The next thing we tackled was winter lighting. It’s dark about 20 hours a day in February in the Arctic, so we wanted some serious illumination in front of our vehicles. The challenge is compounded because the rally rules allow no more than 4 additional lights to be added to each car. Our Mitsubishi Outlanders came equipped with HID headlights, so we decided to stick with the same technology with a set of 8-inch KC Hilites HID rally lights for one of our cars, and a set of Hella H500s for the other. One wide-beam flood and a pencil beam light on each car should be more than enough to light up our lives.

Both Canadian Law and the rally rules require us to ensure that all lights dip to low with a single switch, and we didn’t want to take any chances with the basic vehicle wiring, so we wired up fused relays to isolate our rally lights from the headlights. This is easier to do than most people think, and the instructions on the back of the relay packet are more than sufficient for the amateur in a home garage. Simply connect the relay to the hot lead for the bright beams, and carry the main current for the rally lights straight from the battery through the relay and then to the lights. In this way, you won’t ask your vehicle’s headlight wiring to carry the extra current for the additional lights.