An LED or two under the hood that light up the engine area when you open the hood would be nice as well when you are topping off things and for general inspection and safety. Every car should have these lights nowadays... It just makes sense. 73 and All the Best! DE W8LV Bill
I don't know, but everytime I am stranded with a broken down car (as I WAS frequently before I got a Toyota and owned a certain Two Lettered Domestic make that DEFIANTLY and sadly was NOT my Father's Automobile) I always think of Waldo and Darla when the motorboat stalls, and he's reading the manual as they drift towards the waterfall.... 73 and All the Best! DE W8LV Bill
I don't understand a single one of your references but a lot of tuner cars have some form of engine bay lighting to highlight the engine work that has been done. Here's a nice job on an SRT Hellcat:
The references that I make? Yes, I can see that being difficult if you are younger than myself, so I will explain. Once Upon a Time, A Giant Ruled in The Motor City. And all of our lives in the two Countries it bordered were enriched, no matter if we worked for that company, or were Customers of that company. So anyway, there was an Ad Campaign, and the Slogan was: "This is not your Father's Oldsmobile." This was just before The Big Fall, and the disappearance of The Oldsmobile. And it backfired, and YET, the Slogan hit the nail right on the head, but certainly NOT in the way that the Ad Men hoped, because it highlighted a sad sad SAD Reality: Gone were the Oldsmobile 98's and 88's and even later Cutlasses that we had come to know. The "New" ones were pretty bad. And this was reported year after year after year in Consumer Reports. But the Toyota cars? Well, they got better ratings every year! Say some system or component was below par on a Toyota. By the next year, it would move up to improved, and the scores proved that, because they got better and better! You wwre seeing that MOST IMPORTANT Continous Quality Improvement. They might have a different name for it, but you get the idea. That's what I call it anyway. The Buick Centuries (of THIS Century) and the (rebadged) Roadmasters? Just so missing in quality and reliability. Back in The Day, even if you bought the Lowly Chevy Biscayne because you lacked money as my Dad did as a Young Father, you still got a LOT of car for your money. A real Value. Oh, How The Mighty Have Fallen. Shall we blame the Innovators, Entrepreneurs in their own Right, who had a better pulse on The Market, who took their place, at overwhelming odds and built out of the ashes of war the most efficient continuous quality improvement ever known? No. We shall reward them by buying their products, and never forget that they also employ those working in factories IN the United States and Canada! So much for Nationalist Policies. Trade is always a double win-win. I am VERY Pleased with this arrangement as a Consumer and for the contribution to our Economy. It's a PLEASURE (to me) to get in the car in the morning to go to work, to have a car that actually STARTS and Runs RELIABLY each and every day, which takes me there efficiently and safely. Provided by a Company that I feel has my back. What more could you ask for? ;-) I am reminded of Chairman Toyoda's humility as he was being treated very shamefully by our Congress, for the software "acceleration" glitch that proved in the end to be entirely false, even as ANOTHER COMPANY designed and then hid the "Ignition Switch from Hell" Flaw. A FATAL Flaw. One begins to Wonder Aloud that if the IGNITION SWITCH was bad, what about ANY and ALL of the OTHER components of said car from said manufacturer? Did anyone in Congress have the decency to apologize to Chairman Toyoda for their absolute terrible treatment of him? These kind of things bother me in my heart. Sincerely and All the Best! William PIETSCHMAN (W8LV) 73 and All the Best! DE W8LV Bill
The only car I've owned that might of had an under light would have been the '86 Buick. These days, manufacturers and dealers don't want you doing anything under the hood. Some brands actually cover all the mechanical bits with plastic shrouds.
Yep! Sort of like how Apple doesn't want you to fix your computer or phone screen, nor the Mom and Pop place, either! I like how they have a sleek design, but forget to have holes in the case to cool the thing down. 73 and All the Best! DE W8LV Bill
You could use the same lights they sell for the lids of camping coolers. A little gravity switch to activate/deactivate, and run them from internal batteries. Bonus: you still get to see while you've disconnected the vehicle battery for electrical safety.
Mounted lights never seem to aim where you need them: how about a compact pit lamp with a short cord? I'd be stressing about battery use, are LED's pretty low consumption?
LEDs are insanely efficient, you can get a heck of a lot of light over many hours from whatever battery is available.
Most tuners who go for engine bay lighting add strips like these. Oracle Lighting® - Engine Bay Lighting LED Strip Kit I don't know why you'd be concerned with battery use - it's not like the lights are on all the time (or even most of the time). There's typically a small control box inside the car and/or a switch in the engine bay that turns on the lights when opened.
Yeah, they should also bring hand crank and carb choke back. /sarcasm Aside from adding washer fluid, I see little to no reason to open the hood b/w services, especially with Priuses (cars with oil-consuming engines are obvious exceptions). Seriously, when was the last time you had to open Prime's hood somewhere other than you garage to fix something? Rodent damage ? Well, ok, you see chewed wiring - then what? The car still goes to a mechanic.
I got a few of these on sale for $4.99 each to replace our old incandescent lanterns. Very blight. I am keeping one for each car, and one for each room in house. I am very pleased. They came battery included. 250 Lumen Compact Pop-Up Lantern
And how do we learn that an engine is oil-consuming, without opening the hood between services? That is, before actual engine damage has occurred?
There is no such thing as a low oil LEVEL light. Low oul pressure can be a symptom of low oil level or something worse. On a Prius, usually by the time the low il level light comes on, the oil LEVEL is dangerously low, causing engine damage.
