Under hood light

[roddney1]

Hey people, I have a mercury switched under hood light that I salvaged from my old 84’ Buick Century. I’d like to install it in my Vibe. Any ideas on a good place to mount it under the hood without going thru! Where is a good place to connect for 12v. I’m SLIGHTLY proficient in hooking up stuff. Buy the way, what ever happened to putting in under hood lights from the factory. Not to mention glove box lights. Gets awful dark in there at night

[ragingfish]

Best bet would be to get a generic hood pin and attach your negative lead to that, so when the hood is released, the pin springs up, it grounds, the light goes on.Then, easiest way to get power would be right off the battery...otherwise, I'd recommend punching through the firewall and picking it up in the cabin instead of messing with crucial engine component wiring.

[roddney1]

Never thought about the hood pin thing...Good idea! Should I fuse the line also?

[ragingfish]

If it isn't being tapped into a fused circuit yeah...But then again, never hurts to fuse it...can't have too many safety devices...just remember, put the fuse as close to the battery as possible...

[Jahntassa]

Mike, could he use one of those "add-a-fuse" things you're always pushing? There is a fuse center under the hood...Then, use the hoodpin to switch the ground wire...

[ragingfish]

Not sure it will work under the hood...IIRC, the fuses are inset in the block, which would keep the AAC from contacting the connectors...but it oculd work...if I remember, I'll take a peek at it tomorrow.

[vibeman1]

$20,000 car and no hood light,for that matter no glove box light,no center console lightno backlight for cruse,mirror,windows wiperspontiac could have done this for vary little costbut i guess they think something like a moonroff is more inportant then night safty.

[ragingfish]

Quote, originally posted by vibeman1 »$20,000 car and no hood light,for that matter no glove box light,no center console lightno backlight for cruse,mirror,windows wiperspontiac could have done this for vary little costbut i guess they think something like a moonroff is more inportant then night safty.A bit bitter?First off, few non-luxury cars come with hood lights. Show me a neon, a sunfire, a grand am even, that have lights under the hood.Second, glove box lights never work. They're so far back they're worthless.Third, show me a car that has backlighting on the cruise and wiper controls? Never seen it before.Fourth, this is an entry level car. It's not gonna be loaded!Fifth, Toyota did the majority of the work on this car! Until 2005, Pontiac did very little of their own stuff to it.Yes, this car isn't perfect. No car is. You can't compare a moonroof to backlighting. Apples and oranges.Just my $0.02

[JohnC]

Rodney1; another option is to get the under hood trouble light from a chev p/u. It has a 20' cord that winds up into a small fixture and has a switch built right into it. Just mount it so the light shines over the entire engine compartment, then you can extend/retract it as needed for other things. I once used it to change a flat rear tire on a very dark night (my flash light was dead). The junk yards are full of these.

[sloth]

This topic gave me an Idea. Maybe I'll install an under hood light and put in a switch in to replace the dashboard change holder or in the blank 2 spots over. Maybe if I ever get neons I'll put the switch there as well.

[Jahntassa]

I think a white neon tube and a hood switch would be interesting...

[ColonelPanic]

Years ago, I had a Cutlass Supreme with the retractible light mounted to the inside of hood... That was pretty handy indeed.On the car before that, I got my hands on a light like rodney was describing. Just had to bolt it to the hood, that took care of the grounding. Ran a fused power wire to the battery (probably not the best place but it worked.) Didn't have to worry about a switch, it used a mercury swithch internal to the light assembly.

[northvibe]

Anyone ever put a light in the vibe under the hood?