Sabre
Overlanding Nurse
I sold my trusty '01 Montero not long ago. We had a blast in that thing but it was becoming more challenging to find parts. Not that it needed much work at all, but...well, it was time. Its replacement is this '19 Colorado ZR2 Bison with the baby Duramax diesel. It came with this silly bumper (which will have a winch some time in the coming year) and a bed rack. The first thing I did was fit 33" Falken Wildpeaks AT3s...what a dramatic improvement from the stupidly fat tires it came with!
I recently installed a light bar and wanted a location for the switch that blended into the cockpit, something that looked as close to OEM as possible. I had already wired in my SAE amber fog lights to the Colorado's wiring so that they switch (and indicate) with the OEM driving light controls. As the light bar will only be used when using high beams, it made sense to relate these two together; the turn signal stalk, also used for high beams, seemed a natural place to put the switch.
I started by mounting the Rough Country Black Series LED light bar into the Relentless Fabrication front bumper. The light comes with a nice wiring harness with relay and remote switch. I opened the fuse box and accessed one of the two high beam circuits (#38 if memory serves) with a circuit tap. This wire, which feeds out a small drain hole that GM thoughtfully placed in the bottom of the fuse box, feeds a second relay that powers up the system when high beams are on.
I had no idea what the inside of the turn signal stalk looked like, but knew that other trim levels of the Colorado have the selector switch for the dashboard data system there. Therefore it must be possible to fish wires down the inside of the stalk. I ordered a used stalk ($13 on ebay) and proceeded to disassemble it. Refer to the photo below.
From left to right we have the end cap, a narrow trim ring, the knurled ring (the section that moves in those other models), and finally the body of the stalk itself. The thing is snapped together at the factory, but it's not designed to ever be disassembled. I started by removing the little narrow trim ring, a destructive process. This gave access to the gap between the knurled ring and end cap. Some brute force prying, pulling and twisting soon had the end cap and knurled ring removed. There's no metal inside the stalk, just a lot of inner plastic fins. I used a small die grinder attachment on a Dremel tool to rout out the inside of the stalk, going to needle-nose pliers to reach down inside to pull out a few more bits in order to make it easier to fish the wires. The same tool routed out the inside of the end cap and opened up the end of it. I had ordered an illuminated rocker switch (the switch that came with the light bar is illuminated so the wiring harness already comes this way). Happily, the switch is made from plastic that is an exact color match for the stalk and fits perfectly after the end cap is opened up.
I removed those two screws in the above pic and opened the square base of the switch. After soldering three light-gauge wires to the switch's terminals (12v, ground, and switched leads), I fished the wires down through the stalk. I drilled a 1/4" hole in the top of the square box to allow the wires to exit the switch and be concealed within the shroud that covers the steering column. Satisfied that it all fit perfectly together, I epoxied the switch, end cap, and knurled ring onto the stalk. I clipped off the original push-button switch from the light bar's wiring harness, then poked a hole in the rubber boot that contains the hood release cable. I used a length of stiff wire to fish the wire through the boot, crossing the firewall into the footwell.
Removing the plastic shroud from around the steering column is kind of fiddly if you haven't done it before. Start by removing the 7mm screw from below. Next, release the steering column adjustment lever and fully extend the telescoping column. Carefully separate the upper and lower halves of the shroud...a plastic trim tool is nice but you don't need one if you're careful. This exposes two more 7mm screws, one on each side of the wheel at the 3 and 9 o'clock positions. Rotate the wheel to expose these screws enough to remove them. Now fiddle with the two plastic pieces to remove them.
The entire turn signal assembly popped out easily and the wire connector was easily removed. The modified assembly was connected and popped into place with the new wires routed along existing wires. From here it was a simple matter to fish the wire up behind the dash and use crimp connectors to wire it all together. I'm very happy with the way it turned out...it looks essentially stock. You certainly don't need to use an illuminated switch...if you don't know that your light bar is on you have other problems!
I recently installed a light bar and wanted a location for the switch that blended into the cockpit, something that looked as close to OEM as possible. I had already wired in my SAE amber fog lights to the Colorado's wiring so that they switch (and indicate) with the OEM driving light controls. As the light bar will only be used when using high beams, it made sense to relate these two together; the turn signal stalk, also used for high beams, seemed a natural place to put the switch.
I started by mounting the Rough Country Black Series LED light bar into the Relentless Fabrication front bumper. The light comes with a nice wiring harness with relay and remote switch. I opened the fuse box and accessed one of the two high beam circuits (#38 if memory serves) with a circuit tap. This wire, which feeds out a small drain hole that GM thoughtfully placed in the bottom of the fuse box, feeds a second relay that powers up the system when high beams are on.
I had no idea what the inside of the turn signal stalk looked like, but knew that other trim levels of the Colorado have the selector switch for the dashboard data system there. Therefore it must be possible to fish wires down the inside of the stalk. I ordered a used stalk ($13 on ebay) and proceeded to disassemble it. Refer to the photo below.
From left to right we have the end cap, a narrow trim ring, the knurled ring (the section that moves in those other models), and finally the body of the stalk itself. The thing is snapped together at the factory, but it's not designed to ever be disassembled. I started by removing the little narrow trim ring, a destructive process. This gave access to the gap between the knurled ring and end cap. Some brute force prying, pulling and twisting soon had the end cap and knurled ring removed. There's no metal inside the stalk, just a lot of inner plastic fins. I used a small die grinder attachment on a Dremel tool to rout out the inside of the stalk, going to needle-nose pliers to reach down inside to pull out a few more bits in order to make it easier to fish the wires. The same tool routed out the inside of the end cap and opened up the end of it. I had ordered an illuminated rocker switch (the switch that came with the light bar is illuminated so the wiring harness already comes this way). Happily, the switch is made from plastic that is an exact color match for the stalk and fits perfectly after the end cap is opened up.
I removed those two screws in the above pic and opened the square base of the switch. After soldering three light-gauge wires to the switch's terminals (12v, ground, and switched leads), I fished the wires down through the stalk. I drilled a 1/4" hole in the top of the square box to allow the wires to exit the switch and be concealed within the shroud that covers the steering column. Satisfied that it all fit perfectly together, I epoxied the switch, end cap, and knurled ring onto the stalk. I clipped off the original push-button switch from the light bar's wiring harness, then poked a hole in the rubber boot that contains the hood release cable. I used a length of stiff wire to fish the wire through the boot, crossing the firewall into the footwell.
Removing the plastic shroud from around the steering column is kind of fiddly if you haven't done it before. Start by removing the 7mm screw from below. Next, release the steering column adjustment lever and fully extend the telescoping column. Carefully separate the upper and lower halves of the shroud...a plastic trim tool is nice but you don't need one if you're careful. This exposes two more 7mm screws, one on each side of the wheel at the 3 and 9 o'clock positions. Rotate the wheel to expose these screws enough to remove them. Now fiddle with the two plastic pieces to remove them.
The entire turn signal assembly popped out easily and the wire connector was easily removed. The modified assembly was connected and popped into place with the new wires routed along existing wires. From here it was a simple matter to fish the wire up behind the dash and use crimp connectors to wire it all together. I'm very happy with the way it turned out...it looks essentially stock. You certainly don't need to use an illuminated switch...if you don't know that your light bar is on you have other problems!
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I know some folks have sourced the OEM light switch with two aux switches, but this seemed more intuitive to me.