Any ideas on Mounting extra auxiliary LED headlights?

[Hound]

I have a pair of GROTE LED spot lights I would like to mount on the front of my '16 RTL.
There is too much plastic and minimum metal places to mount them.
They are square and measure about 3.5" x 3.5" x 3.5" with a single bolt mount.
I've seen smaller LEDs mounted on the A-arms but not sure how, and light bars
mounted on the lower center plastic, again, not sure how.
Any ideas are appreciated.

 

[BertRemington]

What bulbs are in your headlights? In your foglights?

I assume your lights are 64Z51. Why did you choose that beam pattern?

 

[Hound]

I have the square BZ221-5 spotlight pattern.
I have replaced the bike's headlights with LED's.
I did not replace the fog lights with LEDs.

Looking for more light when I ride to work early in the AM
looking for the deer, etc. along the road.

 

[EdMat]

Think about a threaded sleeve with a stud in one end that would screw into the lower or upper screw hole of the wind deflector. The light would mount to the other sleeve end turned sideways.

 

[BertRemington]

Yeah I though it would be deer. When my friends and I attended the 2016 Bonneville Speed Week, we commuted between Wells and Wendover in early morning and early evening. I had wondered why all the tractors had these huge bull bars and the first day of the drive I discovered why. After that I tried to ensure I wasn't the leader.

Apparently deer are sensitive to white light which often causes them to freeze and then when the light dims they dash away in some direction, often too late for a motorist to avoid them.

Thinking about lighting during that commute, my conclusion was wide-angle (foglight) beams aimed about 45 degrees off axis would keep the deer frozen until I went by. Because deer are so sensitive to white light, the lights didn't have to be very bright -- not as bright as headlight main lobe but brighter than side lobe to avoid the light level shift triggering the dash away movement.

While we don't have your deer problem in SoCal I do use that lighting for my motorcycle for our backcountry dark and winding roads.

And that would be my recommendation to you. Mount the lights on top of your fenders and aim them 45 degrees off-axis level or slightly downwards to avoid dazzling on-coming drivers.

I would also buy one of these: https://www.findmespot.com/en-us/

 

[Bfromla]

I have a pair of GROTE LED spot lights I would like to mount on the front of my '16 RTL.
There is too much plastic and minimum metal places to mount them.
They are square and measure about 3.5" x 3.5" x 3.5" with a single bolt mount.
I've seen smaller LEDs mounted on the A-arms but not sure how, and light bars
mounted on the lower center plastic, again, not sure how.
Any ideas are appreciated.

Umm what mount brackets do they offer? Few various options to that from band strap around A arm or using existing bolt holes somewhere with a longer stud. Maybe even drilling through bumpskid Please pics of the lights & where you like to try something.
Course additional option: LED bump skid from SpyderPops :firstplace::2thumbs:

 

[Hound]

Umm what mount brackets do they offer? Few various options to that from band strap around A arm or using existing bolt holes somewhere with a longer stud. Maybe even drilling through bumpskid Please pics of the lights & where you like to try something.
Course additional option: LED bump skid from SpyderPops View attachment 205500:firstplace::2thumbs:

here is a link to the light. I've been thinking about the band clamp
I'm looking for more forward light to fill in the space between low beams and high beams, if that makes any sense.
https://www.grote.com/white-light/work-lighting/britezone-led-work-lights/BZ221-5/

 

[Peter Aawen]

here is a link to the light. I've been thinking about the band clamp
I'm looking for more forward light to fill in the space between low beams and high beams, if that makes any sense.
https://www.grote.com/white-light/work-lighting/britezone-led-work-lights/BZ221-5/

If those lights are anything like the lights going by the same make/model/description we get here in Oz, then you won't get a great deal of 'distance lighting' from those lights, certainly not anything that really 'fills the space between your low beams and high beams', as the light from them, while LED 'Bright', isn't likely to project much further than your Low Beam lights if at all, probably not even extending any further than the low mount Fog Lights you get over there that we get as a poor excuse for Low Beam headlights here in Oz, cos those Lights are designed to light up your close in Work space, while the Fogs are designed to have less distance penetration & less upward light scatter in fog than your 'normal' Low Beam!! :lecturef_smilie:

The lights in your link are Work Lights, designed to provide a fairly wide spread of short-range light, not a wide or slightly narrower beam with any 'distance penetrating' capability of any benefit beyond your Low Beams... You really want a 'Forward Lighting' Driving Light or a really good Fog Light with a wide but relatively 'cut-off' beam mounted up high to give you the distance you need beyond your Low Beam light spread while not necessarily penetrating as far/high as your High Beam! Like many others, maybe you could even mount those Driving or Fog Lights off the little 'plastic' OEM 'winglets' that are just underneath the bottom outer corners of the Windscreen on the 2010-2019 RT's hyea: You wouldn't be the first person to have done that, and I don't think that any of us who have done so have had any significant concerns or issues with using the 'plastic' winglets as a base/mounting position for a lightweight Driving Light?!

 

[Bfromla]

If those lights are anything like the lights going by the same make/model/description we get here in Oz, then you won't get a great deal of 'distance lighting' from those lights, certainly not anything that really 'fills the space between your low beams and high beams', as the light from them, while LED 'Bright', isn't likely to project much further than your Low Beam lights if at all, probably not even extending any further than the low mount Fog Lights you get over there that we get as a poor excuse for Low Beam headlights here in Oz, cos those Fog Lights are designed to have less penetration & therefore less light scatter in fog than your 'normal' Low Beam!! :lecturef_smilie:

The lights in your link are Work Lights, designed to provide a fairly wide spread of short-range light, not a wide or even narrower beam with any 'distance penetrating' capability of any benefit beyond your Low Beams... You really want a 'Forward Lighting' Driving Light or a really good Fog Light with a wide but 'cut-off' beam mounted up high to give you the distance you need beyond your Low Beam light spread - maybe even mount those Fogs off the little 'plastic' OEM 'winglets' that are just underneath the bottom outer corners of the Windscreen on the 2010-2019 RT's hyea: You wouldn't be the first person to have done that, and I don't think that any of us who have done so have had any issues with using the 'plastic' as a base/mounting position for a lightweight Driving Light?!

:thumbup::agree: not to mention vibration issues, ya LED might not burn out, but the support will not hold position. Soon will be looking at squirrels & or anything else not intended- maybe even self. There are plenty of options available in & -out of box. Other bike FYI not as much for beam lighting road, or decorative lighting. Does also double as amber blinkers. So hopefully more SEE me light.

 

[BertRemington]

Okay I thought it was about the deer. Basically spotting the deer that will get you is right before you hit it. You need to keep them frozen until you go by.

But if you want more light on the road, then you want 55W HID HB3/9005 6000K for your headlights. Takes a bit of work and care to install but nothing else puts so much light on the road. HID works for USA Spyders because they use a shutter for Hi/Lo beam for continuous HID operation (they take about 10 seconds to fully come up to temperature).

Then for your foglights H8 LEDs. I don't like fans but you might not have much choice to get the lumens. I suggest 4500K for those rainy/foggy days and to soften the contrasts of the 6000K headlights. You'll probably have to lose some lumens to get the lower color temperature.

Add-on lights are always problematic in the tradeoff between illumination and aggravation. I agree with Peter on beam control. A sharp vertical cutoff will reduce aggravation and associated flashing (if not just leaving their Hi beams on).

Try the headlight and foglight upgrade before adding more lights. Unless you want to focus on the deer problem.

 

[BamaJohn]

clearwaterlights.com has mounting brackets for their Darla lights which mount onto the front fender brackets. That separates the fog lights from the headlights to give a triangle picture of lighting to oncoming motorists, plus the lights point wherever the wheels point.
I have this set up on my 2020 Spyder RT and use their yellow lens covers which really stands out. Vertical and horizontal adjustment is possible.View attachment D2_5621f442-f28f-4a14-8112-6a75188bcff7.png.pdf

 

[troop]

On my F3S, and soon on my RT S2S, I mounted a small 2" round pair of aux lights to my inner fender. Drilled the small hole to attach the lights using a button head screw from the inside. I routed the wiring to the lower customer accessory wire connection, so off/on with the ignition switch. From the photo, I will be using the lights positioned on the lower portion of the bumper guard. They are 2" and have ebay gun scope caps on them to flip open from amber > clear.

 

[cruisinTX]

I have a pair of GROTE LED spot lights I would like to mount on the front of my '16 RTL.
There is too much plastic and minimum metal places to mount them.
They are square and measure about 3.5" x 3.5" x 3.5" with a single bolt mount.
I've seen smaller LEDs mounted on the A-arms but not sure how, and light bars
mounted on the lower center plastic, again, not sure how.
Any ideas are appreciated.

My take away from this is you are looking for a place to mount lights that you already have with a single mounting bolt. I had a similar dilemma when looking for a good spot to mount some driving lights on a motorcycle several years ago. I wanted the down very low and separated as far as possible. I chose to put them just under the heads by drilling a hole in the fairing, then to add strength made use of a 3" x 3" backing plate on the inside of the fairing. I made that plate out of 14ga stainless steel with the same size hole as through the fairing right in the center. Over the course of 10 years and 62000 miles that set-up never gave me a problem. No movement of the lights and no cracks developed in the fairing. I did have to make my backing plate contoured to fit the curve of the fairing but that was a pretty easy task.

 

[troop]

Just finished installing some aux lights to the inner front fenders on my 2022 S2S. I routed the wiring to the accessory connection on the right side. Good news is install went great and lights are awesome. Bad news is using the accessory connection likely killed my already spotty FM radio reception. No big deal as I either use my phone or IPod. They are unaffected.