LED Floor illumination Outlander Sport?
#11
08-02-2011, 02:24 PM
They will go on the top side of the headlights to act as day time running lights. I think a few others on this forum have done this as well, I will post a tutorial on that in another thread when it is completed. Just waiting on V-LED to release those.... the sales person says they should be coming out very soon.
I finished the install of the floor board lighting yesterday. I will take pictures and a video of them in action to go along with the write up.
I finished the install of the floor board lighting yesterday. I will take pictures and a video of them in action to go along with the write up.
#13
08-13-2011, 09:49 PM
Below is a tutorial on how to install LED lighting in the floor board of your Outlander Sport. Keep in mind that you need to take care when wiring everything. Although I did not disconnect the battery, any sane person should. Also note that even though it technically can not rain in your vehicle there is still moisture in the air and you still need to ensure there are no unshielded wires or connections.
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How the Dome Lights work:
The dome lights in this car are Negative switched. What that means is there is a constant +12v supplied to the circuit at all times. When any door opens, the Interior Light Control circuit supplies a ground connection to the dome light circuit. When the door is shut, it gradually removes that ground connection which is how the dimming effect is accomplished.
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What do we want to do:
The goal is to provide additional ambient lighting in the footwell areas of the vehicle. If you haven't noticed there are very few sources of light in the Outlander Sport and personally I prefer to see where I will be putting my feet when I step into the car at night.
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How to do it:
First, you need to familiarize yourself with the ETACS-ECU:
Jmant83's Mitsubishi Outlander
We are interested in connection C-416, more specifically the Yellow Wire. As you can see from the next image, the Yellow wire is what provides the temporary ground via an Inverter or Logical Not Gate:
Jmant83's Mitsubishi Outlander
******************************************
How the Dome Lights work:
The dome lights in this car are Negative switched. What that means is there is a constant +12v supplied to the circuit at all times. When any door opens, the Interior Light Control circuit supplies a ground connection to the dome light circuit. When the door is shut, it gradually removes that ground connection which is how the dimming effect is accomplished.
******************************************
What do we want to do:
The goal is to provide additional ambient lighting in the footwell areas of the vehicle. If you haven't noticed there are very few sources of light in the Outlander Sport and personally I prefer to see where I will be putting my feet when I step into the car at night.
******************************************
How to do it:
First, you need to familiarize yourself with the ETACS-ECU:
We are interested in connection C-416, more specifically the Yellow Wire. As you can see from the next image, the Yellow wire is what provides the temporary ground via an Inverter or Logical Not Gate:
Jmant83's Mitsubishi Outlander
#14
08-13-2011, 11:39 PM
Step 1: Figure out where you want to mount the LED strips. They have 3M adhesive backing and stick pretty well. Here is where I mounted mine:
Front Drivers side: Where it looks like the factory led strip would go.
Front Passenger side: Under the glove box. You may need some additional 3M foam adhesive here because you are sticking it to plastic. If you have ever put Armor All here, it will not stick and you will need to get something to clean it off.
Rear seating: The only easy place to mount these under the seat is to the edge of the steel plate that is under both seats. This piece does not move when the seat is shifted forward or backward and it allows you to aim the LEDs to the back of the car as apposed to downward. When mounting these in this location be sure the end of the strip does not have any exposed connections where the strip was trimmed by the manufacturer. When I installed mine one of these was touching the metal and grounding the whole circuit. It was a pain to figure out where it was happening.
Step 2: Approximate the amount of speaker wire for each run to the LED strip and cut them to length.
Step 3: Attach the speaker wire to the leads on the LED strip. Personally I chose to make all of the connections with male/female disconnects in the event I need to replace them or remove them it wont be too much of a hassle. Be sure to heat shrink all of your connections.
Step 4: Attach the LED strips to their predetermined places.
Step 5: Run your wires.
An Easy Connect for your Wires!
Step 6: The power:
Jmant83's Mitsubishi Outlander
Jmant83's Mitsubishi Outlander
Front Drivers side: Where it looks like the factory led strip would go.
Front Passenger side: Under the glove box. You may need some additional 3M foam adhesive here because you are sticking it to plastic. If you have ever put Armor All here, it will not stick and you will need to get something to clean it off.
Rear seating: The only easy place to mount these under the seat is to the edge of the steel plate that is under both seats. This piece does not move when the seat is shifted forward or backward and it allows you to aim the LEDs to the back of the car as apposed to downward. When mounting these in this location be sure the end of the strip does not have any exposed connections where the strip was trimmed by the manufacturer. When I installed mine one of these was touching the metal and grounding the whole circuit. It was a pain to figure out where it was happening.
Step 2: Approximate the amount of speaker wire for each run to the LED strip and cut them to length.
Step 3: Attach the speaker wire to the leads on the LED strip. Personally I chose to make all of the connections with male/female disconnects in the event I need to replace them or remove them it wont be too much of a hassle. Be sure to heat shrink all of your connections.
Step 4: Attach the LED strips to their predetermined places.
Step 5: Run your wires.
Driver's side Rear wires: Tuck them neatly under the door sill moulding and run them up to the fuse box/ETACS-ECU.
Passenger side wires: The easiest way to get these to the ETACS-ECU is to attach them to a metal coat hanger, open the glove box and feed the coat hanger through the opening behind your stereo and out the gap on the drivers side.
Trim any excess length from the wires and add your female/male connectors to the + and - wires of each set.
Note: If you don't want to create the dongles mentioned below I would recommend the following instead:Passenger side wires: The easiest way to get these to the ETACS-ECU is to attach them to a metal coat hanger, open the glove box and feed the coat hanger through the opening behind your stereo and out the gap on the drivers side.
Trim any excess length from the wires and add your female/male connectors to the + and - wires of each set.
An Easy Connect for your Wires!
Step 6: The power:
Because the dome light is negatively switched we need a source of constant +12v that is available even if the car is not turned on. This is accomplished by locating the Dome light fuse and using the Add a Circuit. I used butt connectors to split the single wire from the Add a Circuit into four wires with female/male connections. Connect each of these to the + wire for each LED strip and heat shrink.
Step 7: The ground:Locate the Yellow wire exiting the C-416 connection at the ETACS-ECU and use the Quick splice with Male disconnector to tap the wire. You will need to create a sort of ground wire dongle in a similar fashion that you split up the +12v connection in the previous step. Connect the one end of the wire dongle to the splice and the other end to each of the negative wires of the LED strips and heat shrink.
Step 8: The cleanup:Zip tie the bunch of wires together and cover them with 3/4 inch fire retardent conduit.
Here are a couple pictures of the end result. They are from my phone so they aren't the greatest but you get the idea:Jmant83's Mitsubishi Outlander
Jmant83's Mitsubishi Outlander
#17
08-14-2011, 12:53 PM
great write up. can we get some pics of the add a fuse connection? theoretically this would also work for over head lighting right, same process, just relocating the lights to the roof. my sister is always complaining when strapping in my niece in the back seat.
#19
08-14-2011, 01:14 PM
To connect to these wires you can use a WIRE TAP. I attached a picture and description.
Wire Tap-In Squeeze Connectors (10-Pack) - RadioShack.com
Last edited by GREG; 08-14-2011 at 01:17 PM.
#20
08-14-2011, 09:54 PM
Since you are already working from the C-416 connection at the ETACS-ECU you can make you positive connection from the white wire. The yellow wire is your (switch) negative and the white wire is your (HOT+) positive wire. Doing this will also use the same fuse as your dome lights for protection.
To connect to these wires you can use a WIRE TAP. I attached a picture and description.
Wire Tap-In Squeeze Connectors (10-Pack) - RadioShack.com
To connect to these wires you can use a WIRE TAP. I attached a picture and description.
Wire Tap-In Squeeze Connectors (10-Pack) - RadioShack.com
To be honest I would really use the Add a circuit to the dome light fuse for the +12v. If at all possible you want to avoid tapping existing wires. Also the dome light fuse is 15 amps. You really want to stay in the 5amp or less range for LEDs. Most will tell you it is best to choose your fuse based on the limits of the wiring.