Where do you tap 12v from?

Hello gents, I'm adding spotlights to my gen 3. Got the wiring properly set up during a test with fuse, relay and switch, everything works quite well.

What I wonder is where do you usually get your 12v from to power these accessories? I understand that I can simply attach an eye terminal to the battery positive, but that bypasses the main car fuse and I'd like to tap from a location after it. I confess that I tried to disassemble the main fuse box to take a look at it but after undoing some screws and plastic lock tabs it won't budge out of its position, probably because of all the cable harnesses with considerable thickness holding it in place.

Has anyone done something like this and mind sharing their experience? Any tips on accessing the wiring under the fuse box? Or is there some other method of tapping the 12v line that is recommended?

Personally I wouldn't bother with the main fuse box. As a rule they aren't designed to have additional aftermarket wiring added. Some cars such as the new Bronco or Ineos Grenadier have pre-wired accessory switches, but nothing like this exists in the Jimny.

I'd just use a wiring kit with an inline fuse and directly connect to the 12v battery. If you plan on other accessories you could fit a remote 2nd fuse box and wire it through that.

Yes, go direct to the battery, that way you can select properly rated wire and fuses and trim the wire to the correct length.

Roger

Make sure you ground to the engine grounding point as it can cause issues with back feeding and distorting sensor values etc

wrote:

Make sure you ground to the engine grounding point as it can cause issues with back feeding and distorting sensor values etc

My suggestion would be the exact opposite of this - don't connect anything to the engine grounding point as it can cause issues - all the other lights are grounded via the sheet metal. The headlamps are very slightly different, they are negatively switched, so they are grounded via whatever relay or switch controls them, but they too are grounded to the sheet metal.

Thanks for the input, everyone. I suppose I'll make a dedicated accessory box and a nice harness straight from battery plus and try to make it look factory made.
I'm grounding at the screw that is attached to the sheet metal right next to the battery. It looked to me like a star grounding point with something like 4 eye terminals already attached to it. Since the spotlights are a separate system I set them up as always grounded and the positive is switched via relay; but the relay coil is negative switched to play nice with the high beams (so that the spotlights may only be switched on when high beams are on as well).

I wired a new ECU into the Jimny and part of a wiring course I did was about star point earthing. I have the wiring diagram and are fully aware of all the earth points but good practise is to go to the block.