Rock Light

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Rock-Light Installation

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Step 14

You have to run one lonely wire through your firewall to get to your dash for the rock-light switch. I started by checking behind my glove compartment. That was a dead end. Then I noticed large rubber plugs in the firewall above the bellhousing. I popped one of 'em out, and looked into the other side... sure enough, an unobstructed means of running a wire to the other side. From inside the tub, the port is up and to the right of your steering column. If you pop out the plug from the engine-side and poke your head around under the dash, you can't miss it.

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Step 15

Its not like you can just not use the plug. The manufacturers put that there for a reason! So with my knife, I made two perpendicular slits in the big rubber plug, fed the single wire through these slits and in through the firewall, and put the plug back into place.

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Step 15 - Continued...

Pull the switch wire through and let it dangle on your driver side floor-mat for now. You have other things to contend with.

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Step 16

If you haven't done so already, plug your switch wire into the relay and close your hood once and for all! This was a beautiful moment for me, primarily because I didn't have a relay diagram to work off of. I've got a bald spot on my scalp from where I spent hours scratching my head that night.

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Step 17

Prepare your switch. Dashboard aesthetics mean alot to me, and I chose to use an IPF light switch that comes with an unknown set of IPF lights. The switch mounts to any dash surface using tape, and is a push-button toggle. Its a pretty nice switch. I didn't have to use it and could've made things alot easier, but... naaaah. You can pick one of these switches up at your favorite ARB dealer for a few bucks.

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Step 17 - Continued...

The switch comes prepared to plug into some wiring harness assembly made especially for some particular IPF light.

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Step 17 - Continued...

<snip!> We don't have an IPF light.

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Step 17 - Continued some more...

Strip your wires and seperate them so that they look like this. That is of course, if you are using this switch... most light switches that you can get on a Calterm rack, or at Radio Shack come ready to go.

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Part 17 - Continued one more time...

After a little bit of testing, I figured out which wire was which. The red wire is your positive lead. This is the wire that is going to get connected to the yellow wire that I ran through my firewall. The white wire gets grounded, and the black wire is for a LED indicator contained inside the switch. I did not implement this indicator, so I am grounding this wire as well. As it turns out, doing so causes a green light to come on in the switch to indicate that the rock light is off. Alright, thats kinda backwards, but thats okay.

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Part 18

Connect the red switch wire to the wire that you ran through the firewall. Twist the white and the black wires together and connect them to another wire which you are going to run to a grounding point. Use small connectors, and don't forget to wrap individual connections in electric tape. I speak from personal experience - dash shorts are scary.

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Part 19

Here is that ground location I was telling you about for the switch. As it turns out there is a legitimate grounding point across the pedals and steering column, however I did not want my wire running across all of those moving parts. I put a connector at the end of the ground wire and bolted it down to the gas-pedal pivot bracket. This was unobtrusive with any moving parts and I could easily conceal it from that point and run it to the switch. Your switch is now wired!

ON TO PAGE 6
Mounting the switch and testing your new rock light...




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