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DiskDoctr's avatar
DiskDoctr
Explorer
Mar 29, 2017

120v only lights in slide- convert to 12v?

Our 2005 Cougar 304BHS living room/dining slide ONLY has 120v lighting, one over the table and one over the couch. Boondock = no lights (!)

I have a few questions about "fixing" it.

1. 120v only works when the slide is out all the way. Is there a switch someone knows of (where?) with a relay or whatever to control that?

2. Anyone know where/how the wiring is routed through the slide to the main cabin?

3. Opinions on simply converting the 120V lights to 12v LED? They have standard incandescent twist in (house) light bulbs in there now.

4. I saw someone used LED puck lights, but they were $25/ea.

5. Dimmable? How many? Ideas?

I'm thinking about adding a 12v REGULATED circuit if I run new wires for new light, giving the ability to use standard "under cabinet" LEDs, which seem readily available, with dimmers. It would be a separate fused circuit and regulator in the convertor housing area, for lights only.

Thanks!
  • There would likely be benefits to having a small inverter. Watt whattage would you recommend? (pun!)
  • time2roll wrote:
    I would power that circuit with a small inverter. Swap lamp to LED of course. Then you can watch a show or charge your phone too.


    This is what I did and it works great. The 120V LED lights are very efficient and a tiny inverter does the job efficiently. The lighting is nicer than some 12V LED lighting.
  • I would power that circuit with a small inverter. Swap lamp to LED of course. Then you can watch a show or charge your phone too.
  • Our slide has a mix of 120v and 12v lamps. I found that running a CFL lamp in one 120v wall light as a reading lamp powered by inverter (whole house- shore power into inverter, converter switched off) caused a 1 DC amp draw on the batts. The 12v option drew 3 amps DC. The CFL gives more light too.

    AFAIK you can get 120v LEDs now that go in 120v sockets, if you can't get CFLs anymore. I don't have any, so can't say how many DC amps one would draw via inverter compared with the CFL.

    So you don't need any 12v in the slide for lights if you go 120v LED or CFL via inverter.

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