Batboard

hey guys
hopefully a simple question.... how do you guys seal the connections between your hideaway strobe tubes and the cable leading to the power supply?
i have a 2000 f150 with hideaways in the fog lights, headlights, front turn signals, rear brakes, and reverse lights. the heads i have problems with most frequently are the fog light hideaways followed by the reverse light hideaways. my guess is that water is causing a short at the connection between the cable and the tube (which i am just using the standard strobe amp connectors for) because if i disconnect the tubes from the cables and turn the supply back on the other heads on the supply still do not work whereas if i disconnect the same cables from the supply then the additional heads do work. also i reinstalled the tubes a couble days ago to ensure there was no moisture getting into the light housing and i sealed all around the tube with silicone. i also tried siliconing the ends of the amp connectors which seemed to help for a little while but now after going through the car wash they are not working again.


any ideas on proper connections between hideaways and strobe cable which is outside the vehicle would be greatly appreciated.

thanks

dialectric grease... seek your nearest radio shack...

so still use the amp connectors just seal the ends off with dialectric greese?

Well I tried everything they said and still had problems on my Super-Duty. I removed the plastic hoods and covered the pins with good heat shrink. Next I covered all of them with anotehr piece of heat shrink. As of yet (2 winters later) I have had no more problems.

Jeff

If you really want to get anal, you can always buy the Deutsch waterproof connectors and go that route. Unfortunately, they're big, expensive, and harder to work with.

how I usualy do it, if I don't want to buy Deutsch connectors is I put heat shrink over the AMP Connector and strobe cable going in to it, put dialectric grease in between the two amp connectors, and then put heatshrink over the two amp connectors creating a seal.

yea i was kinda thinking the heat shrink rout just wanted to avoid buying a heat shrink gun if possible. guess ill have to though. thanks so much for the insight.

-zach

Actually, an EASY fix for this problem is liquid electrical tape, available @ your local auto parts store, as well as some hardware stores. You goop it onto the back of the connector where the wires go into, let it dry for about 15 min. and it's good to go. I've used this in several wet applications and it has never let me down. A can of it runs about $4-5, but you cat get a lot of use out of it!

lunzac wrote:yea i was kinda thinking the heat shrink rout just wanted to avoid buying a heat shrink gun if possible. guess ill have to though. thanks so much for the insight.

-zach

if you don't want to get a heat gun, a lighter works, just keep it far enough away that it doesn't burn, it should suffice.

FedSig is supplying their strobes with the waterproof Packard connectors as an option as well and it is what I will spec the next time I do a set. You just have to order it that way

Birken

lunzac wrote:yea i was kinda thinking the heat shrink rout just wanted to avoid buying a heat shrink gun if possible. guess ill have to though. thanks so much for the insight.

oh come on! you spent all the time it took to install hideaways in your truck and now you want to NOT get a heat gun to install heatshrink? Hell, if you're only gonna use it sporadically, just get a arts and crafts one for like $15 bucks (that's 5 butane lighters), it will do the job (if take a little longer). Now it's not a big 1500w heat gun, but it will do the job for your car (and the occasional other time you will use it). Granted it's not the best tool for the job, but it is the right one.

Forget about grease, heat-shrink tubing, and all that crap. Use to do that. Just put on the Deutsch connectors and you can forget it. The male and female pins are simple to put on. Have been using on DOT trucks with ZERO problems. Insert the crimped connectors THRU the orange seal, click, and put in the front keeper. The center pin crimp of an AMP blue handled manual crimper works nice. Go easy twice at 90 degree angles and the pin will not come off. You do not need a special tool.

I agree that Deutsch are nice and I have "pin crimped" them too but they are a single source supplier, and kind of a pain to get for a small volume user like most of us. The Metri-Pack or Weather-Pack connectors from Packard are much easier to get ahold of, FedSig supplies them as an option on their corner strobes in the first place, and also you can buy them through Waytek Wire and in a pinch at NAPA. I agree, grease is a temporary solution.

Birken

and this is why we only use tomar with waterproof connectors on most of our installs...