Here's some more info on the little cockpit spotlights seen in the previous post. These little swiveling LED lights are made by Oplite, and they seem a bit expensive for what they are… but then again at least I don't have to buy the PMA version, which is 3x the money for the same product plus some magic paperwork that makes it legal to install in your certified airplane.
I mounted them to the roll bar weldment with a trio of tiny 4-40 nutplates. The screws shown here are just for test-fitting – in the final installation they need to be much shorter since the space between the roll bar and the skin is very limited. I also later reversed the plastic snap bushing for the same reason.
Here's what the hidden side of the roll bar looks like prior to installation of the skin:
To run power and ground to each light I used pieces of black nylon tube as conduits – it's actually the same pitot/static tubing material I already had laying around. There's a small notch in each corner of the panel to allow the wires to pass through.
I left the wires long enough to solder to the pigtail on the light with the skin installed, which theoretically should allow me to remove and replace it without major surgery if it ever burns out:
Then I pulled the excess wire through the tube and bundled it up behind the panel, and voila, a clean looking installation with hidden wires:
These lights are controlled by dimming knobs located on the F-721A canopy decks. They're also connected to the aircraft's auxiliary battery, which also allows them to double as emergency cockpit lighting.
