custom truck mods

Hella 9" gooseneck driving light with red lens

The basic parts involved	Details of the wire connections
Detail shot of the fab'ed backplate	Finished installation
The light when turned on

vhy are you havink dis gooseneck?

I wanted a light that I could use at night to read maps or directions and not ruin my night vision, which the white interior and dome lights do. I also didn't want to give up any of the stock lighting as the more light you have available, the better, IMO. Otherwise, you could just swap out the stock bulbs with red ones and be done with it.

This light has an optional red lens which I used to attain my desired results, but I could always swap it out for the clear lens which is the default - for even more general interior lighting. What's nice about the Hella goosneck maplight is that you can aim it very precisely where you need it, and is very bright. The head contains the on/off switch and also swivels from side-to-side. The construction is high quality and top notch - not a cheap knock-off like some other maplights, especially those that plug into a 12v socket. I tried the latter as well, and found that the 12v sockets in the front of the X are either too low to be useful or get in the way of the manual shifter.

installing the submarine lighting

The location for installation was a bit of a tough call. I didn't want to modify the truck in such a way that it couldn't be removed 100% without leaving a trace as with most of my mods. However, there wasn't any convenient place to put it without some modifications and also have a ready source of power... Until I looked at the stock maplights. It seemed a natural location (obviously Nissan thought so too) but the plastic of the assy. was a little flimsy for supporting the Hella unit.

I fashioned a backplate out of aluminum to strengthen up the area where it mounts and it works rather well. I figure also it's cheaper to replace this maplight assy. than say, the dashboard - were I to mount it there. In either location, the light sticks out into the cabin enough so that you can keep the light away from the dash and instrumentation - and perhaps more importantly, the windshield (causing glare). It's also up and out of the way here and if I need to tone down the lighting, I can turn the light up towards the sunroof.

When soldering your wire connections, do not be tempted to simply wire to the stock maplight terminals... Your maplight will only come on when the stock maplight is turned on as well - defeating the whole purpose of this mod. Instead, make your connections as seen in this picture - you'll need to tap into one of the existing wires with a "tee" connection.