Glove Box light?

[Guzzi SVT]

I can see my feet, I can see my hands, I can see my drink, but I can’t see what's in my glove boxes!

Anyone come up with a nice lighting system for this? I would like something like the other lights in the interior.

 

[Billm0066]

Just noticed this too. It shouldn't be that hard to put in a white led and tap it off the oem led lighting. Maybe someone who knows more about electrical can chime in on the proper way to wire it.

 

[SHO U UP]

Really surprised that Ford didn't put a light in there. All the lights inside the cab like in the floors, handles, cup holder, etc and none in the glove box. What gives??

 

[HeelBird]

Surprised me, too. I guess they figured that the only gloves in the car would be the driving kind, on the hands of the pilot of this technostarship.

 

[SHOrod]

According to the wiring diagram from the factory service manual, there is an unused "White LED" output from the Smart Junction Box (SJB). It is FET controlled which suggests that it would be dimmed according to the interior light dimmer control. This output is at pin 52 at the SJB connector. According to the diagrams, the LED backlights used elsewhere in our cars each have a current limiting resistor so I suspect they're running at battery voltage. Assuming they are running at 13.8V, and that you're using a white LED with a 3.5 V forward drop, Ohm's Law would suggest you could get a pretty bright LED glove box light or two by using a 470 ohm resistor for each LED. That would be running each LED at about 22 mA.

I suspect that the "White LED" line from the SJB would turn the LEDs on only when the parking or headlights are on which should be sufficient. If for some reason this line is not active, you should be able to tap in to the Violet/Gray wire in terminal location 39. This is the LED backlighting wire that is used for the cabin switch backlighting. It could probably handle another 50 mA without issue....

If you wanted the LEDs on any time the car is on you would just need to tap in to a wire that's only active with the ignition in ACC or Run. If you are looking to install a switch that turns the LEDs on when the glovebox door is open and off when closed, you'll need to supply the switch, but the 470 ohm resistor would still apply if using white LEDs.

-Rod