LED Lighting System

[greentruck]

I've long used a 12 volt extension cord that clamps to the battery posts on my trucks, using it to get power to a 12 volt fluorescent light and other accessories when camping.

With the purchase of our 80 last year, I added some extra 12 volts receptacles and made a new cord with a fused 12 volt plug. It was probably a good idea for safety reasons to have a fused cord, although I never had a problem with the other cord, which I've retained as a backup.

The first pic below shows the new cord, which I keep on a cord winder. The receptacle is made from an old chili powder bottle, the cord is 16 gauge brown lamp cord wire, and the plug is something I got from RatShack. Here it is supplying power to the Reliance On Tap shower located in our Grand Trunk bathroom enclosure, which will be the subject of another post soon.

The second show the cord stuffed on top of the canopy we use with the 80 camper conversion/tailgate tent. The canopy serves as our dressing room, kitchen, and -- in a pinch when there's not enough space to deploy the Grand Trunk tent -- a place for the toilet.

The third pic shows the cords of the LED lighting plugged into the power cord with a Y-plug.

 

[greentruck]

The fourth pic shows one of the LED light strings when unlit. I picked them up for $25 each on Fleabay, added some cheap clamps from HF to support it, and attached a power lead with a simple twist on/off switch. These lights can be strung together for longer light strips, but for our use building each one with a separate power cord seemed best. We have two but may add more since they work so well. They simply clamp onto the bracing of the canopy. I keep them gently rolled in a bag when not in use.

The fifth pic is with the lights on. They're so bright they don't photograph well.

Finally, I used the flash to dampen the light's glare, but in our 8'x10' canopy/enclosure one on each of the long sides of it provides plenty of light to cook and work by. For reading, they are a little dim, which is why we're thinking of adding two more strings so each side will have one on it, giving good cross-lighting.