Led Lights In Footwells

[shubby0901]

A quick and easy project for your cars, installing lights in your foot-wells. Pretty simple but some people might be a bit scared to try it so here is a DIY to help you judge for yourself.

Unfortunately, I don’t have heaps of pictures so I will try to describe it as best and use pictures where I can.

Parts you need:

• 12V RGB LED Strip

o Note: 3528 = less bright and less LED's per meter, 5050 = brighter with more LED’s per meter.

• LED strip joiners like below

• Automotive electrical wiring

1) Decide how you want your lights to operate. I wanted them to turn on and off with the dome light therefore I hooked it up to them

2) Decide what kind of lights you want. I used a RGB strip, which although is more expensive, you can change the colours by playing with which lights are connected (i.e. Red, Blue, Green, Red + Blue, Red + Green, Blue + Green). You can also try to hook up a controller but they are a bit harder and have issues storing previous settings when power is lost (i.e. Doors closed)

3) Remove trim to get access to your dome light. I removed the A-pillar trim and the sun visor on driver’s side. This will allow the roof lining to move a bit and give you better access.

4) Use a multi-meter and work out which terminal on the dome light is positive and negative.

5) Remove dome light.

6) I used a straightened coat hanger and fed it above the roof lining and pulled it through the dome light cut-out.

7) Once the dome light is removed, connect your wire to the appropriate terminals. I soldered it onto the actual metal joiners and fed it through holes already present in the dome light. Make sure not to damage the actual light at this stage.

8) Tape the wires onto the coat hanger and gently pull it out, bringing the wires out with it.

9) Feed the wires through along the pillar and through any gaps you can find inside the car into the driver’s side foot-well.

10) Now you need to create a bridge from the driver to passenger side. Cut one of the joiners in half and add a length of wire long enough to pass behind the centre console. Once wired up, you can pass that through and have both ends sticking out as seen.

11) Use another LED joiner and connect this end to the wires coming from the roof. You may not need to do this step depending on your lights as they may have wires coming out which you can connect directly. You will still need joiners between the two foot wells.

12) Connect the LED’s in the joiners and check operation before sticking them on.

13) Once operating perfectly, stick them under the dash. For passenger side, make sure glove box can still be opened and lights will not interfere.

14) Enjoy

Notes:

• For a RGB light strip, to get a pure white light you need a controller, but you can wire all the three (RGB) lights to one wire, creating a near to white light. It will have a blue shade to it due how LED’s perform at different colors.
• LED strips which are flat and have low profile LED’s can be cut where it is marked on the strip without affecting the performance. Check the type of strip you are buying some can be cut, come cannot.

• DO NOT TRY TO SOLDER DIRECTLY TO LED STRIP. YOU WILL RUIN THAT SECTION TILL THE NEXT CUT POINT. I speak from experience.

Troubleshooting:

• Lights don’t turn on

o Check positive and negative

o Check connections are properly made

• Lights are different colours on two sides

o Bridge connection has mixed up wires

o LED strips not inserted in joiners properly

[niZmO_Man]

Good stuff.

[PranK]

Great DIY, I've added it to the list.

[shubby0901]

Awesome thanks. Hopefully its some use to some people

[XGTRX]

Love it man. Great work. Another job over the Christmas break. Thanks.

[shubby0901]

Love it man. Great work. Another job over the Christmas break. Thanks.

Post up pics to share what it looks like!