Disclaimer - if you screw up, you suck and take full responsibility of
all members that whine and cry like babies.
I nor FitFreak
will take any responsibility for damage or injury.
DO AT YOUR OWN RISK!
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I used a SubaruWRX STi maplight just like wdb did on his install.
I bought it used from a member over at NASIOC.
Here is wat the finished product looks like... yah, looks almost exactly
like wdb's but it's my car.
1. First break the STi maplight's harness to expose the connector pins.
2. You can use a small female spade connector like this as your
mating side. I used some shrinkwrap to insulate the uncovered area.
3. Made the ceiling cutout template using some painter's masking tape.
4. Done cutting... mark FRONT and make sure you are not doing this
up-side-down!!!
5. Here you can see how i used some generic tabs from an old speaker
install as my brackets. the ceiling liner is about 7mm thick.
6. This is the "final" screw-down screw that will hold the maplight in
place. This screw can be accessed with the STI maplight lens off.
7. Ok, now let's go to your car and cut it up.
Remove dome light
lens using interior tool like this.
8. Here is the domelight without lens. The green circled bolt is your
GROUND.
9. Remove the screws and pull down the assembly. Here you see the
connector being removed. It's only 2 conductor.
10. Here is how i tapped the domelight for the (+) RED and (-) GREEN
per below. For (+), i used a small male spade and slid it into the slot.
for (-) i wrapped my tinned wire around that ground screw in pict#8.
11. Ok, moving to the front of the car, place template on the ceiling.
12. Cut out ceiling like this... i hit a big foam piece which you can just
pull-out for now. it's double stick taped onto the metal roof.
13. Measured and cut my wire to length and fed it through the ceiling.
I used my nifty high-end wire feeder (aka wire coat hanger tool
).
14. Hooked up the STI maplight harness like so...
15. Remove the rearview mirror base cover (just slides forward) and
remove 3 phillips head screws at the base to remove the rearview mirror.
this allows more room for you to position the maplight from the other side.
Then installed the maplight into the hole and screwed in that "final"
mounting screw i mentioned earlier to position it to place. it's very snug.
16. Forgot to take a pict, but i cut a small 2" piece of that foam
i pulled out from the ceiling and sandwiched it between the ceiling and
the roof just forward of the maplight. i had to add another 10mm of foam
to make the ceiling bulge out a tad to get the back side of the maplight to
match the contour of the ceiling.
walla, looks factory finish at the end.
