The lighting plan is coming together slowly, rx but surely. I installed lights behind the disc gongs, buy ordered some green EL wire and am eagerly awaiting delivery of the Incredibly Stupid Number of Chinese Strobe Lights, view which may or may not be used in an attempt to dazzle the DMV into giving us a nighttime driving permit.

But until then, I got to work building these light bars – scavenged from BM projects past and hand-built over the past week or so. They will hang over the keyboards, giving light to play by …

I had to cannibalize loose 12V-resistored LEDs from our 2008 bicycle trailers and from my beloved Technicolor Disaster Area backpack to recover enough of them to finish the bars:

I took three 8-foot-long 1-by-2s, and drilled them with holes the exact diameter of the LED bulbs, and then countersunk them to the exact diameter of their mounting collars so that the bulb tips poke out perfectly when inserted into the holes.

The front of the bars got 32 white lights (seen at right directly below) and the backs got seven ultraviolet LEDs (left).

Not sure yet whether I’ll point the whites at the aluminum keyboards and the UVies at the shade canopies, or vice versa.

Then I crimpconnected everything using tap splices, also recycled from the bike trailers.

I stapled everything down …

Et voila – 24 linear feet of soft floodlighting for about $150 less than they’d charge you for a prefab thing.