The glass and mud is done and it is out for upholstery work now. Got another pile of stuff on order so it'll probably be another month before that part is done.
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Dale McLean
aka PS-RagE House of RagE
While I am waiting for stereo parts, I still have other mods to do.
Last week, my back up lights came in so yesterday I took the day and installed them.
Here are the lightheads. These are Whelen 700 Series high intensity LED floods:
I want both to have them automatically come on when the truck is shifted to Reverse as well as to be able to manually fire them using the Cargo light switch.
Back to the schematics:
Both pretty simple circuits. Computer controlled like everything else in this truck.
In order to have two different power sources (reverse lights and cargo lights) I have to seperate the circuits with diodes.
A quick trip to Radio Shack gets me a package of rectifier diodes with a 3A rating:
Diodes, of course, will only allow the flow of current in one direction. So when the reverse lights are on, the cargo lights will not be forced on and vice-versa.
Originally, I was going to use an automotive relay to provide power to these lightheads but it turns out they only draw 300mA each so I decided to cut them directly into the truck's wiring.
Before mounting though, I need to make sure that having them mounted to the bumper is not going to affect the sonar (shoulda checked that before ordering them - doh):
A quick test shows they have no effect on the sonar so next to mount them. They came with nylon expansion clips and stainless screws:
My camera is rather large, so I could not really manipulate it under the truck to get pictures.
For the cargo light line, I cut into the wiring harness in the driver's side trough and pulled it through the firewall. It was fished through the frame to the driver's side tail lamp. I cut into the reverse light wires and the diodes were installed in the tail lamp. The blue wire is the long pull from the Cargo lights and the red is the cut into the Reverse lamps:
Its not pretty but it is protected:
And here is the finished product. Looks good, IMO:
And here is where it counts.
Backup lights off:
Backup lights on:
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Dale McLean
aka PS-RagE House of RagE
Rage. I am going to do everything you just did with the lights to a T. Im going to order the parts and pick up the diods at radio shack. I cant read schematics so I will have a heck of a time figuring just what the heck I am doing. You said you ran a wire from the drivers side all the way down to the tail light assembly correct? Did you use an electricians fish tape? Or did I read it wrong. Could you explain the hooking up part with your wires at the taillight assembly? I can solder fine but can not figure exactly what you did there. Is the blue wire coming from the front of the truck which is attached somehow to power? I am also going to do one more thing that you didnt do which is run power from the reverse line and run it to my tonneau cover interior light so all I have to do is hit the cargo light inside the truck and it will turn my light on in the tonneau cover. Any suggestions and or pictures. I will gladly drop you some money for your time on helping me do this.
Sorry ragE. One more quick question. Did you have to remove the headliner in order to access the "High mounted stop light assembly" also known as cargo light? That way you can see the wires to hook up into the cargo light? Thats what it looks like it says on the TIS website
You said you ran a wire from the drivers side all the way down to the tail light assembly correct? Did you use an electricians fish tape? Or did I read it wrong.
Actually, I started at the back of the truck and worked forward. I had about 20' of #14 wire that I covered with wireloom. Using a creeper, this wire was then fished through the frame by hand, ty wrapping as I went along until I got to the engine compartment. I then fished it through the wire harness grommet in the firewall. I was working alone and it was extremely frustrating so if you plan to do this I would suggest recruiting an extra set of hands.
Inside the driver's side door sill is a large wire harness. Two of the wires in it are brown. One of the brown wires is the switched power feed for the cargo lamps. I tapped into this wire by stripping off some insullation and soldering to it.
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Could you explain the hooking up part with your wires at the taillight assembly? I can solder fine but can not figure exactly what you did there. Is the blue wire coming from the front of the truck which is attached somehow to power?
I did the same at the tail lights - for reverse lamp power I stripped back a bit of the insulation from the red/blue wire and for ground I cut into the white/black.
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I am also going to do one more thing that you didnt do which is run power from the reverse line and run it to my tonneau cover interior light so all I have to do is hit the cargo light inside the truck and it will turn my light on in the tonneau cover. Any suggestions and or pictures. I will gladly drop you some money for your time on helping me do this.
I think you meant Cargo Light but I get it. Is your tonneau light LED or halogen? The only reason I could just tap directly into the truck's wiring like this is because I'm using LEDs - they draw very little current.
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Dale McLean
aka PS-RagE House of RagE
Sorry ragE. One more quick question. Did you have to remove the headliner in order to access the "High mounted stop light assembly" also known as cargo light? That way you can see the wires to hook up into the cargo light? Thats what it looks like it says on the TIS website
Any documents I've seen about that lamp say you have to unbolt it from the back and that would indeed mean dropping the headliner in some fashion. That is why I tapped the harness inside the door sill. You could also look for it in the driver's side kick panel - there is supposed to be a junction connecter in there. Either way you have to tap into the wire so the harness is as good a place as any
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Dale McLean
aka PS-RagE House of RagE
RagE. Thanks for the quck responses. In this picture is this the correst harness? I had a really hard time finding a brown wire let alone two. I did find one I think unless I am color blind that was wrapped around with a red wire maybe 18guage then I found what looked close to a brown wire but wasnt and it was a little tiny one. I hit my cargo switch to the on position and used my tester to check the brown wire and there was no change when I turned on and off the switch. Am I testing this wrong? I put one end of the probe to a metal object and the other to the wire...
Thanks for your help.....
Last edited by Jessyjames; 10-22-2007 at 06:53 PM.
Awesome MODs ! Truck looks spectacular.. ! If ya ever get bored you can come install my Uniden VHF radio in my Tundra ! lol .. But no Drilling HOLES in My ROOF PLEASE or anywhere for that matter..! Enjoy your truck ! You deserve it !
__________________ LIFE IS A BEACH EVERYDAY ! 2007 Tundra DC 5.7 4x4 SR5 (Black Ext./ Tan Int. Cloth), 2.5" Readylift w/ BFG 305/65/18 AT on Stock 18x8 Wheels, Husky Floor Liners front and Rear, Milemarker 9000lbs rear mounted winch setup w/ double ball w/ 1 7/8' & 2 " combo
Another TS member (1tundradude) discovered in a Toyota document that the supply voltage for the back-up camera is supposed to be between 5 and 7 volts.
I've been running it at 12v for the last four months without any problems but if the spec says it should be lower this will no doubt extend the life of the device.
Luckily, this is an easy fix - all that is required is a Voltage Regulator.
I had on hand an NTE956 which is a generic version of an LM317. This is an adjustable voltage regulator whose output is set with a simple voltage divider:
A couple quick calculations finds my resistor values (R1 = 100ohms and R2 = 420ohms) and I can solder it together. Of course it is rare to find the exact values for resistors so I had to put a 220 and a 200 in series. All these parts should be available at Radio Shack, BTW.
Works like a charm. Regardless of my input voltage, the output remains steady at 6.76v:
A bit of heat shrink to protect the contacts:
And solder it in line:
As an added bonus, much of the video noise I previously had on the display has cleaned up. Musta been pushing the video amplifiers too hard.
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Dale McLean
aka PS-RagE House of RagE
I made me a mini board and put a trim pot on it. I'll shoot you a picture later.
I didn't see any need to vary the output and I don't want it to drift. I breifly considered making a board and decided pretty quickly against it.
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I did think your original pics looked like they had some noise, although it's hard to tell when you take a picture of anything electronic. Glad that helped out.
Its like night and day. Before, I figured: "hey, its a camera in the tailgate of a truck" but now its like looking at a TV - what a difference
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I guess this means Toyota makes some tough cameras!
Well, somebody does!
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Dale McLean
aka PS-RagE House of RagE
RagE. I just got to ask. What model of camera do you use? I couldn't help but notice your super telephoto lens. Beats mine. I also am a photographer as a hobby and photo manipulation with good ol' ps3. Any who I have showed many people your truck and with a lot of positive response as to them liking it.
On another note I have another question about the cargo light power under the driver’s side sill. I think I might have found the wire but not a 100% sure. When I probe it with the tester and the other to ground I turn the cargo light switch to the off position and I get power. When I turn it to the on position I get nothing.. Is this backwards? I did the same to all the brown wires and they were hot not matter what position the cargo light switch was on. I used a continuity tester. I hope that is the right device.
Is there maybe a way for you to take a close up picture of the wire you spliced into? I know it is out of your way but it would greatly help me.
Many thanks,
James
Last edited by Jessyjames; 10-24-2007 at 12:51 AM.
RagE. I just got to ask. What model of camera do you use? I couldn't help but notice your super telephoto lens. Beats mine. I also am a photographer as a hobby and photo manipulation with good ol' ps3. Any who I have showed many people your truck and with a lot of positive response as to them liking it.
I use a Nikon D2X. For this project, I have used the 60mm f/2.8 macro, 28-70mm f/2.8, and 12-24mm f/4 lenses. All images are shot as RAW, colour corrected in Nikon Capture and then exported into CS3 for cropping and sharpening. I have a separate website for my photography here if you are interested: Photography by PS-RagE
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On another note I have another question about the cargo light power under the driver’s side sill. I think I might have found the wire but not a 100% sure. When I probe it with the tester and the other to ground I turn the cargo light switch to the off position and I get power. When I turn it to the on position I get nothing.. Is this backwards? I did the same to all the brown wires and they were hot not matter what position the cargo light switch was on. I used a continuity tester. I hope that is the right device.
Is there maybe a way for you to take a close up picture of the wire you spliced into? I know it is out of your way but it would greatly help me.
Many thanks,
James
You want to use a volt meter. Put the black lead of your meter on the grounding points under the driver's side kick panel. It will wedge in there and be out of the way. Then you can use the red lead to find the switching power. These are the brown wires I was talking about. The one I'm tapped into is the rear one. You can see the front one has a "bandaid" where I poked it to check to see if it was the one or not:
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Dale McLean
aka PS-RagE House of RagE
Re: Worklog - Road RagE II (2007 Tundra)
Linear Mode
