12v lights and water...direct lipo connection

[CoolRunning]

I bought some lights from HKing that said 6-12v and naturally they don't work at 6v with a BEC. They seem fine with a 9v battery and of course with a 3S lipo.

I'm personally a bit wary of splicing them into the ESC wiring so they run straight off the lipo in case they get wet and short out. They aren't the 'waterproof' HK LED strips but I'm honestly not sure about if/when they short out and stop working from water, will they take out the lipo...and then up goes lots of stuff like the truck.

Anyone had experience with running lights straight off the lipo and water?

I've wired them up with an EC3 connector and am using a 9v battery for the interim. Just for reference, these are night driving lights for under the truck so you can see what you're crawling over. I've got about 48 LEDs on the front of the truck which gives good visibility but the moment you head up a rock you cannot see what you're on and get stuck or roll over etc. Under truck lighting is pretty cool IMO.

[Waitwhatsthat?]

I use 12v LEDs wired to the battery. No issue with water at all. I get the lights from Amazon. Only $8 for something like 54 led's.

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[ColdFox]

Not lights but I had an issue with direct lipo connection and (salted) water.

My BEC was connected to the lipo using a Jr Plug: the water rusted the connector so bad that it broke and shorted.
The BEC is dead (output is 12V, I've also fried the servo) but battery had no problem, or should I say more that it already had

[crawlhog]

most of my trucks lighting come straight from the battery, all are 12v LEDs and never had an issue and they are in mud and water alot .

[Jeepy84]

Properly installed LEDs should be almost entirely waterproof at the business end, so long as the bulb leads are insulated with shrink tubing or liquid electrical tape, etc.

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[Hydrocarbon92]

Unless it's VERY salty water, it won't short out. The worst that will happen is the contacts on the LED's will corrode (white dust from Tin solder) and reduce voltage. If there was a short on an LED board or in an LED, it will literally explode fast like a fuse the 50+ amps even a tiny lipo can offer.

The BEC example used above was most likely a shorted BEC chip from salt accumulating under it, not a connector. I recently got 55ml of MG Chem urethane conformal coating and it would seal most LED's up no problem. I've already done a dozen servos, receivers, and arduino chips (same size as a micro receiver) and haven't even made a dent in it.