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Fitting Led's In The Footwell & Handbrake- Example On A Mk6.5


trikidy
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Hello forum! This is a quick guide in how to fit footwell LED lights in a ford fiesta, mine is the Mk6 (Mk6.5) zetec but I cannot imagine there being too much difference in design between different fiestas.

Firstly please see my other guide for how to fit them in the boot to find out the equipment you will need, for this I used 4 LED strips. Also a huge thanks to everyone who has helped in the threads to help me learn how to do this and also to jeebowhite!

http://www.fordownersclub.com/forums/topic/44660-fitting-leds-in-the-boot-example-on-mk-65/#entry268352

6HUZNg3.jpg

2y0O3ON.jpg

5bGjJCi.jpg

lnBPYHL.jpg

Xp6yoOI.jpg

I will be connecting these to the light above your head, I call this the map light, so that when the doors open they come on and they can be over-riden when you but the map light on they will also come on.

Firstly pop your map light out, as the light is not designed to allow new connections to it there is not a simple wire we can connect to, so we will make our own. Strip some insulation of the wire and simply wrap it around the two points in the picture. Note do not do this until last, I am just showing you now so you understand how it will work!

eb7FZRZ.jpg

Red is posi and black neg.

So to begin get a length of speaker cable, which you should have left over from the previous LED installation and cut it to size, I recommend cutting it to the length of your car which should allow some extra slack should you ever want to add new LED's on.

Then remove your glovebox and peel away the rubber from the passenger side door bit, you can fully remove one section and leave the top section hanging, see pic.

ic72aYN.jpg

To save removing the plastic pillars, which I have heard is a pain, we will use the roof to hide the wire and then thread it through the gaps in the pillar to come out at the footwell. To start with post the wire through the map light hole straight out to the windscreen, you can see on the pic where I mean

3VQtcXX.jpg

Then you will have this, post the wire through so that there is enough wire left to reach where the current light is:

1e35P0F.jpg

So that only this much wire is left:

zlQoyUO.jpg

From this just tuck the wire up into the roof bit as you bring it along to the passenger side pillar, this way it will be concealed.

Now you have it to the pillar you will see a small gap in the pillar, push the wire through here so it is like this:

eqz1M9W.jpg

Then pull all of the wire through and make sure the rest of it is tucked up in the roof and that there is still enough wire to reach the map light.

You should be left with this:

Whavlgq.jpg

From this look in the pillar for a small gap, then just post the wire down through the gap and it should come out here:

1j9W8MD.jpg

Then you can see another gap from where it is now to the footwell, and post it through. Put the rubber seal back on as this will keep the wire concealed and you should have the wire out in the footwell!

3th1oGy.jpg

Once it is through I recommend tucking it behind the wires from the fusebox, this will keep it hidden and make it blend in a bit more! Now make sure the wire works, so get your LED and a crimp butt- dont seal it just make sure they are touching and then switch the light on, you should get light! Also try the door activation to turn them on:

yuKLJ0C.jpg

Right now you do not have to fit the handbrake lights, but if so you will need to unscrew the top of the handbrake, remove the gaitor and pull the fascia off around the handbrake, it just pulls of. You will also need to remove the plastic fascia in the footwell, there is simply 1 screw to remove and then pull it towards you as there are 2 clips holding it in place, the screw is here:

Ox9bnti.jpg

esxUuex.jpg

Now to power lights in the drivers side you will need another piece of speaker wire, so cut another length and if you wish to do the handbrake light too cut another length, again roughly work it out- always go bigger than you need!

Then poke the new piece of cable through to the drivers side, avoid the heater vents by tucking it under them and then through to the other side- you will need to remove the panel from the drivers side too.

GyQb8BF.jpg

PLy1ESu.jpg

To do the handbrake lights you will need to feed a piece of wire to the handbrake, use the gearstick gap to see what you are doing and make the wire be as much out of the way as possible.

4GdTemS.jpg

fFc7N6m.jpg

Feed it all the way through to the end of the handbrake, you will notice a slight dip at the end, this is what we will use to feed the wires out.

0tFgQGg.jpg

Once it is fed through make sure the cable reaches where I have shown in the pic and the rest is pushed down in the gap on the passenger side.

Next up we need to connect the handbrake cable (that you have just fed through), the cable going through to the drivers side and an LED for the passenger footwell.

So crimp butt, I used yellow for this, crimp the wire that you have fed from the map light down the pillar to these three wires, on the LED blue is posi and clear is neg.

MQyHr8a.jpg

So you want to twist together the posi and neg from the two wires +led into one wire and crimp this to the wire you have threaded down from the map light.

RKrUNr3.jpg

Crimp it tight and make sure it doesn't come lose. Next crimp ends to the handbrake light:

ftdPqy5.jpg

Then crimp two led strips to this, again make the neg go together and the pos go together. Test they work. Once you have done this you can stick them in place, I replaced the handbrake plastic fascia bit first and then stuck the lights on, one on the drivers & one on the passenger sides:

8LLHpDm.jpg

Then stick your gearstick back on and again test the light, by testing as you go you can work out why they aren't working after you do something!

Now we need to crimp the drivers side led strip on, again fairly simple by now:

SMu3OsD.jpg

Once you have done this reattach the drivers side plastic fascia, ensuring enough cable is left to attach the LED's to where you want- I chose the very thin plastic bit where the computer reader plugs in, you should be able to hide all the red and black cable as the LED's tend to have a long cable:

Test again, as you can see on mine they are hidden:

1wNQb1Z.jpg

Next up reattach the passenger side fascia, making sure enough cable is there and all wires are hidden, I stuck my passenger side to the bit of plastic that you can see below the glovebox. Test again and then stick your glovebox back.

Xp6yoOI.jpg

Now as far as the lights go you are done, when you touch the connectors to the place shown on the first picture they should light up, now all that is left is to connect it to the map light.

lnBPYHL.jpg

Strip some of the wire and wrap it around the two connectors, I found using a very small flat head screwdriver was useful to manipulate the wire, once it is around lasso it around itself and make sure it is tight. I taped the wire to the light so that it reduced the tension on the connection:

W4vT4yw.jpg

Check the connection and you are done! I put some insulation tape around the connection because I thought it would help!

Enjoy your LED's!

Any questions I will do my best to help!

  • Like 2
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Nice tutorial mate!! Very simple and some good pictures!! And the red LEDs look really good around your handbreak I think I will have to stick a couple there as well :)

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Very good job mate! well done!

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Yeah I saw jeebowhite had one of them, looks good.

I think I would only have to connect it to the footwell lights with a cut and crimp job rather than install the whole loom.

I don't have anything to cut the current ignition barrel to make room, is it alot to take off?

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yh either way works, not particularly using sandpaper would work just as well

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yh would still need to shave down the diameter of the plastic cowel to allow for the lights to shine through,

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Exellent guide! - glad you could put my idea -

FOCA on 10 june 2013 -(on another thread)

"I had an idea about the interior light/ footwell lights - if you connected your footwell lights where the bulb connects (instead of either of the feeds) on the top front interior light, the footwell lights would come on when the door opened AND when you switched the interior light on manually"

into practice.

i still think you should solder the connections onto the top light -

FOCA on 14 Jun 2013 - (on another thread)

"Just make sure you have long enough cable, ideally if you could solder the wires onto the connections on the top light - or at least make sure they are tight/ make a good connection, and insulate any exposed wires with insulating tape"

The wires could become loose the way they are

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I didn't take a final picture, but the yellow tape is holding the wire in place so that there is not much tension on the connection, I also covered in it insulation tape so touch wood it should hold!

Soldering would be best yeah but I don't have one!

Also thanks for all your input, think it is better that it works with the button, thanks for the advice! :D

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  • 6 months later...

First of all, fantastic guide, and they look great I'll be using this very soon! Just a quick question, say I wanted to have the same setup as yourself but instead wire a button into the circuit (Placed in the dash) to turn them on and off independently. Where could I wire the power too, so they aren't reliant on the centre lights being on? Could I wire into the stereo power wire?

Cheers

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Joe,

Your best bet is to take the feed from the stereo ignition live source. Then wire the button in parallel, so that as long as the ignition is on, you then have the switch control to turn them on or off manually.

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Cheers jeebo, I thought I might be able to, I just needed some clarification. Will be fitting this coming weekend :)

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  • 1 year later...

Top notch guide..does anyone have any pics on how to wire into a focus (09) map light ?

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  • 1 year later...
On 17/06/2013 at 4:43 PM, trikidy said:

Hello forum! This is a quick guide in how to fit footwell LED lights in a ford fiesta, mine is the Mk6 (Mk6.5) zetec but I cannot imagine there being too much difference in design between different fiestas.

Firstly please see my other guide for how to fit them in the boot to find out the equipment you will need, for this I used 4 LED strips. Also a huge thanks to everyone who has helped in the threads to help me learn how to do this and also to jeebowhite!

http://www.fordownersclub.com/forums/topic/44660-fitting-leds-in-the-boot-example-on-mk-65/#entry268352

6HUZNg3.jpg

2y0O3ON.jpg

5bGjJCi.jpg

lnBPYHL.jpg

Xp6yoOI.jpg

I will be connecting these to the light above your head, I call this the map light, so that when the doors open they come on and they can be over-riden when you but the map light on they will also come on.

Firstly pop your map light out, as the light is not designed to allow new connections to it there is not a simple wire we can connect to, so we will make our own. Strip some insulation of the wire and simply wrap it around the two points in the picture. Note do not do this until last, I am just showing you now so you understand how it will work!

eb7FZRZ.jpg

Red is posi and black neg.

So to begin get a length of speaker cable, which you should have left over from the previous LED installation and cut it to size, I recommend cutting it to the length of your car which should allow some extra slack should you ever want to add new LED's on.

Then remove your glovebox and peel away the rubber from the passenger side door bit, you can fully remove one section and leave the top section hanging, see pic.

ic72aYN.jpg

To save removing the plastic pillars, which I have heard is a pain, we will use the roof to hide the wire and then thread it through the gaps in the pillar to come out at the footwell. To start with post the wire through the map light hole straight out to the windscreen, you can see on the pic where I mean

3VQtcXX.jpg

Then you will have this, post the wire through so that there is enough wire left to reach where the current light is:

1e35P0F.jpg

So that only this much wire is left:

zlQoyUO.jpg

From this just tuck the wire up into the roof bit as you bring it along to the passenger side pillar, this way it will be concealed.

Now you have it to the pillar you will see a small gap in the pillar, push the wire through here so it is like this:

eqz1M9W.jpg

Then pull all of the wire through and make sure the rest of it is tucked up in the roof and that there is still enough wire to reach the map light.

You should be left with this:

Whavlgq.jpg

From this look in the pillar for a small gap, then just post the wire down through the gap and it should come out here:

1j9W8MD.jpg

Then you can see another gap from where it is now to the footwell, and post it through. Put the rubber seal back on as this will keep the wire concealed and you should have the wire out in the footwell!

3th1oGy.jpg

Once it is through I recommend tucking it behind the wires from the fusebox, this will keep it hidden and make it blend in a bit more! Now make sure the wire works, so get your LED and a crimp butt- dont seal it just make sure they are touching and then switch the light on, you should get light! Also try the door activation to turn them on:

yuKLJ0C.jpg

Right now you do not have to fit the handbrake lights, but if so you will need to unscrew the top of the handbrake, remove the gaitor and pull the fascia off around the handbrake, it just pulls of. You will also need to remove the plastic fascia in the footwell, there is simply 1 screw to remove and then pull it towards you as there are 2 clips holding it in place, the screw is here:

Ox9bnti.jpg

esxUuex.jpg

Now to power lights in the drivers side you will need another piece of speaker wire, so cut another length and if you wish to do the handbrake light too cut another length, again roughly work it out- always go bigger than you need!

Then poke the new piece of cable through to the drivers side, avoid the heater vents by tucking it under them and then through to the other side- you will need to remove the panel from the drivers side too.

GyQb8BF.jpg

PLy1ESu.jpg

To do the handbrake lights you will need to feed a piece of wire to the handbrake, use the gearstick gap to see what you are doing and make the wire be as much out of the way as possible.

4GdTemS.jpg

fFc7N6m.jpg

Feed it all the way through to the end of the handbrake, you will notice a slight dip at the end, this is what we will use to feed the wires out.

0tFgQGg.jpg

Once it is fed through make sure the cable reaches where I have shown in the pic and the rest is pushed down in the gap on the passenger side.

Next up we need to connect the handbrake cable (that you have just fed through), the cable going through to the drivers side and an LED for the passenger footwell.

So crimp butt, I used yellow for this, crimp the wire that you have fed from the map light down the pillar to these three wires, on the LED blue is posi and clear is neg.

MQyHr8a.jpg

So you want to twist together the posi and neg from the two wires +led into one wire and crimp this to the wire you have threaded down from the map light.

RKrUNr3.jpg

Crimp it tight and make sure it doesn't come lose. Next crimp ends to the handbrake light:

ftdPqy5.jpg

Then crimp two led strips to this, again make the neg go together and the pos go together. Test they work. Once you have done this you can stick them in place, I replaced the handbrake plastic fascia bit first and then stuck the lights on, one on the drivers & one on the passenger sides:

8LLHpDm.jpg

Then stick your gearstick back on and again test the light, by testing as you go you can work out why they aren't working after you do something!

Now we need to crimp the drivers side led strip on, again fairly simple by now:

SMu3OsD.jpg

Once you have done this reattach the drivers side plastic fascia, ensuring enough cable is left to attach the LED's to where you want- I chose the very thin plastic bit where the computer reader plugs in, you should be able to hide all the red and black cable as the LED's tend to have a long cable:

Test again, as you can see on mine they are hidden:

1wNQb1Z.jpg

Next up reattach the passenger side fascia, making sure enough cable is there and all wires are hidden, I stuck my passenger side to the bit of plastic that you can see below the glovebox. Test again and then stick your glovebox back.

Xp6yoOI.jpg

Now as far as the lights go you are done, when you touch the connectors to the place shown on the first picture they should light up, now all that is left is to connect it to the map light.

lnBPYHL.jpg

Strip some of the wire and wrap it around the two connectors, I found using a very small flat head screwdriver was useful to manipulate the wire, once it is around lasso it around itself and make sure it is tight. I taped the wire to the light so that it reduced the tension on the connection:

W4vT4yw.jpg

Check the connection and you are done! I put some insulation tape around the connection because I thought it would help!

Enjoy your LED's!

Any questions I will do my best to help!

Hi,

 

Can I just ask, not sure if it was mentioned but the way that you have wired these LED strips up, is this totally safe? No electric risk of shorting out, starting a fire etc?

 

Can I also just ask, will these only work when the reading light is on? So when I unlock my car and the sidelights, indictors, license place light and reading light all come on and then when I get in my car and then reading light goes off either as a time restriction or if I start my car? Will these lights also go on when my door is open and the ignition is on or off as the reading light goes on and if I want to put them on permanently I would use the reading light switch that turns the reading light on permanently then these LED strips light up too?

 

In order to have them on permanently without the reading light (I want to reading like a crystal white) I would need to wire them up as suggested above to the ignition and have a control button in that loom in order to do this and there is no other way?

 

Thank you in advance 😊

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Unfortunately trikidy is no longer active on the forums, however, personally I would rather go for a more secured and wrapped other connection but as long as it's not loose, wrapped tightly and preferably secured then yes it's perfectly safe.

They would be on when the map light is on, when the doors open for example.

Sent from my D6603 using Tapatalk

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On 16/01/2014 at 5:16 PM, kushmoke said:

First of all, fantastic guide, and they look great I'll be using this very soon! Just a quick question, say I wanted to have the same setup as yourself but instead wire a button into the circuit (Placed in the dash) to turn them on and off independently. Where could I wire the power too, so they aren't reliant on the centre lights being on? Could I wire into the stereo power wire?

Cheers

I just found these that have a manual switch..

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/interior-footwell-lighting-waterproof-instructions/dp/B00GL5LSF4

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