Payjack
Member
I’m interested to see pictures. I have a 2020 I picked up last December and I’m about to put the focal isu200 speakers in and might do this while the door panels are off.
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Pocket Lights
- Thread starter TydalForce
- Start date
I’m interested to see pictures. I have a 2020 I picked up last December and I’m about to put the focal isu200 speakers in and might do this while the door panels are off.
MXracerjimmy
Member
I will take some photos this weekend and post them. It is easy to do. I posted in a thread yesterday showing the interior mods I did last weekend. I had the rear door panels off and thats when I traced the wiring down for the pocket lights. I did this by identifying the harness by part number and the catalog. Reason being, there are two harnesses that go through the same hole and you can;t tell which one terminates to the light. I also mentioned in that thread I had done the footwell lights the previous weekend. I figure if all the hardware is there, why not make it work. I think the thread I posted in was called something like "black and white interior swap" I posted a couple pictures there but not the wiring detail. I will next week.
MXracerjimmy
Member
So another intersting note before you buy speakers. The entire interior of the door panel is plastic welded. I looked at the speakers and I believe you have to dismantle the interior panel in order to get the speaker out. I say this for a particular reason baking up a bit. When I chose to change the look of my interior, there is a company in Texas I bleieve that will change out the insert in your door panels to a different color. I figured ok cool. I went to the site and they had a full video of them doing this. The entire backside structure is plastic welded and has to be melted in two or three dozen spots to get it apart. I watched it and said forget it. I just found the black and white OEM panels from a wrecked car and replaced the entire panel. But as I said, once I had the panel off I looked at the speakers and thought nows a good time. However no screws, it has sort of a plastic cage on the back of the speaker and appears to beplastic welded in place. I have to assume there are plenty of places that do this kind of swap but after I watched the interior guys do it, it just looked to me like it's messing too much with the integrity of the panel for my comfort level.
MXracerjimmy
Member
Watts_Up
Well-Known Member
I have an (October) 2018 LR AWD and I have the front and back door pocket lights.
Honestly I didn't make too much attention of those lights, but they really provides a nice and cozy atmosphere ambiance.
I found also the front door wheels lights to be both very useful and providing a little bit of luxurious impression.
I was surprised that the rear seats didn't have any floor lights, which could be very practical,
in particular in the case of robot taxis where I assume, the passengers would primarily use the rear seats.
I noticed that Abstract Ocean recently offers Rear Footwell lights described in this DÆrik video Installation Guide.
I found this to be a great idea but this item is a little bit pricey ($80) and didn't like too much having some wires and LED dangling under the seats.
To avoid having any dangling I would prefer install an LED inside the Air Vent using a single LED light:
I already tested such installation using a $1.50 Dimmer LED light from Daiso.
I would like now to connect this Daiso's LED Light using the wire connector using the front door wheels lights (see DÆrik video at 3:39)
I would like to make a clean installation without cutting or splitting any original Tesla wires.
I wonder where I could find such connectors? (see a detailed picture below)
did you even watch the installation video? nothing dangles.
the led itself is attaches via adhesive to a bar that is the perfect width and length for it. and you use the (included) ties to wrap around an existing wire. it is expensive though.
Hi_Im_Mike
Member
Does the 2021 have footwell front and back and under door lights? How do I operate them? Sorry new Tesla owner 
Watts_Up
Well-Known Member
Hi, thank you for following. Well, I have a model 3 and the seats are very low to the ground compare to the Model Y.
So there would be possibly not too much light to help when entering into the car if the lights were located under the seats.
I think that a better location would be to use the central air vent to install a rear light.
I already use an USB lamp which work fine, but I would prefer having a light automatically turning on and off.
The LED light has a switch and a dimmer, and costs me $1.50 and I just need to find a Tesla connector.
MXracerjimmy
Member
Hi Mike,
I think your going to find it depends on what interior trim package you have. After doing a ton of research (mostly here before joining) what I found on my 2019 SR+ is that the footwell lights, pocket lights and all the ambient lighting hardware is there but turned off via software because it's not the premium package. There are some threads here to look at. I have seen many people like myself where all the hardware is there and had some say their model it's not installed. The first and most easy place to look is under the dash on each side to see if the footwell lights are there. If so, you can wire them up to work which is what I did. If you have the premium interior you just control it through your screen. If not, there are many ways to connect them. I also replaced mine with blue LED's which are far brighter than the stock lights. I ran mine from the 12V accessory plug in the center console rather than tapping into the cars wiring harness. I like this because the lights stay illuminated while driving and stay on until the car goes to sleep, then they go out. I also did the USB LED's for the back as WATTS_UP mentioned above. After that I swapped out the puddle lights for the Tesla T logo LED's. At this point when I thought I was done, I changed out the door panels at which time I validated the pocket lights were there. I wired those to the puddle lights so when the door is open, the puddle lights and pocket lights are illuminated and go out when the door is closed. I did it this way because I saw no reason to have the pocket lights on the entire time I am driving. The LED footwell lights provide plenty of light.
I think your going to find it depends on what interior trim package you have. After doing a ton of research (mostly here before joining) what I found on my 2019 SR+ is that the footwell lights, pocket lights and all the ambient lighting hardware is there but turned off via software because it's not the premium package. There are some threads here to look at. I have seen many people like myself where all the hardware is there and had some say their model it's not installed. The first and most easy place to look is under the dash on each side to see if the footwell lights are there. If so, you can wire them up to work which is what I did. If you have the premium interior you just control it through your screen. If not, there are many ways to connect them. I also replaced mine with blue LED's which are far brighter than the stock lights. I ran mine from the 12V accessory plug in the center console rather than tapping into the cars wiring harness. I like this because the lights stay illuminated while driving and stay on until the car goes to sleep, then they go out. I also did the USB LED's for the back as WATTS_UP mentioned above. After that I swapped out the puddle lights for the Tesla T logo LED's. At this point when I thought I was done, I changed out the door panels at which time I validated the pocket lights were there. I wired those to the puddle lights so when the door is open, the puddle lights and pocket lights are illuminated and go out when the door is closed. I did it this way because I saw no reason to have the pocket lights on the entire time I am driving. The LED footwell lights provide plenty of light.
MXracerjimmy
Member
Totally agree. Search for this discussion. It will give you better insight.
No footwell lights on standard range plus model 3
No footwell lights on standard range plus model 3
i installed the lights on my model 3 and it lights up pretty well for me, if you want i can send you pictures.
but i do agree your solution is a way better deal for the price. you should be able to get a pigtail to extend and than tap the extension.
Watts_Up
Well-Known Member
Yes, I'd like but I think you should post them so other could take advantage.
I think adding a light inside the console would cost like nothing to Tesla,
since there is already a harness for the USB and the CAN bus.
MXracerjimmy
Member
So I took the rear door panels back off this weekend and wired up the pocket lights. While I had them off, I also swapped out the puddle lights with blue LED's. You can get a 4 pack of them on Amazon for $22.00. I used these for the footwell lights too. The cool thing about those is that they come with wire harness extenders which makes it easy for this mod. I popped the new puddle light in, then I take one of the wire extender adapters and cut it in half. I splice in a section of wire to run up to the pocket light. This way using the adapter extender, you don't have to cut the factory wiring because the extenders plug into the light as well as the factory harness. You do have to cut off the factory plug on the pocket light and direct splice that with a butt connector. Then I take the factory feed wire that goes to the pockect light and ty-wrap in back securely to the harness so it does not rattle. Now
when you open the door, the puddle light and the pocket lights illuminate.
corndog
Member
In case anyone is interested in how I installed and activated door pocket lights in my 2020 3LR:
I ordered lights from Tesla and wired them into the original wiring in the doors (the ones that were cut off from factory). They didn't work automatically and Tesla were unwilling to activate them in the software. I then cut the positive wires to isolate them from the body controllers, and spliced them into the footwell positive wires. The negative wires are still grounded to the body, so I didn't need to do anything with those. Works like a charm. The door pocket lights do as the footwell lights do; turn on and brightness level in sync.
I ordered lights from Tesla and wired them into the original wiring in the doors (the ones that were cut off from factory). They didn't work automatically and Tesla were unwilling to activate them in the software. I then cut the positive wires to isolate them from the body controllers, and spliced them into the footwell positive wires. The negative wires are still grounded to the body, so I didn't need to do anything with those. Works like a charm. The door pocket lights do as the footwell lights do; turn on and brightness level in sync.
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