"Upstairs" light - which battery?

[KernowLad]

Our kids (baby especially!) sleep MUCH better upstairs with the light left on. Having killed our driving battery once (with the stereo I think), I'd like to avoid it again despite now carrying jump leads at all times!

Assume/hope it's off the leisure battery?

 

[sebking]

Re: "Upstairs" light - which battery?

Pretty sure its on the leisure

 

[KernowLad]

Re:

Pretty sure its on the leisure

Cheers - thought it probably would be.

The length of time the batteries last and the speed at which they recharge really did impress me in Scotland - a week without hook up, upstairs light on all night plus the fridge, only a couple of short drives seemed to keep them topped up.

Still not sure what happened when we killed the battery - only two nights, used the stereo a fair bit (story CDs to help the kids get to sleep then some music) and the battery was utterly dead. Might have left headlights on or something? Who knows?! It's been fine ever since.

 

[SimplyDubs]

Re: "Upstairs" light - which battery?

Pretty sure it's the leisure... Certainly was on my 2009.

Additionally I did an LED conversion on it... Brighter, lower power consumption and more importantly cooler. It always surprised me just how hot the lamp head got.

Rgds

Mark

 

[KernowLad]

Re:

Pretty sure it's the leisure... Certainly was on my 2009.

Additionally I did an LED conversion on it... Brighter, lower power consumption and more importantly cooler. It always surprised me just how hot the lamp head got.

Rgds

Mark

And the next question is... how did you do that?!

 

[SimplyDubs]

Pretty easy really.

The light head itself (the bit that swivels) actually comes off to make things easier...

There's a copper plate that holds it on that needs to be pulled out and the whole head simply comes away at the swivel.

I then removed the bulb, and soldered a G4 bulb connector in it's place.

http://www.ultraleds.co.uk/mr16-12v-bulb-connector

This 4 LED unit fits inside nicely and the plastic front of the fitting actually holds it in place.

http://www.ultraleds.co.uk/g4-with-4-le ... e-1-8w-15w

All in all took about 15 minutes.

Results were pretty good.

1.8w instead of the 6w and very little heat.

[album]332[/album]

Drop me a note if you want more detail or pics.

Cheers,

Mark

 

[Stu]

Nice mod, I like it.

Heat is an issue with several people reporting burning mattresses when accidently leaving or switching the light on.

 

[nickstjt]

Another way to see which battery is being used is to look at the current displayed on the central console which seems to be the leisure battery current (I haven't checked the manual on that). You can see how draw things like the parking heater make. For me, if everything is off I see 0.0A, but if I switch on the upstairs light it shows -0.4A. I get the same from the main kitchen light.
--Nick