LED Brake Light Bar. Who has one? | Ford Explorer Forums - Serious Explorations

  • Register Today It's free!

LED Brake Light Bar. Who has one?

Pjibs

Well-Known Member
Joined
May 17, 2011
Messages
326
Reaction score
0
City, State
Wittenberg University
Year, Model & Trim Level
'03 Sport Trac XLT 4x4
Hey guys!

I'm lookin at getting one of those LED Brake Light Bars that go under your tailgate and was just wondering if anyone here had one and if they liked the brand they purchased. I'm doing some shopping around and have my heart set on one, but I was wondering if I just could get some outside experiences with people who have purchased these and if they like them.

Thanks!
J.B.
 



Join the Elite Explorers for $20 each year.
Elite Explorer members see no advertisements, no banner ads, no double underlined links,.
Add an avatar, upload photo attachments, and more!
.





picture.php


Here's a picture of one I had on mine for a couple years until the Pa. road salt made it's way to the circuit board. I loved having it on there and will be getting another one soon. The 49" bar is the one I had on mine, I cut off the inner tab off and put 3M double sided tape on it so I could mount it to the bottom inside lip of the tailgate.
 






They look nice and are an added safety feature. They seem to have a high failure rate though. A lot of them I see have some of the LED's dead.
 






Ya I really liked having the added lights for safety. The next one I get I'm gonna seal in the housing better then straight out of the box so the road salt and moisture doesn't get in and destroy it like the last one.
 






looks good! brand? I was thinking about going with a Recon brand.
 






I think IIRC it was a Bully Dog brand I bought from Advanced Auto Parts.
 






How hard is it to wire those things??
 






You don't have to wire them in if you don't row a trailer, they plug into the 4plug trailer harness. I tow alot so I spliced mine into that harness. All you have to do is match up the colored wired, some don't have the same exact colors but they do come with instructions (wiring diagram) for the four wires to splice together. It's really easy, only four wires and most light bars come with matching colored wires.
 






Sounds like something that's right up my alley :)
 






Just ordered the Recon "White Lightning" can't wait to get it!!
 






Ya I really liked having the added lights for safety. The next one I get I'm gonna seal in the housing better then straight out of the box so the road salt and moisture doesn't get in and destroy it like the last one.
Same here. The wife got me one for Christmas and it lasted about a month since it was the middle of winter.
 






Rebel,

Could you post a close pic of where you attached it? I'm thinking about putting mine on the plastic bumper lip that is under the tailgate. Also, the ground pin on the trailer hitch light connector is very corroded. How should I go about removing corrosion so I can make a clean connection?
 






There really isn't a way to clean the corrosion in those connections completely. I went and replaced my connector and lengthened the wires so the connector is up insge the bed now when I'm not using it ( out of the weather under the tonneau cover). You can get the trailer wiring connector from any parts stores, wally world, etc..

As far as how I mounted the lightbar itself, I put 3M emblem tape on the inside lip of the tailgate and stuck the lightbar onto that so the lightbar looked like it was part of the tailgate.

Let me see if I can find any pictures of the bar on there in the daylight so you can see what I'm talking about.
 






By the way how much was the Recon lightbar??
 






Yjis picture you can kinda see the lightbar on the bottom of the tailgate.

picture.php
 






picture.php


picture.php


picture.php


Here the pictures that show the lightbar on the tailgate.

And yes I know my Trac has blue balls before anyone says anything, It's because it doesn't get to go offroading as much as it used to.

:mattmoon::wtf::crazy::wavey:[
 






Recon bar I found for $80 on amazon. I did a lot of research cuz I found that these LED bars havent gotten a good rap because of how the LED's will go out, or moisture will get inside them and short the whole strip out. Recon seemed to be the most reliable and I plan on putting a coat of water repellent on it just for good measure.

I really like where that bar sits on your trac, I gotta keep playing around with placement, but thanks for the pics!
 






I had a Recon, it crapped out in less than three months but then it was winter.

IMG_4619.JPG


It plugs into the trailer wiring harness but you do have to splice into a backup light wire if you want the white backup lights to work.

IMG_4617.JPG


I will probably get another one at some point but like MidnightRebel I will try to seal it better with some silicone or whatever.
 






Back
Top