Hard Korr Lighting Install Part 1

Dirtraveler partnered up with Hard Korr Lighting when the van was purchased. I knew that I wanted a lighting package that meant business. Hard Korr Lighting hails from the Australian Outback where high end lighting is needed on a daily basis. Their products have blown my expectations out of the water from the unboxing to the install to the light output. 

This write up will cover the roof rack lighting consisting of (2) 10w Floods, (6) 20w Flood Pods, and (4) BZR 210 Driving Lights.

Starting with the mounting, I chose to keep all the lights attached to the roof rack in order to maintain the pop top's functionality. Even spacing is purely for aesthetics but I just followed the cross bars. The rear floods act as dust lights and reversing lights which come in very handy. Parking this van is a chore and having as much possible light at night eases a lot of nervousness when parallel parking. 

I had some aluminum angle left over from a prior project, so I chopped and drilled up some simple brackets. I did invest in a threaded rivet kit, which is pricey but is just so useful for projects like this. Instead of drilling a through hole and running a bolt and nut. You just drill a blind hole, set the correct threaded rivet, crimp in the hole, and boom. You're all set.

The rear lights were even more simple due to the included mounts.

The elevated height allows for the lights to be visible in dust. However, in a lower position these 10w floods will not be bright enough as dust lights. I would suggest the 20w models.

For the light rack I went with a Smitty Built light cage made for 9" round lights. I had to modify the roof rack to use the included brackets. The BZR 210's sit nicely up on top, although the draw back is the weight of the cage and lights. I will probably change this to a light bar in the future, but it looks badass. All of the lights include a pre made waterproof connection, making proper wiring installs even easier.

For wiring I went with an SPOD with Touch Screen. I thought about building my own relay controller but with the time savings and compactness I went with SPOD. The customizable touch screen actually allowed for more options than I originally thought. With options like dimming, stroke, flash, momentary, labels, battery monitoring, and expansion up to 3 total controllers totaling 24 circuits. The SPOD is some serious hardware. To maintain the functionality of the pop top I needed to make a wiring harness that had enough service to allow the top to open with out binding. I chose to go with an aircraft style bulkhead connector and an outdoor junction box. This allows for easy removal of lights and ability to change out wiring with out disturbing the bulkhead connection.

When building your wiring harness be sure to reference basic electrical guides. Ensure your wiring size is proper to the voltage and current that he circuit will use and go one or two gauges larger. Make sure you know the difference between series and parallel, you will either increase your voltage or your amperage. Give plenty of service length, don't find yourself in a situation where you are pulling wires tight or have them contacting something that could result in damage. Watch some YouTube and get your basics down, have any questions feel free to reach out!