DIY Tower Lights Pix inside

(taylormade) · (taylormade) **Join Date: Jun 2001** 09-21-2005, 4:02 PM

So over the weekend I put together this little light bar for my tower. I plan on using it primarily for navigating down my narrow canal at dusk and for the occasional night surfing. Total investment was about $140. Haven't been able to wire it up to the actual switches yet due to nasty weather (thanks Rita), but I've wired from the tower, through the hull (gut check) and to the blocks... just got dark last night and I didn't want to screw around and mess something up.

(taylormade) · (taylormade) **Join Date: Jun 2001** 09-21-2005, 4:03 PM

chris_hargis 09-21-2005, 5:58 PM

Nice work Scott. Are you using a relay to get the power up there? When I put mine on my old boat, I used a realy to keep from over heating and melting the switch. I had a problem with that when I wired them straight into a switch. Using the relay meant that juice went straight from the battery to the lights instead of going through the switch. Made the lights a little brighter also.

(taylormade) · (taylormade) **Join Date: Jun 2001** 09-21-2005, 6:05 PM

Hey Chris! Still doing first shirt stuff? Good to hear from you. Yeah, I've got two relays actually, one for the front and one for the back sets.

chris_hargis 09-21-2005, 9:22 PM

Scott,
Yeah, still doing it. Here in Oklahoma now and the lakes suck, well, the lakes are not bad, but the wind pretty much eliminates any butter except very early in the morning. Have to drive about an hour to get to a decent lake though. I guess the upside is that I found a good deal on my Mobius LSV here so I traded in my fish and ski. Did a year in Korea without the family before I came here though, so that was pretty tough, but a great assignment. Just happy to be back with them. Still have some riding weather left, but I had knee surgery yesterday, so I am out for a bit.

I like your set up there, hope it works out great for ya. Let me know how it makes night riding. I found that with my old boat it lit the boat up so much, it actually made it harder to see.

(taylormade) · (taylormade) **Join Date: Jun 2001** 09-21-2005, 10:49 PM

Glad to see you're still serving... most people I know have punched out loooong ago. My ex wife is getting stationed at Tinker next week after being at Kunson (watch out!), and my Dad's the City Manager just outside of OKC in a small town called Tuttle. Anyway, welcome back. I had knee surgery just about a year ago and it's still not 100%, but the torn tendons in my foot hurt a lot worse than the knee. :-)

With the lights, I'm just hoping they'll help me get home from my friend's house or give me an extra couple of runs at dusk. I have the fronts and rears wired on different switches so I don't have to have them both on.

chris_hargis 09-22-2005, 10:52 AM

I was just stationed at Kunsan for the last year. Got back here in July. What is your ex wife's name and what does she do? Being a shirt for such a small base means I may have met her over there.

(taylormade) · (taylormade) **Join Date: Jun 2001** 09-22-2005, 10:57 AM

oh yeah? Her name is Carmen Gray. She's an optometrist I think. TSgt type.