Hey Randall,
Your lights out mountain drive mush have inspired Dan Masters when he
designed the AAW harness. He steadfastly refuses to use any fuses in the
headlight circuit for his harnesses. In fact, he insists on a direct wire
run from the relay to the headlights using a new socket that he provides.
Not even a bullet connector is used. He feels the experience you had isn't
worth it. Granted his harness is "over-designed", so a wire meltdown isn't
likely. However, I see that his stand-alone Headlight Relay Kit that can be
added to a stock harness does have 4 fuses similar to what you're suggesting
so you would have to blow 4 fuses to be driving in the dark.
Bob
Bob Danielson
http://tr6.danielsonfamily.org
1975 TR6 with:
Throttle Body Injection
Toyota 5 Speed
Nissan Diff & CVJs
-----Original Message-----
From: Randall
Sent: Monday, April 11, 2011 6:25 PM
To: 'Cosmo Kramer' ; Triumphs@autox.team.net
Subject: Re: [TR] Subject: Re:
Headlights/drivinglights/relays/fuses/connectors
> Instead
> of using a 'regulator fuse' would a 'Slow-burn Fuse' be of any help?
Not really. The issue remains that fuses sometimes fail for reasons other
than too much current through them. In my case (when the headlights went
out while going down a mountain at night), the problem was eventually traced
to a poor connection between the fuse and it's clip. Even through the clip
was tinned, and the assembly was inside a sealed metal can, it had
apparently picked up just enough corrosion over the years to get hot without
dimming the headlights enough to notice. (My 100 watt H4 headlights
probably had something to do with that as well.)
Only took a few quick swipes with a Scotch-Brite pad to fix the problem,
once I found it. But it was several months and 2 more fuses later before I
figured it out.
Not really a problem at the time, once I managed to find the dimmer switch
and hit the high beams. (Fortunately there was no one else on the road, so
I didn't have to worry about blinding them.) But it was an experience that
I would rather not repeat, hence the perhaps overkill design that I'm
implementing now. Relays are cheap.
-- Randall
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