so i did a bit of searching, found a couple things and just have a few Q's for you guys. i got a pair of 2 white CCFL tubes, i want to put them in the footwells and have them come on when the door opens, but i'd rather have them not wired in with the dome light so they just turn on/off not slowly turn off, basically like the hatch like, can i wire it into that? so if someone can tell me where/what i wire them into, i'd greatly appreciate it.
[loveff]

Do you know there is a button that get's pushed when the door closes. You can probably find wires for it by pulling the trim off.

hm i know the button you're talking about, but what trim?

I don't know... start with the lower B pillar. If you can't acces it, then I guess back panels.

for those people who do know i hope they look @ this thread lol.

yea that lil button would be the best thing to do unless u want to just wire them up to the dome lights so u know for sure u got the right one

u cann accually buy one of thoes little push butten things and just wire it straight to that i have mine hooked up to a switch in the center counsel and i got the led int he hvac hooked up to the switch and i did that last weekend
and i did the trunk
the only real problem was mounting the passanger side cathode there was nothing to ziptie it to and the velcro strips are week
first i had to make 2 cap of the cathode shorter and then gorilla glue the velcro on and then super glue it to the indent under the glove box

it comes with the car...
You can also hook it up to dome light
I didn't have any problems zipping cathode under the glove box

he doesent want it on the dome light
and that it srue but idk if he wants to go cutting through wires like that
and for the glove box
take a picture i couldent find anything to zip it 2

there are holes in the metal part to whitch glove box bolts to? maybe on 05 model it's different?

probly i got an 02
and theres a little crease under the box and then under that theres like a strip with 2 screws and its like
idk how to explain it

u cann accually buy one of thoes little push butten things and just wire it straight to that i have mine hooked up to a switch in the center counsel and i got the led int he hvac hooked up to the switch and i did that last weekend
and i did the trunk
the only real problem was mounting the passanger side cathode there was nothing to ziptie it to and the velcro strips are week
first i had to make 2 cap of the cathode shorter and then gorilla glue the velcro on and then super glue it to the indent under the glove box
dude im not gonna lie, usually im fairly good with figuring out what people are trying to say when speaking jibberish but that made little to no sense at all.

Maybe you could use this door/hood pin switch? http://www.oznium.com/pin-switch

Seems like it would do what you want. All you would need to do is hook it up through a constant power source like the cigerette lighter.

exactly what i was talking about

why would you do that if you already have one?

to b cool?
i wouldent wanna start pokeing around to find 1 wire

so can anyone give some assistance theres so many of you with this mod =/

ugggh....

so im guessing you didnt find anything...

ok.... the door switches pass a ground, both sides are a normally open switch when the door is closed, when you open the door the switch makes contact, and gives the

GEM module (basically alittle circuit board full of relays, switches etc, the GEM's take care of everything else that the PCM doesnt care about, such as lights, etc)

so what you would need to do is give the inverter(the little box the cathodes plug into) constant power, then tap into the ground at the door switches, or as close as you can to them. you'll probably have to pull the kick plate trim up, the driver side ground wire that activates the light is: black with a yellow tracer, and the passenger side is: black with a blue tracer.

so you'll have constant power going to the little inverter, and when the door opens the door switch will give the inverter a ground, and then the cathodes will come on.

and i just looked at the chassis cut-away view, and the door switch goes into a large loom that goes into the kick well(bottom of the door jam.

so you should be able to find it in the loom, and follow it and be able to make your connections closer to the dash.

easiest way to find out and make sure those are the correct wires(the colors i stated above) is to put the alligator clip of a test light on the positive side of your battery, then poke the wire( either, driver side, black with yellow tracer or passenger side, black with blue tracer) and then shut both doors, while poking the wire with your test light and the alligator clip on positive, your test light will fade out with the dome light, because the GEM module is dimming the ground wire.

hope this helps.


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sorry for saying uggh... i was just discusted, by ford using a ground to activate the lights.... lol but thinking about it... to get the "dimming" affect, ground is the best way. because you either have power or you dont. but you can limit the amount of ground and control the light more easily.

yieks that seems kinda complicated lol....is wiring it into the dome light any easier?

you would have to find the wire coming from the dome light. it goes down the driver side A-pillar i believe. ill look. 1 second.

ok. found something. but if you pull off your A-pillar trim, i do remember seeing a plug stuck the sheet metal.

sinse you have a 3-door like me there should be 3 wires in it. there should be a black with a blue tracer wire.

thats the wire that dims, so you could tap into it there, and then run the wire down, but remember that'll be your ground, so you'll still have to give the inverter constant power, and then when the door opens that black with blue tracer will get ground, and then when the door shuts, the GEM will "dim" out that ground.

by saying "dim" i mean that the GEM just switches and elminates the ground when it "dims" past a part of so much resistance.

I would have imagined the dimming effect came from a small capacitor, not because it is activated by the ground.

no. the "dimming" affect is by a resistor increasing its resistance to the point where it just cuts it off entirely.

which is why if you have an LED dome light, it'll never go completely out unless you turn the dome light completely off, because the LED cannot build enough resistance to "turn off" the ground.

how does a resistor "increase" it's resistance?

well im about to pull off the a-pillar trim so ill see how that goes. i pulled off the panel thing where that fuel switch cut off or whatever it is, and theres a zillion wires that are yellow with black strips and vice versa LOL theres 2 big clusters one with a ford part # tag and its massive and another one thats smaller. along with a bunch of other stuff lol. hopefully the a-pillar isnt that confusing.

by the fuel cut off is the 3 GEM's, and PCM hiding under neath them.

and a common "resistor" increases its resistance by a manual input, like you or someone turning a knob to dim or raise the light output.

but sinse ford has the GEM do it, im sure it does it somehow electronically.

in my book, when it says it goes to the GEM, it just has a box that says GEM, the book doesnt explain at all how the GEM does it, and im sure that ford doesnt really want everyone to know how their stuff works.

i got the a pillar off on the driver side, theres a black wire with blue on it, therse also an orange/blue wire as well they're tied togeather. but thats all...is that the one i follow?

yes. the all black is your full time ground for the map lights and when you switch on the dome manually, and the one with the orange tracer is constant power, and the wire with the blue tracer should be the "dimming" circuit.

ok now how do i wire all that togeather LOL

you hook the red wire from the cathode inverter into a constant power source, then hook the black wire from the cathode inverter to the black with blue tracer wire thats running down the a-pillar.

you'll need alittle bit of wire, sinse i know the cold cathode wiring isnt very long.

when you hook it up like that, you should be able to have the cathode inveter come on and off with the doors opening and closing.

only thing i havent come across personally or heard of anyone... is how the inveter will react with the ground dimming out. it may work perfect, or might freak out...

It will work. I connected the wire at the dome light and run it down to the glove box area, since it was easier. Then I connected black wires from transformers to that wire and red wire to the 12V.
THe lights go out slowly like the dome light would. If you close the door they remain lit for a few secodns then dim out. If you press lock, they will shut down right away. basically the same as domelight.

I thought you didn't want to use domelight? He wanted to have it like in the hatch, if it closes then lights turn off right away. That's why i suggested that button in the door.

The other way got too complicated lol, do you have any pics how yours are wired? im either really dumb or this is confusing lol.

ok so orange/blue wire hook into the red wire from cathode inverter

then black/blue wire hook into the black wire from cathode inverter


and just extend stuff as needed?

goodluck.

I don't have any pictures, sorry. Ok so if you want to run the wire from domelight you need to connect it to the black wire. There're two ground wires that are black.
If you look at the plug the wire you need is connected to the connector positioned vertically like this [ | ] in the plug that connects to the light.
After that you run this wire to the location you want and connect black wires from transformers to that. And red wires connect to constant 12V. Thats it.

I DID IT!!!!!!![ffrocks]

so since theres no current how-to IM GOING TO DO IT!!!! lol


So first....dome light removal (BTW this is WITH sunroof)
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v208/Spinal/Picture1650Medium.jpg

once the a and b pillars are off everythings exposed so you can work on it. i fished the red wire from where the dome light is through the headliner and down the side, interestingly enough there is enough room for an arm to go up almost the entire way and grab the wire.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v208/Spinal/Picture1653Medium.jpg

and this is why its very good...
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v208/Spinal/Picture1654Medium.jpg
the driver side is 10x worse lol. so anyway i did both on each side....heres some mid progress pics....
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v208/Spinal/Picture1658Medium.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v208/Spinal/Picture1659Medium.jpg
and then the moment of truth for soldering lol. hon hon was 100% correct about the wires, the BLUE/ORANGE is constant power, so that goes to the RED wire off of the inverter. the BLACK/BLUE wire goes to the BLACK wire on the inverter. I mounted the inverter to the right of the dome light with some 2-way tape and its out of the way.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v208/Spinal/Picture1660Medium.jpg

i'll get pics up tonight, im so excited i can't believe it works and i didn't break anything lol.[thankyou]

woot they work!!!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v208/Spinal/Picture1695Medium.jpg

yay! congrats. Did you just throw them on the floor?

temporarily lol while i was finishing the sun was going down, theres a cold front coming through and its supposed to get down to like -2 tonight so i wasnt about to spend time fiddling around with them in the dark lol, tomorrows supposed to be nice and sunny during the day, im off school so im gonna mount them then.

but im so happy they work![grinking]

I'm glad you got them working. The comment honhon had said about the reaction of the inverters... from what Phil (Owner, Oznium.com) had said is that they don't react well to the dimming. However, lowering the contact of the ground as the dimmer of the Focus seems to do, I don't foresee any ill effects. I hope they work well for you though. I wish I could have helped since I've done the exact same project last fall, only with LED's. I actually soldered my wires directly on the former dome light contacts as to avoid any unnecessary splicing... quite convenient! But since you've put in your small write-up, I won't steal your thunder[:)] .

cool. good job.

thanks for your help[grinking]

your welcome, glad the result came out the way you wanted.

my wire diagram book has been a life saver, and has been well worth the 20$ for it.