Improved Trunk lighting - Is there demand?

[reynirb]

I have OEM lights in the foot wells and doors already, it's just a question of making them better. After trying it out, I decided that the brighter foot wells just shows off my kids' mess and my lack of vacuuming. I do like the brighter puddles though, so I've got another 4-pack ordered to upgrade those.

The newer models must come with more lights or the lights are included in one of your packages. I ordered the whole kit, but I had to add them into places where there were none before. My trunk had one lonely LED in the trunk lid, I had to add the two inside the trunk on each corner (the cut out imprints are there, but you have to break them open) so I now have 3 in the trunk.

My rear passenger doors had no puddle lights, had to cut the vinyl that covered the openings and fish the harness out.

My rear foot wells had no lights, had to snap in the brackets on the underside seat frame, and add the two lights there.

I ended up getting the entire Model S package, replaced four Red LED's, and 6 White LED's. Added another 6 LED's where there were none before. Had one left over, which I ended up using to replace a trunk LED that was intermittent.

I bought some Blue clear plastic coating spray for RC windows which I was planning on experimenting with to make the foot well lights Blue. Will test that out one of these days.

Also, just got the A.O. license plate lights and put them in this week. Makes the plate nice and bright and now fits the car vs the Yellow incandescent bulbs that came with the car.

I got to give A.O. a lot of credit, the LED's are definitely a huge upgrade to the car.

My next project will be to see if I can get rid of the rust where the rims mount on the wheel hubs. Looks like an old fishing trawler through my rims and my OCD is definitely kicking up a notch looking at it.

 

[Andyw2100]

The newer models must come with more lights or the lights are included in one of your packages. I ordered the whole kit, but I had to add them into places where there were none before.

In the past, the differences you are talking about were the differences between the standard and premium interiors. The premium interiors had lights in the places you needed to add them.

i'm not sure that this has changed, but I'm not up on what is included in the options on cars Tesla is currently shipping.

 

[reynirb]

In the past, the differences you are talking about were the differences between the standard and premium interiors. The premium interiors had lights in the places you needed to add them.

i'm not sure that this has changed, but I'm not up on what is included in the options on cars Tesla is currently shipping.

I wasn't sure where in the option packages the lights were included. I know mine was missing about 6 LED's, but don't know if they are now standard or part of one of the packages on the newer models.

Adding them was a bit of a process. It wasn't necessarily brain surgery, but they are far from plug and play, especially in the doors and trunk area. I could see many people opting for someone to install them, as there is quite a bit of crawling under doors, fishing wires with hooks, and pulling form fitting interior carpet out of place in the trunk, which was a bit of a bear to put back.

 

[bmah]

Hey @pete8314! At one point you posted that you were experimenting with RGB interior lights that could be adjusted with some kind of controller. How's that coming along? (Asking for my son!)

Bruce.

 

[pete8314]

Hey Bruce

Coming along OK. I need to check with my supplier, but I think I'll have a limited amount for sale within the next month. The first batch will sell for a little less, as I want to gather some feedback. I've made some assumptions on the typical usage based on my personal preferences, but I don't claim to represent the views and preferences of the entire Tesla community Technically the main challenge was keeping the same form-factor for the bulbs, but that was important based on the feedback of the current bulbs, and how they keep the factory look. I'll certainly post to this thread when I have them.

 

[pete8314]

For those not on our mailing list, we're running an end of year/new year/screw 2016 promo until Jan 8, use coupon code "F2016" to receive a 20.16% discount.

 

[beeeerock]

For those not on our mailing list, we're running an end of year/new year/screw 2016 promo until Jan 8, use coupon code "F2016" to receive a 20.16% discount.

If we enter the full four letters of the word instead of 'F', does the discount increase? ;-)

 

[pete8314]

If we enter the full four letters of the word instead of 'F', does the discount increase? ;-)

Maybe

 

[Jim Holder]

Hi,

One question from several pages up remained open. Has anyone found the type/name of the 2-pin male connector that clicks into the LED so one can build a Y-connector by buying its female equivalent and another male?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Julie's MS]

Can we expect to see Ambient Lighting similar to what is offered in Mercedes Benz cars?

Would love to be able to change the colour of my interior lighting as well.

 

[Cyclone]

Can we expect to see Ambient Lighting similar to what is offered in Mercedes Benz cars?

Would love to be able to change the colour of my interior lighting as well.

While @pete8314 runs Abstract Ocean and will weigh in on an official answer, my gut would say "No". Abstract Ocean has very much preferred to do "plug and play" items that most individuals with just a little ingenuity (such as fishing the hidden cables in the trunk area, etc.) can do. Changing the ambient light in the door panel, even if you already have the regular "white" lights there, would require removing the door panel and likely outside of AO's target comfort area. That doesn't mean he can't/wouldn't produce it, but just that it is unlikely since it is outside his target customer experience.

 

[BozieBeMe2]

Hi,

One question from several pages up remained open. Has anyone found the type/name of the 2-pin male connector that clicks into the LED so one can build a Y-connector by buying its female equivalent and another male?

Thanks in advance.

Include me in on this as well. I'd like to re do my connectors, in the truck area.
+10 to Abstract Ocean, Pete is very attentive to details and because of this,
I changed all -17- of Tesla's incandescent units, Thanks Pete!

 

[jcaspar]

M

Can we expect to see Ambient Lighting similar to what is offered in Mercedes Benz cars?

Would love to be able to change the colour of my interior lighting as well.

My wife's 2012 Ford Explorer and daughter's 2013 Ford Focus Electric both do this. The kids like it.

 

[pete8314]

Hey everyone. A couple of things...

Firstly, we did receive more of the bulbs last week, but they're almost out of stock again :-/ We'll have more in the first week of April, but at this rate I suspect we'll be out within a week. It's a good problem to have, and I really appreciate all the great feedback, I'm trying to improve the supply chain to avoid future stock issues.

Second, and in response to @Julie's MS above, we do actually have an RGB light in 'beta' at the moment. You can see a non-professional video of them in action here, and here's a photo I snapped in a parking lot (the bulb is set to purple): They work well. The largest challenge was getting everything into the same form-factor, without over heating. We've solved that. The brightness is great too, about 12x the factory bulbs (our straight white bulbs are 16x). The remote isn't as pretty as I'd like, but it does work well. If I have bulbs installed in the doors and trunk, I can typically change all of them at the same time be standing behind the car. My preference would be for an app-based remote, but the majority of those are ugly. THe white is achieved by lighting all the LEDs, thus is a cooler (bluer) white that our stock white bulbs.

But there's a catch. Right now, these bulbs work great in the trunk, frunk and doors, but not in the foot wells. It took me forever to figure out why, but I now think it's because the foot wells have a soft on/off feature, where they fade on and off. This does something bad to the bulbs, and stops them from working correctly again until they're plugged into one of the other non-fading feeds. If anyone else has a theory I'd love to hear it, but everything I've tested and scoped points to the fade being the issue. We're trying to do a lot in a very compressed form factor, so there's not a lot of wiggle room for additional components.

So we're back to working with the electrical engineer to figure out a solution. It's very time consuming, as he's in Taiwan with no access to a Tesla, but I think we do now have a test rig built to simulate the behavior.

 

[bmah]

we do actually have an RGB light in 'beta' at the moment. You can see a non-professional video of them in action here, and here's a photo I snapped in a parking lot (the bulb is set to purple): They work well. The largest challenge was getting everything into the same form-factor, without over heating. We've solved that. The brightness is great too, about 12x the factory bulbs (our straight white bulbs are 16x). The remote isn't as pretty as I'd like, but it does work well. If I have bulbs installed in the doors and trunk, I can typically change all of them at the same time be standing behind the car. My preference would be for an app-based remote, but the majority of those are ugly. THe white is achieved by lighting all the LEDs, thus is a cooler (bluer) white that our stock white bulbs.

But there's a catch. Right now, these bulbs work great in the trunk, frunk and doors, but not in the foot wells. It took me forever to figure out why, but I now think it's because the foot wells have a soft on/off feature, where they fade on and off. This does something bad to the bulbs, and stops them from working correctly again until they're plugged into one of the other non-fading feeds. If anyone else has a theory I'd love to hear it, but everything I've tested and scoped points to the fade being the issue. We're trying to do a lot in a very compressed form factor, so there's not a lot of wiggle room for additional components.

So we're back to working with the electrical engineer to figure out a solution. It's very time consuming, as he's in Taiwan with no access to a Tesla, but I think we do now have a test rig built to simulate the behavior.

Hey Pete--

My son and I watched the video. He says "good job" but he'd like to see an app-based controller. Just passing on his reaction. (He's been playing with RGB LED strips in various parts of his bedroom.) I think the RGB lights are cool, if used, shall we say, in good taste.

Without knowing any of the details, I agree with your assessment of the footwell lights. It reminds me of playing with (residential) lighting controllers that dim their loads; some LED bulbs play well with dimmers and some don't (trying to "dim" the controller itself as in these RGB lights sounds like a recipe for confusion).

Hasn't Tesla started deliveries to Taiwan yet? Maybe there's some new Taiwanese owner here on TMC who'd let your guy dink around with his car a bit?

Bruce.

 

[pete8314]

Thanks. Yes, there's a store relatively close by in Taiwan, but, owners are few and far between, and tend to be less approachable than what we're familiar with. But I agree with everything you've said, the usability and aesthetic of the product are important.

 

[hungyip84]

Just a note to add here. The rear foorwell for Model S become pretty useless now. The new premium seat set the bulb to face directly down ward, making the light invisible at all.

 

[SomeJoe7777]

Just a note to add here. The rear foorwell for Model S become pretty useless now. The new premium seat set the bulb to face directly down ward, making the light invisible at all.

Hmmm ... opportunity for aftermarket custom brackets? @pete8314 ?

 

[pete8314]

Ha, well, the brackets we supply are technically already after-market as Tesla wouldn't supply them to us any more. They're based on the Tesla ones of course, but with a couple of tweaks. Does the new premium seat still have the bar that the brackets clip onto? And is this a new new premium seat? I guess I'm out the loop, aside from the momentary trip into ventilated seats, I thought we were back to the 'original' premium seats, in which case, that's what I have in my S.

 

[TSLA Pilot]

Hi Pete,

We have the new Tesla "in house" seats on our Feb, 2017-build MS; let me know if you want to take a look at them. (We're in Hurst.)

The under-seat lights now appear to face straight down via a purpose-built bracket; don't see an easy way to fix this but hoping you'll have some ideas?

Best,


Mark