To chicken light, or not

I posted a picture of the wiring I hacked out of my cab's dash a while ago. Suprised the truck never burnt to the ground. Good thing its a 40 year old truck and it can be rewired completely in a matter of a few days.

 

If I were wiring up chicken lights (and I will, once I get something to hang them on), they're going to be run off their own dedicated fuse panel, completely independent of any other wiring circuits. Switched accordingly as well, so OEM switches = OEM lighting, and chicken switch = SUNSHINE BABY! Sometimes incognito at night is useful...

So, to answer OP's question... light 'er up!

 

That was my plan to, even went as far as buying the fuse panel and planing out how everything would be wired. Then the new truck showed up with 4 spare switches and 10 unused circuits on the factory fuse panel. Makes it pretty easy to hook things up and look factory.

 

If you were pulling a refer, and it's a 900, then I'd have to say you need to rival the mother ship from Close Encounters.

 

Many years ago you could get a ticket for a chicken light out, I sure got my fair share of them in Tennessee and Virginia. But that was changed a long time ago.

 

I've always been told that too. And have had a number of arguments here on TTR about it. I just try to keep them all working and go from there. Makes more sense than worrying about what DOT officer will or won't write it up. It also makes more sense to fix it than to argue about it.

 

The only people I run into are poorly educated techs at the truckstop who say "it's got to work." A one word answer "no" is clear enough to me!

 

Arizona if there's a light on the truck it has to work.

 

The less junk you hang on your truck, the less problems you will have.
It's also easier to get lost in the crowd if need be.

Knew a trucker that was obsessed with lights, had a couple hundred on the truck, kept burning out alternators and kept replacing or rebuilding them, then added a second alternator to keep up with the lights, was seen on the side of road many times trying to fix shorts, replacing bulbs and changing alternators.

He never did catch on, his lights were his top priority, the downtime and costs weren't even a thought or consideration.
I'm surprised that truck never caught fire with all the shoddy wiring on it.