Positive, ground wire terminal question

[noob4x4]

Hi, i recently bought a 94 Ford Explorer and i'm trying to install off road lights and have few questions. I heard most of cars have a box under the hood for positive wiring for accessories like this. Does my car have one?? On diagram, it says to connect wires to positive wire and ground. I'm having trouble understanding what ground wire is... Shouldn't the lights be connected to positive and negative?? Is ground wire a different word for negative?
Please advise...

 

[Bill Kemp]

Yes the negative terminal on the battery is the ground terminal. Negative = ground.
Check FAQ for diagram...

 

[noob4x4]

should i hook the wires to battery or is there somewhere else i can hook up the wires..??

 

[rookieshooter]

should i hook the wires to battery or is there somewhere else i can hook up the wires..??

Just a thought, how about splicing into the headlights for Pos. and to the metal of the body for ground. That way your Aux lights can't come on untill you turn on headlights and flip the Aux switch. Just make sure on the Neg/ground that you clean the metal. The body and frame are connected to the Neg. side of Bat.

Do you have a relay and switch. Some of the switches have ground wire also that again you would have to fasten to body. On some makes and models of trucks you can open the hood and you will see grounding wires. some are like a woven metal type thing and others just wires. They connect the engine to cab and cab to frame to make a complete circuit back to the Neg or ground side of the Bat. Every electrical device on your truck has to make a complete circuit back to your Bat. Just like in your house every elec. thing will eventually go back to Mother earth.

 

[DeRocha]

Electricity can be a little tricky at first.. The battery has a positve and a negative post. The negative post attaches to the vehicle's body & Frame (Thus all metal components will be grounded).

See my Hella 500 Installtion Thread for info and pics on installing AUX lights on a 1st gen Explorer.
Here is my state table and wiring diagram.

 

[noob4x4]

thanks for the replies guys.. I now have good understanding of ground wire.
DeRocha, did you wire positive directly to the battery?

 

[410Fortune]

You have a couple of choices for a source for your constant 12v+
You can go directyl to the battery + terminal, yes.
You can also do like Ford and go to the + terminal on your starter solenoid.

If you look at your battery, one of the wires leaves and goes to the starter solenoid. You will see Ford has a few other 12v+ wires going to that same post (less wires going to battery)

You will also see one wire going to the front of your power distribution box (fuse box) there are two bolts on there you can also get 12v+ from (again less wires going to the battery)

If you are really ambitious you can open that power dist box up and tap into both 12v+ constant and also 12v+ acc (key on)

 

[Bill Kemp]

What kind of lights are you hooking up and do they have a relay or is it direct connect?

 

[noob4x4]

i am trying to add 2 auxilary lights, yea it has a relay. I guess I'm going to try to connect to starter solenoid or power distributon box. Thanks for help!