Adding led lights to 9540

Tooljunkie

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L1501,home built carry all, mini plow blade.
May 13, 2014
4,150
33
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60
Lac Du Bonnet, Manitoba,Canada
A farmer friend put a couple led lamps in roof of his tractor. Amazing!!inexpensive and take little power to run. Lights up 1/2mile because they so high.
 

sheepfarmer

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L3560, B2650, Gator, Ingersoll mower
Nov 14, 2014
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MidMichigan
Thanks skeets! I'm pretty sure there is nothing faintly resembling a cigarette lighter on this tractor, but I found a cluster of wires by the base of the seat that the manual labels "for use with an implement (total 10 A)". I took this to mean some thing on the 3 pt hitch, and there is no commitment on voltage. But maybe they would do. I'll try downloading the electrical circuit for this tractor and see how far I get. My electronics mostly consists of finding shorts and broken wires.
 

85Hokie

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BX-25D ,PTB. Under Armor, '90&'92-B7100HST's, '06 BX1850 FEL
Jul 13, 2013
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Bedford - VA
I am wondering if it would work ok to hook an LED light bar as in the links above up to a separate 12 volt car battery stashed (neatly in some kind of box) behind the seat? The reason for this inelegant solution is that I don't want to touch one electron of the Kubota's system while it is under warrantee and given all its fancy computer stuff. Also I don't plan on too much after dark work, but just occasional finishing up of projects, so it wouldn't require a lot of recharging.
Sheep,

If you add a "new" fuse box - you have a "pos" and "neg" from the battery being used ONLY:)

or

http://www.amazon.com/LAMPHUS-CRUIZ...im_auto_1?ie=UTF8&refRID=02KZXK9J8090NDQN5GTM

would be better for the one circuit

This way you can run what you want/ how you want and have everything self contained. The only link is TO the battery - IF you use another battery, you will have to charge THAT battery.....and in that case, either you charge it off the electrical system of the tractor and run the battery down and then recharge OR you charge it via the alternator ON the tractor....which WOULD be taxing the total system! If you really want to get off the tractors grid, get you a small lawn tractor battery - have your lights on a battery clip and then like you said - you can use the lights and then take the battery out to recharge. A small $30 lawn battery would hold 2 of these lights for a couple of hours, that is a 3 amp/hour draw - and only if a couple of hours it would be fine.

these would add plenty of light ......

http://www.amazon.com/SHANREN-water...425223497&sr=8-1&keywords=led+off+road+lights

your light bar will provide MORE light , but draws a lot more amps!
the light bars "amp rating" is a little misleading ...

1.Total of 120W(3W X 40 pieces LEDs) at 6,000K Color Temperature,Current draw 8.2A @ 12V, 4.1A @ 24V
you do the math - 8.2 x 12 volts = ???? now what they REALLY mean is that a fully charged tractor RUNNING with a ALTERNATOR charging the battery at about 13.5 volts.....that will get you back down to about 8+ amps

The disadvantage of the light bar - it is fixed other than tilting up and down, now it does light up the forest :D but question is - do you need that much light to only work in the dark a little bit of time? Or does it look damn sexy?:eek: ...ok it does look damn good!

Some of you guys are talking about lights that are drawing a good bit of amps, your tractor has a 45 amp alternator on it !:D

I understand the concern of the warranty - but for the same cost you could have your cake and eat it too! :)

You do what you need to do ! If you are thinking about the light bar type - the extra battery idea will almost be taxed to death!:(
 

Tallahassee Kubota Man

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Equipment
M5140HD/LA1153/LandPride RCF2072/DirtDog disc/RakeMaster grapple/Caroni tiller
Shaunblake, they will be an addition. Time to do some calculations.

N I Wolfman, had to laugh when I read your post and thought "what was I thinking?"
I should have said I wanted to tie into the wiring that's under the fender and where the flashers are located. On a previous install I used an empty wire (which had a connector) that was part of a line of wires that fed the flashers. That extra wire was controlled only by the key. My new tractor has an unused wire on both sides of the ROPS. I'm guessing Kubota put these there for auxiliary lighting?

Anyhow, that's my story and I'm stickin' to it! :)
 

sheepfarmer

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L3560, B2650, Gator, Ingersoll mower
Nov 14, 2014
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Thanks hokie, that gives me a lot to think about. I hit upon my original notion because I havea salvaged car battery lying around, and I thought that a bar would survive being hit by branches better if I tucked it on the under side of the rops. I can't seem to get the drift of how high that thing is. But I can see another approach might be better in the long run. I will do some thinking before I order!
 

steve3393

New member

Equipment
M9540, KX080 , 1100c rtv
Feb 25, 2015
5
0
1
BUFFALO NY

steve3393

New member

Equipment
M9540, KX080 , 1100c rtv
Feb 25, 2015
5
0
1
BUFFALO NY
LED, LED, LED, LED!!

Spots, spot floods, single or double row light bars, front. back-as many as you can find room to mount!

Look for units that are IP67 or 68 compliant (means dust, insects, field debris, water/condensate can't migrate into the housing)

A 3 Watt LED light will generate such an abundance of light it will "amaze you", a 5 Watt version will blind you!

Forget everything you think you know about wattage in the cottage! LED's have little to no load, will last forever, emit continuous white light without fixture shadow or dead spots, are not subject to flicker caused from varying electrical output or vibration and are relatively inexpensive.

Don't worry about which manufacturer made the LED in the light you settle on (CREE, Epistar, Osram) they're very much on the same in terms of lumens, heat dissipation and circuit board technology contained in the housing.

In terms of brands, there are so many good quality "house brands" out there now all offering a relatively similar quality that paying more for a Rigid Industries or Vision-X doesn't make sense and your wife won't approve of you paying more than necessary for lights anyway!!

Look more for a light that feels "solid" and one that offers flexibility in mounting.

After you install some, post back some pictures of your tractor and don't forget to post one of yourself; it will be the one where your Kubota is in the background with the lights illuminating an area the size of an airfield with you in the foreground two thumbs up with a huge grin on your face!

Ohhhhhhhhh ya!

LED lights on your Kubota; does it get any better?
thx any idea how to mount these lights on the roof, is their a standard mount available ?
 

steve3393

New member

Equipment
M9540, KX080 , 1100c rtv
Feb 25, 2015
5
0
1
BUFFALO NY

Burt

New member

Equipment
L3700SU, box blade, 6 foot rhino blade, 1 bottom plow, 3 point receiver hitch.
Mar 24, 2012
337
1
0
Goldendale, WA USA
DSC_0313.jpg Installing lights,

There is no magic "bar" or template or hanger to follow for light installations.

Therefore, I highly recommend Click Bond. Click bond allows you to mount them where you want, how you want without the added rust attractions of hangers, supports or hardware that is bugly.

Please spend some time looking at click bond on you tube. Go to you tube and "digs gardens." You will see our installation there. There are a lot of posts about click bond. www.youtube.com/watch?v=7l7k3ScZxj0 is our installation on an L3700SU (same as L3800).

Our installation was done using Click Bond and you can see how much tidier it is because of the lack of supporting hardware. Do some homework and check other guys installations on this site. You will find many recommendations for the Click Bond and it is how I found out how handy this product is.

Burt
 

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