A bit of "IKEA hacking" to make a 12-volt LED lamp.

[Blue~Go]

It's nice that the Chinook has so many overhead lights, but I also wanted a lamp. A 12-volt lamp with an LED bulb. I decided to "hack" an IKEA Fillsta table lamp. IKEA sells a variety of bulbs for this lamp, including LED, but they are all 110 volt. Here is the lamp as shown in an IKEA room (not my Concourse ). It also comes in orange.

ikea fillsta.jpg (47.62 KiB) Viewed 4816 times

I had this IKEA bulb as well (uses 110 power as bought).

I bought this 12-volt LED bulb (Phillips 418392 3-Watt (20-Watt) AccentLED T3 Desk and Cabinet G4 Base 12-Volt Light Bulb)

[Blue~Go]

I should mention that it has been six months or so since I made this mod, so it's possible my memory of how I did it is not perfect, but it was relatively simple in any case.

First I assembled most of the lamp according to the instructions.

It comes in a small, flat box, and is basically a jigsaw puzzle of flat pieces with a lot of Slot A's and Tab B's that you put together to make a three dimensional lamp. Then there is a switched cord and lamp base that screw into the lamp. I used all of these in pretty much stock configuration (although I exchanged their cord switch for a different one I like better).

Then I deconstructed the bulb. I removed the globe and set that aside for later use (sorry about the lousy photo).

[Blue~Go]

That left the IKEA screw in bulb base with guts. Unfortunately I don't have any photos of this next part, and can't describe every step exactly, but as I remember it there were a couple of metal prongs sticking up from the top of the IKEA bulb's screw in base after I removed the globe. I was able to wedge the new bulb into that area (bolstered by a bit of white Sugru on each side to steady it), and then soldered a couple of wires to the pins on the new bulb. Here is a photo looking straight down into the lamp after that was done. You can just see the black wires going to the pins on the new bulb on the right hand side of the photo.

After this I put the globe back on. It juuust fit over the new bulb (whew!), and stays in place just fine as long as the lamp is right-side up

Next I cut off the 110 male plug on the end of the cord and put on a "cigar lighter" plug instead. This gave me a working, 12-volt, LED lamp No photos of that, but totally straightforward.

[Blue~Go]

The IKEA cord switch that came on the cord was fine, so this next step is totally optional. I removed the molded on IKEA cord switch and put on a different one that I liked better. These cord switches (which you can buy at hardware stores, home centers, etc.) assume you are starting with a whole (uncut) cord and only have you cut one side; however since I cut out the existing IKEA switch, I had two cut wires, thus I had to rejoin the one. That's the pink crimp fitting you can see.

This one is a bit more heavy duty than the usual type that have the notched "wheel" to turn them and off (which are for smaller wire anyway so would not fit the IKEA wire). This one has a nice, definite "click" to it when switching on and off.

Finished product. It doesn't look quite this "gold" in real life but is more of a typical warm white. It's fairly small, lightweight, and portable. Being 12-volt powered I can use it any time, and doesn't use much electricity since its LED. Serves the intended purpose nicely.

I think it took longer to write up than to actually do the project