Thinking about adding led light bar...

[scot moore]

Ok, so I am still not sure in the end what I am going to do. Right now I am leaning towards a light bar behind the grille. I can’t decide if I like the way the bars on the front look. I did start mounting 2 small led spot lights on the front. They were smaller then I was expecting, but I think they will look ok once I get them finished. Here is the first one mounted on.



I still have to get it aimed, and tweak the mounting. It is small, but they are really bright


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[scot moore]

Still have some tweaking to do, but here is a few shots of them at night. Had to lower my exposure a lot obviously since looking right at them.





Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[scot moore]

A quick update. I am going to try a light bar on the roof. I purchased a Sirius single row light bar. It is a 42” with a ip69k rating and A lifetime warranty. I only have 2 pics right now test fitting it. Still has the blue film on the lenses. I am going to mount it just behind the moon roof. I’ll add pictures of the installation and progress as I get time to work on it.






Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[The_Burban]

The fogs are not enough?

Up on the roof, expect whistling.. need to make adjustments, easy enough, to prevent/limit sounds.

Why far back? Will a roof mount bracket from a Tahoe work?

 

[scot moore]

The fogs are not enough?

Up on the roof, expect whistling.. need to make adjustments, easy enough, to prevent/limit sounds.

Why far back? Will a roof mount bracket from a Tahoe work?

The fogs help, but I wanted to have the ability to throw more light. I didn’t put a bar behind the grille because I was afraid with the Denali style grille too much of the light would be blocked. It is only open about 50%. As far as sound I am hoping it won’t be to bad, but it is a concern. The location is mostly to make the wife happy. Though I didn’t know if I wanted a big 50” light bar right above the windshield. On the roof I can either go in front of the antenna, or behind the moon roof. In This location it sticks out less and make the wife happier about the light bar. I am not sure about the brackets from a Tahoe. I would guess they would be the same. Right now, the way I am thinking about mounting it is with a custom fab bracket that attaches to the roof rail and positions it where I want it. I did not want to drill into the roof or the gutter by the door. I may not even keep the light bar up there. If I decide I don’t like the look, or it just isn’t used or needed after all, or too much sound, or the wife really doesn’t like it, i will take it back off. I don’t want to drill and mount something if I don’t even know if I will keep it on there.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[The_Burban]

The fogs help, but I wanted to have the ability to throw more light. I didn’t put a bar behind the grille because I was afraid with the Denali style grille too much of the light would be blocked. It is only open about 50%. As far as sound I am hoping it won’t be to bad, but it is a concern. The location is mostly to make the wife happy. Though I didn’t know if I wanted a big 50” light bar right above the windshield. On the roof I can either go in front of the antenna, or behind the moon roof. In This location it sticks out less and make the wife happier about the light bar. I am not sure about the brackets from a Tahoe. I would guess they would be the same. Right now, the way I am thinking about mounting it is with a custom fab bracket that attaches to the roof rail and positions it where I want it. I did not want to drill into the roof or the gutter by the door. I may not even keep the light bar up there. If I decide I don’t like the look, or it just isn’t used or needed after all, or too much sound, or the wife really doesn’t like it, i will take it back off. I don’t want to drill and mount something if I don’t even know if I will keep it on there.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I recall a behind the grill LED bar on a Denali somewhere here on the web..a pick-up.... it seemed to not be affected heavily (though the grill is certainly blocking given it's density).

Thing I have noticed is, and maybe it is my cheap eBay bar, the throw of LEDs is weak. I am considering dumping my 30" bar behind the grill and doing good old fashioned KC fogs. This may be a problem with my purchase and not with LEDs. It was a "combo" flood and spot.

Cut out grill to accommodate lights? Use lower grill for a ~20" bar?

 

[scot moore]

I recall a behind the grill LED bar on a Denali somewhere here on the web..a pick-up.... it seemed to not be affected heavily (though the grill is certainly blocking given it's density).

Thing I have noticed is, and maybe it is my cheap eBay bar, the throw of LEDs is weak. I am considering dumping my 30" bar behind the grill and doing good old fashioned KC fogs. This may be a problem with my purchase and not with LEDs. It was a "combo" flood and spot.

Cut out grill to accommodate lights? Use lower grill for a ~20" bar?

the throw distance is what was hurting me on my 2 small leds I put in place of the tow hooks. they are bright, but I had to aim them down to keep from glaring in someone's eyes. the distance wasn't as good as I thought before I mounted them. that combined with aiming them down left me only somewhat happy with the results. after my wife was really against adding any kind of bull bar to the front of the Yukon, I had decided if I was going to add more I would add a 20" bar in the lower grill like you suggested. I was going to cut out around it and then use a grommet around the cut out to give me a clean edge. This is the direction I was going until I saw a post on another website with a different brand SUV, but the guy did something similar to what I am leaning towards now. I got my idea from him. I'll see if I can find the post again. Anyway I think I am going to try this and see what results I get. I did shine this light bar on some treetops about a block away, and it had a very focused spot beam that looked like it would shoot 10 times as far, and it lit or the hole area pretty good. I am curious to see how well it does on the car.

I could have really used it this past weekend as I was at my parents farm and had to fix some fence at night where a tree had fallen. The cows were out and we had to get them back in before fixing the fence. The extra light would have been very helpful.


here is that link.

https://forum.ih8mud.com/threads/discreet-40-led-lightbar-on-factory-roof-rack.935112/

 

[The_Burban]

the throw distance is what was hurting me on my 2 small leds I put in place of the tow hooks. they are bright, but I had to aim them down to keep from glaring in someone's eyes. the distance wasn't as good as I thought before I mounted them. that combined with aiming them down left me only somewhat happy with the results. after my wife was really against adding any kind of bull bar to the front of the Yukon, I had decided if I was going to add more I would add a 20" bar in the lower grill like you suggested. I was going to cut out around it and then use a grommet around the cut out to give me a clean edge. This is the direction I was going until I saw a post on another website with a different brand SUV, but the guy did something similar to what I am leaning towards now. I got my idea from him. I'll see if I can find the post again. Anyway I think I am going to try this and see what results I get. I did shine this light bar on some treetops about a block away, and it had a very focused spot beam that looked like it would shoot 10 times as far, and it lit or the hole area pretty good. I am curious to see how well it does on the car.

I could have really used it this past weekend as I was at my parents farm and had to fix some fence at night where a tree had fallen. The cows were out and we had to get them back in before fixing the fence. The extra light would have been very helpful.


here is that link.

https://forum.ih8mud.com/threads/discreet-40-led-lightbar-on-factory-roof-rack.935112/

That ih8mud link, is pretty awesome.

 

[scot moore]

Ok I have made some progress. Here are the 2 brackets. Not finished but most of the holes drilled.



Still need to round off those corners and trim the top. Going to make it close to the cardboard shown here.



Drilling some holes for the adjustment slot.





I didn’t make the slot quite big enough for the screw so I will have to make it a little bigger.

Here it is for a test fit on the Yukon.





And some of the mounting hardware and fitment.









I still have to run the wiring and shape the brackets. After I get the shape I want I will either send them off for powered coating or paint them. It is solid though. And I didn’t get any noticeable noice, though I haven’t got to drive over 45mph yet. I will post more as I get more done.





Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[scot moore]

Good news. Drove 75mph for 20 mins with no detectable noises.

Bad news. Drove on a rough road and had some vibrations from up and down movement. With the light forward this far it puts a lot of leverage on the roof rail. Enough to let the roof rail flex and cause a noise. I have already came up with a fix for this, I will test fit it and take more pictures.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk