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interior light project = fail

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 2:54 am
by hapagan
i was trying to put some orange light rods underneath both front seats but for some reason the lights wouldnt work. here are the steps i tookconected a 12v wire to the battery pole and ran this through the fire wall along the side of the car to underneath the driver seat.brought it out where the coin holder is beneath the e-brake on an 04grounded an on/off switch to the chasis and brought it out the same holeconnected the 12v to the on/off switchgrounded both light rods at same spot i grounded the switchconnected the light rods to the output terminal on the switch reconnected the battery turn on switchno work.....dont know what i did wrongi wish i had pics to show.can anybody hel[p ?

Re: interior light project = fail (hapagan)

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 6:12 am
by keithvibe
what kind of lights?led? ccfl?

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 6:19 am
by hapagan
Idk what type of lights. i dont think they r LCD. i dont know much about them a friend of mine gave em to me. they used to plug into the cig outlet and i just cut the wires and connected the 12v to the switch and grounded the negative wire to the chasis by the e-brake. all i can tell you about them is they r light rods they used to plug into the cig outlet and they glow to the beat of the music.

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 6:23 am
by hapagan
i think they might be neon. they r sorta like these ones

Re: (hapagan)

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 6:26 am
by keithvibe
If they glowed and changed intensenty with the beat of the radio. My guess is your missing something. To check remove them from their current location and connect them directly to the battery. If they light, then your ground sucks... move it.

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 7:05 am
by hapagan
u mean ground it at the battery and connect the 12v at the battery too ?

Re: (hapagan)

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 7:19 am
by MotoAce51
Quote, originally posted by hapagan »u mean ground it at the battery and connect the 12v at the battery too ?Thats what I would do. Also, some neon lights only work in one dirrection. Power and ground can't be switched. Power can only go 1 dirrection. Hooking it all straight to the battery is the best bet. I think the other post was just saying to test the light that way.

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 7:34 am
by hapagan
alright ill try that and see if it works. if it doesnt then thats really wierd cuz they were working right before i cut all the wires from the cig plugs

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 9:33 am
by MotoAce51
It should work. I did this with my old riced out Grand Am and my pick up. I had lights under all the seats and under the dash. They sell little adaptors that you can put on your battery terminals to make it easy but not needed.If they lit up before you cut the wires I would bet its either configuration, a bad ground, or a bad wire.

Re: interior light project = fail (hapagan)

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 10:01 am
by ColonelPanic
Perhaps whatever kind of light that is can't run off of 12v directly and needs a transformer to step up the voltage (or even something to reduce the voltage?) Was there a big square thingy on the cigarette lighter plug?If it was straight 12v into the lights, shouldn't be much to getting them to work, aside from making note of proper polarity.

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 12:37 pm
by joshuaeb09
I would try using an add a circuit to an empty slot in your interior fuse box. Thats what i did for my leds. I then grounded em to the same place where the fuse box grounds.

Re: interior light project = fail (hapagan)

Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 9:22 pm
by Sublimewind
Quote, originally posted by hapagan »grounded an on/off switch to the chasis and brought it out the same holeconnected the 12v to the on/off switchgrounded both light rods at same spot i grounded the switchconnected the light rods to the output terminal on the switch reconnected the battery turn on switchno work.....dont know what i did wrongi wish i had pics to show.can anybody hel[p ?What sort of switch did you use? does it have 2 or 3 terminals? In a typical 12v install a 2 terminal switch is put inline... if you grounded one side, you prolly don't have a circuit..

Re: (joshuaeb09)

Posted: Wed Feb 16, 2011 3:05 am
by hapagan
Quote, originally posted by joshuaeb09 »I would try using an add a circuit to an empty slot in your interior fuse box. Thats what i did for my leds. I then grounded em to the same place where the fuse box grounds. Sorry don't know how to do this lol

Re: interior light project = fail (Sublimewind)

Posted: Wed Feb 16, 2011 3:09 am
by hapagan
Quote, originally posted by Sublimewind »What sort of switch did you use? does it have 2 or 3 terminals? In a typical 12v install a 2 terminal switch is put inline... if you grounded one side, you prolly don't have a circuit.. Its a three terminal switch i got on ebay. this one to be exacthttp://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors...eb65bit has an led light on it that goes on when you turn the switch on. and it is turning on so the switch is recieving power

Posted: Wed Feb 16, 2011 7:05 am
by MotoAce51
I had one of those before. They are finickey. I ended up not using the led light. I would be willing to bet the issue is in the switch connections. IF you hook them up wront they wont work. Try the wires in different configurations.

Re: interior light project = fail (hapagan)

Posted: Sat Feb 19, 2011 8:51 pm
by Sublimewind
Quote, originally posted by hapagan »Its a three terminal switch i got on ebay. this one to be exacthttp://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors...eb65bit has an led light on it that goes on when you turn the switch on. and it is turning on so the switch is recieving powerDo you have a volt meter? or are you just "hookin things up"