Matt Gecko LED truck cap lighting

I recently added some LED lighting to my truck bed shell and thought I’d post up the details.

Vehicle: 2017 SR5 DCLB
Camper Shell: ARE Z-Series
Lighting: Matt Gecko LED set me up with the following kit:
1.) Cool White LED's: 48" LED strip - 12" wire harness - 36" LED strip - 12" wire harness - 48" LED strip - 36" wire harness
2.) Remote option pre-wired to bed switch
3.) Quick disconnect plug

The “standard” setup is to either adhere the LED strips to the underside of the bed rails OR use Velcro to stick the strips to the interior carpet headliner of the cap. I didn’t like either setup so I decided to utilize the frames of my camper shell windows. The LED strips Matt sells are 10mm wide and that fit perfectly on the shell’s window frames. The left/right windows have 4’ long strips, and the front window has a 3’ strip. Matt took care of wiring up connector harnesses (12”) in between each light strip. All I had to do to start the install was unroll the lights and stick them on.






The actual install was fairly straight forward. Matt gave me 3’ of extra wire off the right light strip. I ran that wire through .25” split loom and then cut it to connect to the harness. I then ran the rest of the wire (again in split loom) through a 3/8” hole in the side of my truck bed (see below).




Next up was to install the push-button switch. I opted to install mine in the location pictured below. The backside of this location is the right rear taillight cavity, which gave me a nice open space to hide all the wires. There is also a plate back there that works perfectly as a ground wire mount location.


Next up was the actual wiring of the remote module, push button, ground wire, etc. I won’t be getting into that here as Matt Gecko LED provides a wiring diagram and instructions for install.




Top Arrow = ground wire
Right Arrow = Wiring from LED lights in truck bed
Bottom Left Arrow = Wiring from harness to battery

Last up was to run the wires from the taillight location to the battery. Matt Gecko’s instructions denote running the wires along the passenger side of the truck. I opted to run the down from the right taillight, across the back of the truck, and then along the driver’s side. There is a factory wire loom running along that route and was thus easier to zip-tie the LED loom to that.



Wire coming out of the taillight cavity



Wire running across the back of the truck, following existing harness



Wire following the existing wire loom on the driver’s side


Just run the wire along the driver’s side and then up into the engine compartment. Connect to the battery and you’re good to go.

 

Nice write up buddy