, a power and a ground. I just looked on my Rubicon and I have three wires(One I'm assuming for the separate mood lighting.) I'm not next to her Jeep now, but from the pictures it looks to be the Yellow wire with a brown stripe(Rubicon also has a Yellow/Blue.)

If you are unsure use a test light and see which wire gets power when you open the door.

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Don't forget to put your fuse back in, now go and open your doors and see if everything works properly. If the relay is triggering like it should, there will be a red LED illuminated. If you close the doors don't be alarmed if the lights don't turn off right away. By default there is a 30 second timer if the key is not in the run position for them to turn off.

I'm sorry if I left anything out, I feel like I just wrote a book.....

20180506_160553_resized.jpg


Thanks for all your help, but may I add something?

I just spent the last few months trying to get my LED Roam lights to shut off automatically, to no avail.

I would go back and re-read your uxcell relay instructions, but no success?

Then it occurred to me that you may not have had the optional factory LED Light package, but I do
.

Once I wired the Roam LED's directly, by-way-of a fused link to my interior LED wire, all was well!

I suspect that my factory interior LED lights didn't draw enough power to trigger the disconnect function of the uxcell solid state relay?

With my Roam lights wired directly to the interior lights without a relay, my Roam lights still dim quite nicely in the same fashion as the interor dimming qualities.

uxcell ASH-25DD 3-32VDC to 5-250VDC 25A Single Phase Solid State DC-DC Relay
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