Third brake light install

Finally had some time to install the led third brake light I mentioned earlier last week. A few people were interested to see how it worked out so, here it is. I'm not 100% satisfied with it, but it is in and secure, so it will stay for now. In case you haven't seen the other thread, I found a 10-Led light at autozone that will fit through the engine cooling vents and act as a third brake light. Here is the light:


The light had a little black control box connected to it (you could set it to blink randomly or stay on), so I cut that box off, and then had to lengthen the wires. There were five gray wires (grounds) and one black wire (+). I soldered new wires on, and covered them with that heat shrink stuff.


I did not want to drill any holes, so I decided to make two separate mounts and wrap them around the engine vents. For the mounts I used that banding wire stuff (I'm not sure what the correct name is, I just found it in my parents basement). I painted it the color of my car to help hide it. The next few pictures pretty much show how the mounts work. These were taken during the "mock-up" stage.

This is one mount from the outside view. This mount got cut a lot shorter than it is in this pic. I cut about another inch off the top for the final product.


Here is the view underneath. These are the vents you actually have to slide the light through. It's a tight squeeze, but they just make it.


Here is how the light looks with the mounts attached.



The tricky part is, you can't fit the light and the prebent mounts through the vents. I had to attach the unbent mounts to the light, and insert the light and straight mounts through the vent. Then, once inside no man's land, you have to wriggle, squirm, and fish your fingers around through the vents to bend the mounts around the lower vents. I didn't remove my decklid, because I hate installing decklids, but it would have been a lot easier without it in the way.

Here is the final product before I neatly ran my wires.


And here it is with the light off


Overall I am satisfied with it. It's right against the rear vents, so it's not really as "hidden" as I would like it. I pretty much had to mount it there, because I had to hold it in place while bending the mounts. I would have like to have had it more recessed, but oh well, maybe next time. A word of caution if anyone else trys this. If you screw the mounts on, make sure you use very very short screws. I cut longer screws down, but didn't get one short enough. The screw hit the circuit board, and my 10-LED light instantly became a 9-LED light .

I LOVE it!
If/when I get another bug, I'm going to copy that.

Very cool idea and the safety factor is priceless.

Thanks yall. I must admit, the idea was not mine. I've seen a couple of others do it on the Samba, but they all had to cut the area open to get the light in there. That's why this light is so cool, it fits without any cutting!