Adding 12v to Ranger STX Bed?

[dailygrind]

Has anyone done this? If so, were you able to wire into an existing wire run, or did you run a whole new line from battery. I was looking for an unused pigtail, which I know 5Gs had, but I couldn’t find one. Maybe I’m blind?

Sponsored

 

[1996-to-2025]

This guy added a 12V outlet to his bed, but has not responded to follow up questions. https://www.ranger6g.com/forum/threads/rear-bed-power-point-outlet-missing.18454/#post-292381

 

[rikairving]

Sorry about that. A member reached out and asked by pm, and I responded not thinking. Here is the link with info provided; https://www.ranger6g.com/forum/conversations/25-ranger-bed-power-panel.3907/#convMessage-21549

 

[dailygrind]

Hey @rikairving , link unfortunately doesn’t work. Could you please copy and paste the info if possible?

 

[rikairving]

Weird. When I click on the link, it takes me directly to the to the conversation. No clue what I did wrong.

 

[dailygrind]

@rikairving I’m guessing the link works for you, but not anyway else, because it looks like it links directly to a personal message, which I’m guessing has privacy settings that restrict its access to only the conversations participants.

 

[ATXian]

Weird. When I click on the link, it takes me directly to the to the conversation. No clue what I did wrong.

You can't publicly link DMs, even your own.
It still works for you because it's your internal/private link, but nobody else has access.

 

[rikairving]

Ok, I’ll do it this way:

It is bad practice splicing or using wire taps in an exposed area like that, so will always use a liquid intrusion resistant connection. The manufacturers do as well for the same reason.
There is a fair amount of room there, and the connectors are well exposed, so I did the connector work lying on a creeper in my shop.
If you follow the 120V wires down to the frame there is connector there. The male side, which goes up to the bed mounted plate has 4 unpopulated pin positions. If you compare the female side to the male side, you can see that there are two positions that have female sockets that have wire from the frame harness terminated there. One is black, (12V-), the other is violet (12V+). The male side is missing the corresponding pins, so it is just a matter of running wires and pinning the terminations. The male side has silicone rubber plugs in them, but they can be easily pushed out; a small Allen key works nicely. I had pins that happened to fit from some TE connectivity (aka Amp) connectors I had leftover from a project a couple years ago, so used those. I also have all sorts of specialized crimpers, which made the whole operation simpler for me. (I will hunt for the part# of those pins and will update this if I can find them.)
You could twist and tin the ends of the wires and carefully insert them into the male connector if you don’t have or can’t find the right pins or install tools. The pins are flat, so once tinned, you can flatten the ends to help with insertion, noting the flat orientation of the female sockets.
Those connectors also use silicon wire seals, (necessary for that high ‘splash’ area). that you need to put on before you pin the wires, but if you don’t have the seals, a little dab of of silicone sealer pushed into the back of the male connector at those positions will work once you have the wires inserted, and that will double up to hold them in place once the sealer sets up. Just make sure it sets up evenly all around the wires. This is important to prevent moisture (and corrosion) intrusion.
I then used some split black plastic casing to protect the wires from any chafing, and zip tied it to the Ford casing. Ford used the same stuff, but it is orange as it’s considered ‘high voltage’ wiring.
As noted in my earlier post, I used black (12V-) and red (12V+) silicone insulated 14awg wiring as that’s what I had in my shop. The insulation is thicker on that stuff, so it was a bit of a pain to work in the connector. Any 14awg stranded THWN (wet location) wire will work fine for you.

Attachments

• 
  IMG_0746.jpeg
  220.3 KBViews: 3
• 
  IMG_0749.jpeg
  124.2 KBViews: 4
• 
  IMG_0750.jpeg
  302.7 KBViews: 4
• The 12volt outlet you can grab almost anywhere that sells automotive stuff.
  The usb outlet I used is no longer available, (I bought those for another project back in 2022), but Amazon suggested this: https://www.amazon.com/Waterproof-C...=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9kZXRhaWxfdGhlbWF0aWM&th=1

 

[rikairving]

As the XL models don’t have the inverter, the AC lines are likely unpopulated at that connector, and a blank male connector is there. The violet and black wires likely still have 12vdc power though. See if fuse 33 is in the underhood fuse box.

 

[superj]

man, you should price making up a batch of those wire sets to add the stuff for people and see if there is enough interest in actually putting a set together and sell them here.

i think it would be nice to have a plug in the bed of my stx but i likely wouldn't ever add it myself because i don't have the tools to do all the stuff. a kit, though, would make it alot easier for me to talk myself into needing that plug, ha ha ha. i did actually use the bed plugs on my old truck, the 120v and the 12v

 

[rikairving]

Will lend my knowledge where it’ll help others, but building and selling stuff is not on my agenda! Had many side hustles in my younger years, along with 44 years of semiconductor processing tool build and design. Retired for a reason, and the only one I want to build for is myself!
I get the cost cutting, but am surprised Ford dropped the 12 volt power point instead of the much more expensive 120 volt circuit.
Maybe Ford will see enough demand and offer a retrofit kit, but the fact that they dropped the feature all together shows enough people were not using them. At Least they left the circuit there to make it fairly easy to add ourselves.

Sponsored