Courtesy Lights?

[Deadly Sushi]

Hey, folks, my 92 Camry seems to only have courtesy lights on the ceiling and doors. Not much light. Has anyone done a mod where they added lights under the dash by the feet and the are turned on / off when the door opens?

[CamryWilly]

I never really heard of it here, but I read about it in the gen 6 forum. They hook up to the dome light, get a wire down under the upholstery and then they wire some lighs down there... I think it's stickied, check it out.

William

[Tom 2000]

At least you have door courtesy lights! Gen4 doesn't have them at all.

I did something a little different with my Gen4. On the Gen4, there is a sunglass holder/ garage door opener holder in the ceiling between the sunvisors.

Unless a gen4 comes with a mooroof, there are no map lights, just the holder. Mine has no moonroof :-(

What I did was to get the sunglass holder/garage door opener holder from a 1st gen Tundra which comes with maplights even without the moonroof. I enlarged the opening in the headliner to accept the unit from the tundra.

I wired it up to the stock dome light so that these come on when the door opens also, as it does in a Tundra. I can also turn these on independently when the doors are shut by pressing on the lights themselves.

Notice the switch that reads OFF and DOOR. This switch determines if the lights come on with the door opening or not.



I don't rememeber what this area looks like on a gen3 LE (I think it was blank, unless it has a moonroof), but you might be able to pull of something similar with maplights from another Toyota or if the XLE had maplights, you might be able to rewire them to work with the doors

[WhiteRabbit]

I did it on my car.

The dome light wire can be found in the driver side kick panel. It is a white wire with a black stripe (or white wire with a blue stripe, can't remember exactly). Best way is to use a relay to control the lights/neons.

[CamryWilly]

Nice to see you back White Rabbit, long time no see!

And Tom 2000, your right suchi is lucky, even the 3.5 don't have the door courtesy lights. I've always had 3.5s until I bought the 92 V6, it was a nice bonus when I finally noticed them!

[Lightning Blue]

Originally Posted by Tom 2000

Unless a gen4 comes with a mooroof, there are no map lights, just the holder. Mine has no moonroof :-(

I have a gen 4.5 with a moonroof and no maplights, just the holder!

[Tom 2000]

You must have an aftermarket moonroof.

Gen4s with factory moonroof have a holder with maplights and moonroof switch like this. The moonroof switch is on the driver's side. The maplight switch is on the passenger side.

[WhiteRabbit]

Here is the wiring diagram I made when I did my setup:



I had mine do a lot more features though such as being able to turn on the cathodes and LEDs when the doors are closed, have them automatically turn off when the key was taken out of the ignition, and being able to turn them on/off with the doors closed and no key in the ignition.

[WhiteRabbit]

Pics:

I managed to change every interior bulb to blue/white LEDs =P, yes, even the ignition ring and clock.

[LUVLEXUS101]

Drilled the red lens and put in 15 5 mm cyan leds

[Timbits93]

You could snatch one from a Gen 1 Sienna :P

Anyways, nice lights everyone!

[Deadly Sushi]

Originally Posted by WhiteRabbit

Here is the wiring diagram I made when I did my setup:



I had mine do a lot more features though such as being able to turn on the cathodes and LEDs when the doors are closed, have them automatically turn off when the key was taken out of the ignition, and being able to turn them on/off with the doors closed and no key in the ignition.

Wow man!!! Great job!!!!

I just want mine to turn on when the door opens. Your car looks great! Are those reverse gauges for your instrument cluster?

[WhiteRabbit]

^Then disregard the two relays on the right side and you wouldn't need a switch inline on the neons/cathodes.

The 1N4001 is a diode to make the electrical flow one way only.

So when you open the door, it goes to ground, trips the relay, and turns the cathodes/neons/leds on.