Best place to ground HID ballast/harness and aux LED wires?


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Pointman1776

Member
Elite Member
Any recommendations as to the best place to ground HID ballast/harness and aux LED wires?

PCV instructs that the ground is connected to neg post on battery.

But HID ballast/harness specifically instruct to NOT ground to neg post on battery. So where is the best place to ground the HID ballast/harness?

Likewise, where is the best place to ground aux LED wires? Neg post on battery? Or someplace else?

Thanks in advance for your recommendations!
 
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Rabbitman109

Lumen Junkie
Elite Member
Pointman1776 said:
But HID ballast/harness specifically instruct to NOT ground to neg post on battery. So where is the best place to ground the HID ballast/harness?
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Says to not use the Neg battery terminal if possible. With all the retrofits that I have done, and including my own, I always put the ground on the Neg battery terminal. No failures yet. Seems like a pretty solid location, and since the wire is long enough to reach there, will be fine.
 
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nismos14

I'm movin on
Elite Member
Dunno why it says not to run to the battery, probably because of the length of wire. The neg battery terminal is the best ground location available.
 
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Pointman1776

Member
Elite Member
For testing of wiring routes before I finalize and hide all the wires, I currently have it ground to neg post on battery, and don't see any light flicker, so seems like all is good.

Thank you both!

(My pos & neg posts are gonna be stacked sky high with 3 leads for aux LED, +1 for HID, +1 for battery tender, +1 for PCV, +1 for main. :D LOL!)
 
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Scott_Thomas

Insert title Here
Elite Member
Pointman1776 said:
For testing of wiring routes before I finalize and hide all the wires, I currently have it ground to neg post on battery, and don't see any light flicker, so seems like all is good.

Thank you both!

(My pos & neg posts are gonna be stacked sky high with 3 leads for aux LED, +1 for HID, +1 for battery tender, +1 for PCV, +1 for main. :D LOL!)
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Same here, my posts are full with most of the same stuff. No problems with hid.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337 using Tapatalk 4
 
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MNGreg

waiting out winter
Elite Member
I initially grounded to another bolt on the bike, but then after thinking about it, I just routed the ground to the battery for my HID Projector also. Thought it was easier for any kind of service to keep it close to my positive wire.

Just stinks that my battery is getting SOO crowded.. Even having a distribution panel is not helping as much as I thought/Hoped it would, since some connectors are too big to go onto the distribution panel.
 
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Pointman1776

Member
Elite Member
MNGreg said:
I initially grounded to another bolt on the bike, but then after thinking about it, I just routed the ground to the battery for my HID Projector also. Thought it was easier for any kind of service to keep it close to my positive wire.

Just stinks that my battery is getting SOO crowded.. Even having a distribution panel is not helping as much as I thought/Hoped it would, since some connectors are too big to go onto the distribution panel.
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Totally agree with keeping it close to battery for same-space service.

I was thinking about a distribution panel also! Bummer to hear about the size of the panel.

If you could, would you do it all over again with a larger distribution panel?

And where would such a panel fit without juicing up the frame?
 
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MNGreg

waiting out winter
Elite Member
Pointman1776 said:
Totally agree with keeping it close to battery for same-space service.

I was thinking about a distribution panel also! Bummer to hear about the size of the panel.

If you could, would you do it all over again with a larger distribution panel?

And where would such a panel fit without juicing up the frame?
Click to expand...
Doing it again: That depends on the number of things I would be hooking up to it, and the size of the connections.

I routed everything to under my dash. Many people seem to put them under the dash, inside the side cowling, or under the passenger seat.

To prevent short outs (because I did short and blow a fuse once) I put a tiny bit of electrical tape over the panels so the metal of the panel is not exposed anymore. My problem was that the HID balast/relay connections were too large (even for the larger panel I purchased from Home Depot). I was told that the Battery tender connector also has to be direct on the battery. The panel from Radio shack was also easier to fully charge or ground each side than the Home Depot one was. To do it on HD, I would have had to create tiny little jumpers, instead of just buying the jumper panel.
 
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HClay

New Member
I just used a bolt on the inside after testing it for function, then attached and tightened. Works like a charm and didnt have to run all the way to the Neg terminal on battery. But there are lots of places to run and attach the wire. Just have to get a good ground.
 

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