So an idea popped into my head the other day about a small, inexpensive project. I thought about the idea of rigging up an led light (no more than 5" long) underneath the each door panel of my two doors. the kicker is they would only work when the doors open.

My question is do i honestly have to run them all the way to my dome light so they are simultanoues with that? Something a bit less wiring would be nice. Anybody got any other ideas?

P.s. I drive a 99 ex and i have done electrical work many times before so dont waste time replying with info about circuits and such. Thanks

 

Suitable wires should be available under the dash. Pretty much every circuit inside the car converges under the driver's side of the dash. Does your car have lights on the inside corner of the door that come on when the door is open to warn oncoming cars?

 

I'm actually not to sure about that. Im pretty sure I dont have them but if i do have those then wiring would be nice and easy to do. The only problem with wiring under the dash is that it some wires are grouped together. Im not sure about my civic ( ive only had it for a year) but in my past elantra, i wired single led's around the car that were run under the dash through the dome wire. And I noticed every once in a while, if my dome's corresponding fuse blew, i had no radio. But that was 7 years and a lot less experience ago.

 

There is an easy way to do it, run a constant 12v wire to each one then, to ground, use a t-tap to connect to the single ground wire underneath the black door button in the door frame. You can reach this from inside the car by removing the panel just underneath the seatbelt bolt at the bottom of the door. It will only ground out when the door is open so the light will only have a completed circuit with the door open.

Ben

 

oooo damn dats a smart one...but wait...wats a t-tap???

 

a kind of quick connect. any quick connect will do

ben

 

another choice is to use a relay that is triggered using the door triggers. On the 99 civic all the doors are run off of the same wire and is negative triggered and is colored light green/red. it can be found at either the pin switch, the driver kick panel, or the factory alarm plug which is in every car even if you don't have the factory alarm and is green.

on a standard relay hook up the following:

85- +12V constant
86- door trigger wire
30- +12V constant
87A- nothing
87- output to positive side of LED.

and just hook the negative side of the LED to ground

 

quick way... just hook up the leds to the fuse box WITH A FUSE, and simply ground the leds off the door pin switch

ive seen the idea done before....
cannt find the pictures tho.
its relatively easy.... expetialy if ya use some prewired leds. or some prewired superflux leds. the superflux ones are more expensive but a widern pattern.

http://www.oznium.com/leds

http://www.oznium.com/images/pre-wir...ux/compare.jpg


i highly suggest the prewired units BUT if you want to save some cash you can get a bag of leds and resistors and a soldering gun but let me tell you from experience after the 4th resitor and wire soldered together youll be outta your mind with soldering.LMFAO
ill never cheap out again and ill always buy prewired leds