I finally got this done, thought I'd share.

I wasn't really happy with the illumination scheme, so here's what I did....


OK, now that the waiver is behind us let's get busy......

I did some prelim testing with various leds, and decided to go with a red T-1 size (3mm). I bought all my LED's online, I can provide exact part numbers if anyone is interested in doing this mod. PM me, I don't think I can post the vendor since they are not a sponser of the board. I will say that they are 4500 mcd, 45 deg viewing angle. I am running 680 ohm resistors in the doors, and 4.7k in the center stack.

I did lots of prep work first, made two break out harnesses for tapping into the dash light wire and ground using insulated snap connectors available at Rat Shack.
I took about 2" of wire, crimped on a female snap conn, one end.
Then I took about 6" of wire, crimped on a male snap conn on one end, female on the other end, then stripped 5 evenly spaced small sections, one at a time, and soldered on 5 short "pigtails", each with a female snap conn on the other end. What you end up with is a harness with one male snap conn on one end and 6 female snap conns on the other. Shrink tube/electrical tape as required.


I also pre-soldered all resistors and wiring to the leds whenever possible to speed things along.


First off, I took the door panels off. 4 screws and a little prying and it popped right off. Watch for the wires that go to the power lock switch if you have them.
The door handle sets in a plastic cup, so I drilled a 3mm hole in the top of the cup far enough back so the led would not be in direct view.
Put the led in the hole, used some black sealer tape (almost like tar, black and sticky) to secure it and grounded the cathode (-) lead of the led to the nearest screw.
Ran the wire with the factory loom on the inside of the door, used a stiff wire to fish it thru the nylon stop strap and inserted a snap connector inline under the dash in case I want to take the doors off.
Now's the time to open up the center stack if you haven't already.
Then I ran the remainder of the wire to the back side of the center stack, fished it thru to the front and terminated it with a male snap conn.





Next, I installed the two break out harnesses with squeeze taps on the 2" length of wire with the female snap conn. Now everthing plugs in and out and is removable for service or future mods.
I used 22 ga wire on the whole project, so I got 22-18ga taps. They worked OK with the JK's wire size.
One harness goes on the orange wire with a gray stripe (the positive connection), the other on either of the black wires (the negative connection) coming off the power outlets.

Then I plugged in the door led snap conn to the positive harness, turned on the lights, and stood back to look at my new illuminated door pulls.

I can't get a decent shot of it lit, but it looks awesome.

Now, on to the center stack.......


For the center stack, I drilled one hole, 3mm, directly above the center of the two window switches on what I'll call tier one of the center stack. I drilled all the holes in the stack by hand, it was too tight for a drill.
Then I drilled two holes in tier 2, located directly between the climate control knobs.



After some prelim testing, I made sure I located all the holes toward the face of the panel, not centered on the tier. This gave it the effect I was looking for, you may like it more forward. Feel free to experiment with a led and tape before you drill holes

I then drilled the last two holes in tier 3, located half way between the leds on tier 2 and the edge of the panel. Worked out pretty good, nice even illumination on the transfer case lever, and now I can see the O/D button.

Left side



Right side


After drilling the holes, I built the wire harnesses as I went, right on the back side of the panel. I wanted exact lengths on the wires, it's kinda tight on the back of the stack.
After getting everything built and secured with more black sealing tape, I used more male snap conns on the harnesses to make it a true plug and play mod. Plugged everthing up, turned on the lights and enjoyed the new illumination.

So here's how it looks, and again, hard to take decent pics of something red at night. The center stack looks great, kinda like a cockpit in a fighter or bomber..best of all it doesn't kill night vision and it's not distracting.




Any questions, let me know. I'll do my best to answer them.

 

door handle is a great idea, The center stack looks great but looks a little to cock-pit like for me but either way awesome job.

 

Thats what BMW does on their cars- Great Idea!! Especially on the door handles that no one can find

 

OOOOOH more electronic stuff for me to add to my to-do-list when I actually get a JK. I love l.e.d.'s

I was actually thinking of a similar idea of adding l.e.d.'s in various places shortly before reading this. Now I'm more fueled to do it.

Any pics of your harnesses??

 

Unfortunately no pics, I'm one of the few people on this planet that doesn't have a digital cam. I always have to beg one. It's really simple though, think power strip if you make one. That's what I did

 

Exactly why I did it, I can't find the door handle. It also serves as a marker light when the door is open, you can't miss it.

 

Awesome!!! I have been thinking about doing this as well. I had a MINI and they did their lights like this. It was something I really used, believe it or not. Can you hook a brotha up on the source of your LEDs? How Many OHMS resistor did you use? 470-560 Ohm?

 

Very cool!

I love it. The "cockpit" thing is right up my alley

 

Thanks, me too. I'm around B-52, F/A-18, C-5 and F-16 stuff all day at work

 

Just sent you a PM with the details, 680 ohm for the doors, 4.7k for the stack.