Yes, they're installed. Drop me your e-mail on PM, I'll send you a mail with my number, and we can discuss, and I can send you some pictures, etc.

The relay and power feed is on my aux battery, you could also wire it to the primary. I did bypass the high beam circuit after fiddling with the existing wiring a bit. As far as I could tell it wasn't wired with the high beam over ride anyway.

The relay and power feed is in the 2nd battery box, and the switch wire goes through the firewall plug under and to the right of the brake booster. The wiring is feed to the roof under the A pillar cowl. Overall the installation looks pretty nice, I didn't get fancy with the switch mounting in to cabin.

 

Hey all,

I installed a 30 inch light bar by cutting up a perfectly good grille, and fabricating some simple mounting points.

As far as switching goes, the light bar is on a relay; the relay is triggered by a splice to the right hand high beam wire; power is direct from the battery, fused in line close to the battery.

Now the important bit. Sometimes it is beneficial to run high beam without the light bar. Examples include: fog, rain, snow, dust or driving on secondary highways near towns and suburbs where the police may have an issue with the use of an "off-road" light on a public road.

The solution? Simple. I SWITCHED THE GROUND WIRE. This means the light will always come on with the high beam IF the ground is connected by the switch. If the switch is placed in the off/disconnected position, the high beam works fine and the light bar won't work. Run the ground from the battery or any good ground point, to the switch, and then from the switch to the light.

I also tried to use a switch to activate the light bar without the high beam on (again, only works with the ground switch on). My issue with the second switch was that the power would back feed to the one high beam wire I spliced into. So I get a light bar and one high beam headlight, which was just silly looking, so that option was eliminated.

Switch placement is on the left side of the panel below the steering wheel. This places the switch close to the factory rotary switch. Also a huge bonus is that the panel pulls right off for easy drilling and is open to the area above the foot well where wires are easy to run (ie, through the grommet near the brake booster).

As far as running wires to the roof; I contemplated this as well. I found that 3/8 inch brake line is large enough for three wires if splices are slightly offset from each other or that if two wires are used 5/16 inch would work. It is easy to bend with an inexpensive tubing bender and offers great protection for the wires as it is stainless steel and solid unlike the cheapo plastic split loom often used when routing aftermarket "wiring harnesses". Exact placement of this tubing is up to the owner of the vehicle. I have some plans to run wires for rear facing LED flood lights for use while reversing or as campsite light.

 

Well now that is "holy $hit bright."

Not sure I'd agree about using your brights in fog! ...but I digress. I do love that we can use our "fog lights" (the ones in the bumper) without our main headlamps (my Montero could not do this) and I'd say this is the best approach in fog. Even though they aren't amber, their low mounting and aim point work best to illuminate the road and reduce retro-reflection from the fog.

Your light bar would be great on a "night run" off-road! Good job and nice write up!

 

I note the comment about fog lights on, head lights off, and that surprises me. Am I to assume the USA switching setup allows for that? Up here, we have full time daytime running lights so perhaps that is why I cannot get the Xeons to shut off except when in Park or Neutral.

I did solve the fog light colour concern by removing the stock white halogens and installing PIAA H11 2500K Yellow Ion 55 watt halogen bulbs.

The 2500 K yellow works well in snow I find, and illuminates the ditch side of the road right in front of the 3; useful at slow speed.


I am not a real fan of whiter light, (5000K), and less of blue toned light, (6,000K+), particularly when weather conditions are less than perfect.

 

Behold...

 

sure... looks good in the picture but is that vehicle in drive? or in park? As bbyer mentioned, the day time runners are always on unless in park, something that I would rather change. I would like to find a way to have the low beam off and have a set of orange lights like the toyotas run.

As far as running brights in the fog/adverse weather, sometimes the brights help out, but if the reflection becomes a problem they are shut off as well. I can tell you this much, that light bar is certainly NOT an advantage in the snow.

You my also notice that my side marker/turning lamp is not white. I didn't like the look of white marker lamps, so I simple replaced them with amber bulbs. My goal would be to have super bright LEDs much like GRover96's, only in the amber colour. Then all I need to do is have the low beam off and my amber day time runner would already be in place.

Thanks for the kudos on the write up, if I get the look I want I will do a write up on that as well

 

The vehicle is in Park. I took the photo and I'm not in the vehicle, so....it'd better be in park! That said, there is no change to the state of the lighting when I go from Park to Drive. I also never use the "Auto" setting on my light select switch and in the USA daytime running lights are not mandated. I've run my fog lights with daytime running lights only many times; park, drive, reverse....doesn't matter.

 

Re the picture of your 3, I was very much admiring the scenery behind.

Nice clean snow, (that not really unusual), and a nice clean 3 as well - not so common.

The day did not look too cold, hence my surprise with how clean and sharp your 3 was - like you were doing an advertising spot for a Land Rover Super Bowl ad.

The spots within the rubber push bar seem very appropriate and tend to help blend the push bar into the front end. That new style push bar design has never been a favorite of mine to look at, but on your 3 with the black coloured paint and big spots, it seems very right. On my silver 3, the same install would just not look as good.

Re the white marker lights or whatever they are called, I did change out the tungsten bulbs to LEDs to more closely match the colour of the Xeons - never thought about doing them in yellow, but then the signal lights are amber so ... For whatever reason, I like the amber signal light colour in the front and hence have not done the "detango" thing that seems popular in the UK - that is removing the amber plastic and then using amber LED's or bulbs as the signal lights.

To even dig myself a deeper hole, I much prefer my factory red tail lights with the factory tungsten bulbs over the LED LR4 units.

 

If I recall it was a cold day by Washington standards...around 0 deg F. I detail my LR3 myself and I'm meticulous about it. It gets dirty! ...but I clean it.

I like the ARB style bull bar, but I can't get myself to ditch the A-frame. I like it. I agree that some things look different on various colored vehicles. Thanks for the compliments.

 

I found you a black D4 with the ARB already fitted in Australia.

Note that the bonnet carries the DISCOVERY lettering rather than LAND ROVER - not my idea of product improvement.

It is a matter of taste I suppose, but I like the look of yours over the D4 with ARB.

What I was really looking for was a jpg of a white D3 with black ARB and a pair of real nice 12"? Hella ribbed glass lens off road lights; one light with a spot light lens and the second light with the wide angle lens - that combo looked good.