FD1 Tapping into dome light - Query

[ynotfd]

So i'm trying to tap into the dome light wires on my FD1 to power some LED strips for footwell lighting. Basically aiming to have them come on and off in sync with dome lights. Read around on the DIY sections here and on 8th civic and had a go myself. What I did was I tapped into the blue/pink wires (1) as shown here:

http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/889/img0818resize.jpg (http://img707.imageshack.us/i/img0818resize.jpg/)

At first when i turned on the dome lights, the LED strips wouldnt light up, only the dome lights. When i put my key in, the LEDs started to light up. however, after I took my key out and turned the dome lights to the off position, the LEDs remained on, even after I locked my car. After some more fiddling, I realised the blue/pink wires also provide power to the map lights. If I pulled them out, the dome lights and map lights stopped working.

So, after all this jibberish, my query comes down to this: Does anyone know where I should tap my LED strips into in order for them to turn on and off in sync with the dome lights? Thanks for all your help in advance!

[kawai]

does it stay on when you lock the car?

i have no clue on this but shouldn't there be another spot further down the wire where the main power for all the lights should go thru a device or split into a different wire to supply power to the dome?

try to find a schematic of the cars dome light then you will know there is the point you should mount the wires to

[ynotfd]

does it stay on when you lock the car?

i have no clue on this but shouldn't there be another spot further down the wire where the main power for all the lights should go thru a device or split into a different wire to supply power to the dome?

try to find a schematic of the cars dome light then you will know there is the point you should mount the wires to

Yes it stays on when I lock the car...sometimes. I'll try what you suggested but i think that may require taking the dash apart because the wires are pretty deep inside. Not sure where I'd get a schematic for the car's wiring tho.

[Stig]

try taping into fuse #14 and change the fuse from 7.5A to a bigger one like 15A so there is enough current to power the LED strips

[ynotfd]

try taping into fuse #14 and change the fuse from 7.5A to a bigger one like 15A so there is enough current to power the LED strips

Ok so I have a 15A fuse but do I also need to get a "fuse tap" to tap into it? Would they have them at Jaycar?

[Stig]

yea you would need a fuse tap, dont know if they have it at jaycar, im assuming they do lol... well that was my hunch looking at the manual at tapping into fuse 14 here...

im not even sure if its going to work

[ynotfd]

yea you would need a fuse tap, dont know if they have it at jaycar, im assuming they do lol... well that was my hunch looking at the manual at tapping into fuse 14 here...

im not even sure if its going to work

alright I'll drop into jaycar over the weekend and see how it goes. thanks :)

[curtis265]

yo dude, try and go to your dome light, take it apart, and find which colour wires go to the fusebox - maybe that'll help...

The light comes from a 'controlled ground' but i have no fkin clue what to tap down t here - nobody answered me on 8thcivic :(

In for info (Y) - if you can write a DIY for it, i'll rep you hard.

[ynotfd]

yo dude, try and go to your dome light, take it apart, and find which colour wires go to the fusebox - maybe that'll help...

The light comes from a 'controlled ground' but i have no fkin clue what to tap down t here - nobody answered me on 8thcivic :(

In for info (Y) - if you can write a DIY for it, i'll rep you hard.

Oh that's a good idea. Will probably take apart dash on Monday and have a look around. Will definitely snap some pictures along the way and write up a DIY if all is successful.

[ynotfd]

So I had some free time today and went searching for the dome light wires. Tried to trace the blue/pink wires to where it connects to the dome light wires but didnt get far because it runs very deep into the dash and there was no way I could get to it without having to take apart ALOT of the front dash.

However, my fiddling around wasn't entirely fruitless. I reconnected my LED strips to the blue/pink wires (shown in my first post) and made sure they were connected correctly. This is what happens whenever certain events occur:

1. Unlock car: LEDs turn on
2. Start Engine: LEDs turn off
3. Turn off engine: LEDs turn on
4. Lock car: LEDs turn off

Obviously the dome light switch still doesn't control the LEDs but I find tapping into the blue/pink wires achieves my original purpose.

For anyone who wants to try this, the blue wire is the power (+) and pink wire is the ground (-) (refer to diagram in first post).

[curtis265]

Hey now, that's good info. I'll try this later on, perhaps when warranty's gone.

[kawai]

any photos of how you taped the wires? and the led light :D i would like to try it too and put some neon inside.

[curtis265]

I have my LEDstrips already installed, so i'll just cut off the ciggy lighter and work from there... :)

Tap wires works like this: cut the wire, strip, solder the whole lot together, lol!

[pieee]

Why don't you try powering your LEDs with only one of these wires and grounding it to a bolt near the fuse box?

What if one of those wires was for the map lights and the other being the dome light? Anyway this is just my thinking. The way i had my LEDs wired was by using the trigger cable on the back of my stereo, but this is pointless for you since you want it to come on and off when your dome light does.

Since your dome light is wired into the sensors on your doors when you open and close them, why not try tapping into the door sensor cables?

[curtis265]

Why don't you try powering your LEDs with only one of these wires and grounding it to a bolt near the fuse box?

What if one of those wires was for the map lights and the other being the dome light? Anyway this is just my thinking. The way i had my LEDs wired was by using the trigger cable on the back of my stereo, but this is pointless for you since you want it to come on and off when your dome light does.

Since your dome light is wired into the sensors on your doors when you open and close them, why not try tapping into the door sensor cables?

I think you'd need both the ground and the live wire tapped, because the car controls either the ground, or the voltage output - Some say both, but nobody wants to experiment.

I thnik one's the live and one's the ground for the dome light. The map lights don't fade.. (i think :S)

Tapping into door sensors won't give the fade effect.

[ynotfd]

Hmm sorry about the tardiness of the reply, been busy lately.

In regards to how i tapped into the wires, yes pretty much what curtis265 said. However, the way i do it is a bit more ghetto (hails back to my pc modding days). I use a small sharp pair of scissors to make two incisions into the plastic casing of the wire, about half a cm apart. Make sure not to cut the metal bit. then using the pointy tip, i remove the half centimetre segment of plastic casing, thus revealing the metal wire. Then I simply wrap the metal end of whatever I wish to connect to the exposed bit of wire and put lots of electrical tape around it. Cbf'd soldering haha.

@pieee - its been confirmed by myself and others on 8thcivic that the blue is the (+) and pink is the ground (-). Tapping into the senors on the doors will only allow the lights to come on when the door is open. When the doors are closed it will turn off.

Will get some pics and vids tonight and tmrw morning to show what it looks like. But first i need to find the instructions for my Canon 500D to figure out how to shoot video haha.

[ynotfd]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N87nI5LNYug

Took this last night, just to show how it works. I haven't mounted it anywhere yet because I'm still waiting for a few more LED strips to arrive (dont worry, im not dumb enough to mount it on the steering wheel).

As per the description, it starts off with me unlocking the car which turns the LEDs on. After I start the engine, they turn off. They turn on again once I stop the engine and finally they turn off once I lock the car in the end.

Will probably post pictures of how I connected everything in the afternoon.

[ynotfd]

So here are a few pictures of how I hooked everything together:
http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/4519/img0844resize.jpg (http://img6.imageshack.us/i/img0844resize.jpg/)

http://img14.imageshack.us/img14/602/img0843resize.jpg (http://img14.imageshack.us/i/img0843resize.jpg/)

I bought some red and green wire from Jaycar in order to extend the length of the cable. Red wire taps into the blue wire (+) and green wire taps into pink ground wire (-).

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/4349/img0835resize.jpg (http://img100.imageshack.us/i/img0835resize.jpg/)

Then the red and green wires are wired up to my led strips. Please disregard the dirtyness of my car.

Hope this helps!

[kawai]

sweet!! can try to do mine when i have some time and cash :D, BTW black cars are like that as i have one too, it gets dirt all over in 15min after washing it :D.

Just another question would the i draw too much amp's out of the mains if i have a few more of those led strips? and how are you thinking of hiding the wires? thx

[curtis265]

Hiding wires is easy, everything's just pull apart. The cable can be hidden under the plastic panels.

Ynot, i'd recommend hiding the actual LED strip, hvaing it exposed like that looks a bit tacky :(

[HotKgon]

Oh man. This thread is perfect! I've been trying to ask this question for the past 6 months and finally it is fruitful. YAY!

So what happens when the engine is on and you open the doors? Do the lights turn on?
(The dome turns on when the engine is on and the door is open, so I'm guessing the LEDs would turn on as well.)

+Reps mate! :)

[ynotfd]

@kawai: asked a mechanic friend and he said he said it should handle up to 10 of my led strips no sweat. zip ties and electric tape is how I intend to hide the wires. like curtis265 said, anywhere behind the plastic panels would be fine.

@curtis265: haha no way I'm gonna put it there mate. atm i haven't secured any of the led strips as i'm waiting for a few more to come in. just wanted to show how all the wiring works.

@hotkgon: hmm not really sure, i'll double check when I head out and let u know :)

[ynotfd]

I've gotten a few PMs about how I actually attached the wires. This will be a simple guide showing how I normally do it. I know lots of people prefer soldering but this is for people who don't want to solder/dont know how to solder.

1. Basic Materials:
http://img525.imageshack.us/img525/7881/img0845resize.jpg (http://img525.imageshack.us/i/img0845resize.jpg/)
Everything should be straight forward. The switch with battery is optional, required only for testing to see if the LEDs work or not.
Note the blue item - this is the easy alternative to connect wires. Not sure if they are called parallel taps but they're available from Jaycar.

2. Easy alternative
http://img260.imageshack.us/img260/3922/img0846resize.jpg (http://img260.imageshack.us/i/img0846resize.jpg/)
http://img269.imageshack.us/img269/1624/img0849resize.jpg (http://img269.imageshack.us/i/img0849resize.jpg/)
You simply push the two wires into the recesses and clamp the cap over it. the recess will hopefully dig thru the wire casing and touch the metal wire within. From my experiences, these dont work too well.

3. Tut continued
http://img714.imageshack.us/img714/2069/img0852resize.jpg (http://img714.imageshack.us/i/img0852resize.jpg/)
So here the black wire represents the blue/pink wires next to the fuse box which you're going to be tapping into. Make incisions, strip away the middle bit of wire casing.

4.
http://img222.imageshack.us/img222/8956/img0853resize.jpg (http://img222.imageshack.us/i/img0853resize.jpg/)
Once you strip away the wire casing you should be left with a bare strip of metal wire.

5.
http://img39.imageshack.us/img39/4971/img0856resize.jpg (http://img39.imageshack.us/i/img0856resize.jpg/)
Refer to text haha. Imagine wrapping gauze around a wounded finger.

Hopefully this brings clarity to the photos i've posted up in previous posts. Again, this is just my easy way of doing it and so far it hasn't given me any trouble.

[kawai]

the blue things are called T-Tap Connectors or mid-way wire connectors but i remember there is a better one which does look like a T shape and you can cut the wires into 2 then strip it and join them one end to the other *-* (there is a little screw on each side to connect it) then for the other end you can plug in your wire for tapping :D.

[curtis265]

mmmmmm i still reckon u should solder. Seems dodgy, no offence.

[kawai]

What kind of soldering iron do you use? I have a dodgee portable one at home and I can't use that for sh1t. I feel ashame saying that since I use hakko ones every day at work ( I fix mobile phones :d). btw Any cheap and nice portable ones you recomend?

[curtis265]

lol im anything but an electrical expert, you'd know more than i do.

[black8thgen]

man u guys are so unlazy... my led wiring was ghetto as before tim fixed half of mine up LOL. =.=