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I have seen a number of threads like this, but just bits and pieces here and there.
I have a '91 XJ Limited. The under hood light is a single bulb (1156) with a physical door switch that picks up when the hood is shut. I don't know if this is stock but the switch works (I have checked with a multimeter). The light housing however is shorted and causes any bulbs to just stay on.
I'm getting tired of using a flashlight and want something built in with good light output.
I want to replace the bulb/ light housing with a new LED unit. I want to keep it in the same spot (right next to passenger side hood hinge). I can make a custom bracket. I have under hood insulation so I don't want to change the location of the light because that would require me to fuss around with the hood insulation and would also expose the light to hotter temps.
Does anyone have any recommendations for inexpensive LED lights that could handle the temps in that area? My engine doesn't overheat. It runs fairly cool. The light should be water resistant - I live in the PNW.
I'm looking for suggestions if you all have any. I'd like to keep the cost low (less than $30)
I have been looking at lights like the following but most of them I can't find many specs. I'm not sure about temperature ratings, etc.
All links are Princess Auto, but this is just due to convenience. I've found equivalent lights on Amazon and other sources.
I got one of those GM "trouble lights" and mounted it in the factory location using a simple mending bracket from Ace hardware. The GM trouble light has it's own on/off switch on the reel housing of the light.
The problem is the factory light has a ball-bearing tilt switch in it, so you will need to either wire up an aftermarket tilt switch if you use a light without it's own switch. I would recommend a standard "door jamb" style switch like this;
Reason is that the ball bearing aftermarket switches suck, the mercury ones are better but will still activate on steep inclines, or under hard acceleration. A mechanical switch like the one above will just work, with no fuss.
Lastly, the most ideal location for a light is at the very front of the hood, where it opens the highest. With the factory underhood liner you may be limited on where you can mount a light though. Here is what I am talking about, it lights up the engine bay very smoothly, and doesn't shine straight into your eyes which I absolutely hate (one potential problem of using an LED work light mounted at eye-height like you listed);
And here is what my GM trouble light looks like in the factory location (ignore the rats-nest wiring, I shortened the leads after taking this picture). I also glued on a much stronger magnet so now it sticks really well. The cable is so long I can wrap it around my XJ pretty much one full time;
I got one of those GM "trouble lights" and mounted it in the factory location using a simple mending bracket from Ace hardware. The GM trouble light has it's own on/off switch on the reel housing of the light.
The problem is the factory light has a ball-bearing tilt switch in it, so you will need to either wire up an aftermarket tilt switch if you use a light without it's own switch. I would recommend a standard "door jamb" style switch like this;
Reason is that the ball bearing aftermarket switches suck, the mercury ones are better but will still activate on steep inclines, or under hard acceleration. A mechanical switch like the one above will just work, with no fuss.
Lastly, the most ideal location for a light is at the very front of the hood, where it opens the highest. With the factory underhood liner you may be limited on where you can mount a light though. Here is what I am talking about, it lights up the engine bay very smoothly, and doesn't shine straight into your eyes which I absolutely hate (one potential problem of using an LED work light mounted at eye-height like you listed);
And here is what my GM trouble light looks like in the factory location (ignore the rats-nest wiring, I shortened the leads after taking this picture). I also glued on a much stronger magnet so now it sticks really well. The cable is so long I can wrap it around my XJ pretty much one full time;
Hope that gives you some ideas!
Thanks! It's good to have the recommendation for the GM one reinforced. Do you have an LED bulb? Does it throw enough light under the hood to be of much use?
I don't have the tilt switch; I have that door jam switch already installed (possibly from previous owner). It works quite well but the light housing itself needs replacement.
I don't think the front of the hood will have space for something like the GM retractable light but there might be room for a bracket or magnet to hold it. I'm thinking I could pull the light out and clip it into a bracket at the front of the hood. Then unclip and retract it to the passenger corner again.
They are cheap. Probably not super bright, but small enough that I could probably throw two in the back corners and two hidden away in the front of the hood. Kind of like this:
Thanks! It's good to have the recommendation for the GM one reinforced. Do you have an LED bulb? Does it throw enough light under the hood to be of much use?
I have not installed mine yet. He says in the post it is a 1156. I can't find it at the moment to double check the bulb number. He also mentions you don't want one that stands to high so it will fit in the little plastic cover. Thinking something like this might be the ticket.
Thanks! It's good to have the recommendation for the GM one reinforced. Do you have an LED bulb? Does it throw enough light under the hood to be of much use?
I don't have the tilt switch; I have that door jam switch already installed (possibly from previous owner). It works quite well but the light housing itself needs replacement.
I don't think the front of the hood will have space for something like the GM retractable light but there might be room for a bracket or magnet to hold it. I'm thinking I could pull the light out and clip it into a bracket at the front of the hood. Then unclip and retract it to the passenger corner again.
They are cheap. Probably not super bright, but small enough that I could probably throw two in the back corners and two hidden away in the front of the hood. Kind of like this:
I ordered an LED but it didn't fit. I actually just ordered another one because you reminded me. Anything under 39mm should work just fine, I will confirm when I get mine. (ordered these, annother listing says they are 35mm tall)
They are claiming 25 lumens for that light you lilsted, which is not that much. If you already have a door jamb style switch then you can use pretty much whatever light you want.
Actually, since you have the hoodliner, I would say
and wire it up behind the hood liner! Would make for a really clean install. Comes with 8 pods but 4 would be enough for under the hood. You could also find 3" waterproof LED strips which would be cheaper (eBay of course). Just wire them all together and to the door jamb switch
And you could still install a GM trouble light in the factory location because with the cord, it is super useful. Get an N52 magnet for the light pod (one of the strongest cheap neodymium magnets) off ebay. They are really strong. The stock magnet sucked, lol
EDIT:
And for what its worth, I got my trouble light at the junkyard. I think they charged me $4 for it, there were a few I saw in the yard that day. Many 1988-98 GM pickups had them according to google
Last edited by investinwaffles; 12-29-2017 at 04:00 PM.
Yea, I'd be fine buying the light used on CL or the JY. I agree the small LED bulbs likely won't put out too much light, especially compared to multiple LED pods or strips around the hood. Even if I strategically direct a couple LED pod lights from the back of the hood around the stock location I could probably get more light than one stubby LED bulb.
I'm really leaning towards the pods idea with the retractable one as a backup for convenience (I can imagine changing the CPS on the side of the road with the retractable light dangling down behind the engine). I am more than capable of wiring them up nicely for a clean install. I haven't seen the truck bed LEDs before either so I'll look around at different options of those.
With the new LED it should actually be pretty bright, but mine is mounted pretty low on the hood so it just isn't as effective.
Actually, now I want to order one of those truck bed LED kits and wire it to a door jamb switch, having to turn on the light manually is kind of inconvenient, lol
The light being on a cord reel is pretty awesome, and at 2.5w the LED should be great for long runtimes compared to a 20w+ incandescent
Yea, sorry I misread both the specs and your previous thread. The pod lights i had found are 25 lumens. I think the bulb you found was much more (like 200 lumens). So I totally see the LED bulb and retractable light being bright, just poorly placed and probably not well distributed light.
I'm still leaning towards both the retractable light in the back (so I can dangle the light down places if I need to accesS) and on the front of the hood set up the truck bed lights or similar (I've found rock crawler lights that look pretty good and are completely water proof and higher temperature rated, or a good LED strip would be low profile enough to use).
I won't do this mod for probably a month or so. Just planning and collecting parts now and working through more urgent issues with the Jeep. If you get the truck bed lights set up, post a reply here so I know how it worked out!
So the Jeep is at the shop right now, so I can't go down and do any sanity checks on fitment in person but I'm looking at some other options. In particular I pivoted to LED strips after looking at dozens of options on my phone last night.
I kind of like these for simple (waterproof) LED strips. They screw on and are a little thicker than the usual flexible type but they are fairly bright per foot and I like the solid enclosure. The dedicated switch can be good or bad. It'd be good until it breaks https://www.superbrightleds.com/more...Specifications
I kind of like the idea of going with a 1 foot long length at the very front, or two 1 foot long lengths on the sides of the hood.
They are only roughly 10 mm tall, so still pretty low profile. The temperature rating is up to 60 degrees C, so although engine temps can get pretty high I doubt they will get that high on the edges of the hood.
I used to do some high temp/ environmental testing and design of consumer products so I have a little bit of experience with temperature ratings (but honestly can't remember much of it!). I double checked and realize you can get higher temperature rated devices, but I found consumer grade devices generally are below 65C for temperature rating. From the work I used to do, much of the temperature ratings were a result of thermal cycling and cracking circuit boards/ solder. So yea... I am guessing they put a temperature rating at 60C to match standard manufacturing processes and to avoid having to do extensive thermal load testing.
I don't think that'll be a problem with the location and application of the light. Might die sooner.. but it's 20 bucks.
Back to the truck bed lights. I still haven't been able to get the Jeep back from the shop to check out fitment so I'm not sure if they will fit nicely enough. However if you buy the truck bed lights you found on Amazon and have spare lights you don't install in your Jeep I would be open to buying any of the extra ones you have around. The thing keeping me away from buying those bed lights is the cost - the kit also has 2x as many light as I need. So I don't want to pay 2x what I want to buy 2x the lights I need!
Last edited by moonsandals; 01-10-2018 at 11:16 PM.
Reason: Wrote some inaccurate statements about temperature rating.
12-28-2017, 11:53 PM
Under hood light options?
