Thread: Lets see pictures of custom lights/lightbars

Well, I've done another upgrade. I'm donating this bar to my old FD back home in KY for their "new to them" engine.

This time I've started with a Whelen 9M eight strobe bar, which was originally eight strobes, TDs, alleys and rear flashers (w/TD flash capability) and gutted the halogens and corner strobes. Red Freedom corners went in the bar, with the four 400 series strobes facing to the front along with two 400 series six over six LEDs. Since this is going on an engine, the primary use of this bar will be to the front, hence all the warning concentrated there. Basically, it will be red LEDs and clear strobes.

I've got to cut some new lens sticks down to size and do some swapping of lenses on another bar, so this pic is the bar w/o lenses. I have clear 9M endcaps w/o alley cutouts in really good shape that I'd like to trade for some solid red 9M endcaps, if anybody is interested.

I love the idea of red LEDs and clear strobes. Nothing "pops" like a clear strobe and the warning power afforded by freedom corners and the 6 over 6 heads should balance it out nicely. Can't wait to see it with lenses.

Had an old Patriot bar with bad power supplies laying around and thought I'd do something with it.

Pretty cool. Is it a TA or just a warning bar?

Here's a pic of the bar with lenses. I need to polish the center clear lenses, but that's all that needs to be done. I want to change the endcaps to solid red, but I doubt that will happen any time soon. Perhaps I'll change them down the road, but it will be after I donate it and recoup some costs put into this upgrade.

Originally Posted by foxtrot5

Pretty cool. Is it a TA or just a warning bar?

It can do traffic but it's a pain. I have to cycle though all of the patterns. I used an ETD quad led flasher. The only thing that still worked out of the light. I found a sho-me flasher with arrow I'm thinking about putting in it.

heres a custom built star interceptor. it was just a 47" 4 rotator bar with a speaker grill and a 100w speaker, came with a D&R sp600 switchbox, nice one at that and a pa300. cost me $230, seems like a fair deal. I rearranged the rotators,and mirrors, staggered them for intersection coverage, added alleys and takwdowns. I cut an amber plastic out for a rear cut out to fill the speaker hole.

I have been off of the board for a while, but I did manage to finish this project over a year ago. The "first" final version had 6 solaris modules to the rear and one to each side. For those who live by "amber to the rear" rule, I am no longer subscribing to this theory. Two of my rear solaris modules were amber. I was able to put this bar on my car at work, (how cool is that) and with the lightbar going full blast, amber to the rear and all, a drunk rear ended and totalled my car. After sitting in the shed for a while, I dusted it off and replaced the two amber modules with blue cuda modules. Here is some new video as well as the original configuration. I did finally slave the front to a ULF44. The rear and side are controlled by an independant ULF44. The original rear halogen flashers were left in place. My power supply does not have enough juice to run the flashers and the center rotator at the same time, but you can get the idea by looking at all the videos. Please note that all of the lights in the room were on when these videos were made!

New video of completed rear:


And a 360 video:

Originally Posted by cpdchief

And my very own! This uses Whelen 700 series and Tomar RECT34 LEDs. They are all independent. I'm debating on whether to add a flasher or not in the future. As of now, the bar is only half done as I have only completed the front. The rear still has the original strobes. Complete with a Barker's beauty! Video to follow soon!

added 4 strobes, wigwag take downs, moved 2 rotators over

soon to come is 2 more rotators where the front strobes are, and re-locating the front strobes.

that jet looks pretty sweet! looks like a modern tomar 925!


I built two of these for my work truck. It has one amber (drivers side) and one blue (pass) star 9200s. the blue has been disconnected for summer use for roadside construction work, and has not been re-connected in years, its for plowing. so I removed the power supply in the blue and the inner strobe in each, ran a strobe cable from the passenger side strobe and connected it to the driver side in lieu of the inner strobe.

I added 2 mx7000 freeform rotators (new) to the inner sides and went and split some brand new amber and blue domes, sealed them
up with windsheild glue ( i used that for everything, even fixed my kitchen cabinet)

I mounted a radio shack project enclosure with 3 "pollak" 75 amp pull/push switches, one for amber strobe, blue rotators and work lights. Now, durring summer seasons and road work, I can have amber visible on both sides spread apart, and still blue for plowing.

Originally Posted by eng18ine

added 4 strobes, wigwag take downs, moved 2 rotators over

soon to come is 2 more rotators where the front strobes are, and re-locating the front strobes.

That's a nice looking MX. Nice job!

Originally Posted by lafd55

That's a nice looking MX. Nice job!

thanks! only the second bar iv done. cant wait to sell it and start a new project

I guess you could call this "custom"...(not mine)
Federal Signal Vector Dash Light | eBay

Edit: Might as well attach photos

Originally Posted by Reno911

I guess you could call this "custom"...(not mine)
Federal Signal Vector Dash Light | eBay

Sure looks waterproof on the underside..

Finally got vids/pics taken of this, it's been in my garage since the summer. Strobe tubes are new, lens are new, housing was professionally cutdown from a longer unit. Flash patterns are changed via button combination. Not satisfied with the cabling, but it works for now. I'd like to find a longer, single cable capable of running this vs 3 6-wire cables. Vid was taken in low power.

Arrowstick.jpgPower Supply.jpgController.jpg

Originally Posted by rwo978

Finally got vids/pics taken of this, it's been in my garage since the summer. Strobe tubes are new, lens are new, housing was professionally cutdown from a longer unit. Flash patterns are changed via button combination. Vid was taken in low power.

That's awesome, I REALLY want one!

Originally Posted by rwo978

Finally got vids/pics taken of this, it's been in my garage since the summer. Strobe tubes are new, lens are new, housing was professionally cutdown from a longer unit. Flash patterns are changed via button combination. Not satisfied with the cabling, but it works for now. I'd like to find a longer, single cable capable of running this vs 3 6-wire cables. Vid was taken in low power.

I love the patterns!!!

Very nice. Couldn't you use a lightbar cable for it? Something like a liberty or freedom wiring harness? I not sure how many wires are in those harness' but it something to think about.

As long as you are running a UPS690, and NOT a ISP unit, you can run a common RED and a common BLACK. The "TRIGGER" wire still needs to be seperate. So, you would need an 8 wire conductor.

Originally Posted by ford-dealer

As long as you are running a UPS690, and NOT a ISP unit, you can run a common RED and a common BLACK. The "TRIGGER" wire still needs to be seperate. So, you would need an 8 wire conductor.

Yes, but you should probably beef-up the common red and black wires. What comes to mind is an MX7000 cable, where the red and red/black wires are a gauge larger than the rest.

Originally Posted by RBRONKEMA GHTFD

Very nice. Couldn't you use a lightbar cable for it? Something like a liberty or freedom wiring harness? I not sure how many wires are in those harness' but it something to think about.

It's 3 sections of the 6 wire strobe cable (18/6), so 2 heads per cable.

Originally Posted by ford-dealer

As long as you are running a UPS690, and NOT a ISP unit, you can run a common RED and a common BLACK. The "TRIGGER" wire still needs to be seperate. So, you would need an 8 wire conductor.

I knew there was a way to do this, I'd seen it before, but couldn't find the pic/diagram of it. Thanks!!!

Originally Posted by shues

Yes, but you should probably beef-up the common red and black wires. What comes to mind is an MX7000 cable, where the red and red/black wires are a gauge larger than the rest.

Yes, was thinking lightbar cable, but I thought I would have needed 18 wires. If it's only 8, that's more doable. I can always double up on wiring, as most lightbar cables have more than 8 wires.

Thanks guys!!!!!!

Originally Posted by Wheels

For those that haven't seen the video yet, here's my custom lightbar. (Thanks to ChargerLighting for adding mounts/brackets.) I added brand new Whelen 700 strobes/lenses inside a mini-jet and powered it with an EB6 power supply. It looks almost identical to a Tomar 925. I plan to have another made soon but with 700 series leds. I like it!...I hope you all do to. Enjoy.

Chris, that came out really nice! I have something on the bench in "The Lab" that you might just like.... stay tuned!

I just pulled this from the rear deck of my patrol CVPI. This is a custom Rear deck light that I built.

Started with a 44" flush mount Edge frame. Installed 6ea 6x6 and 2 6x0 400 series. The 2 6x0 are in the center with the voided section(s) on the bottom as it was behind the third brake light. Nothing like having a Freedom INSIDE the car! I built custom brackets for this, which kept it tight to the deck, so once it was installed, the top of the bar was only 1 inch higher than an Inner Edge. The vid was recorded on low power. Those that have seen this know that this is one killer deck light.

I just pulled this from the rear deck of my patrol CVPI. This is a custom Rear deck light that I built.

Started with a 44" flush mount Edge frame. Installed 6ea 6x6 and 2 6x0 400 series. The 2 6x0 are in the center with the voided section(s) on the bottom as it was behind the third brake light. Nothing like having a Freedom INSIDE the car! I built custom brackets for this, which kept it tight to the deck, so once it was installed, the top of the bar was only 1 inch higher than an Inner Edge. The vid was recorded on low power. Those that have seen this know that this is one killer deck light.

I keep trying to figure out how to distract you when I'm at your place so I can put it in my truck. But I am very sure you would notice it within seconds.... This is a nice setup and very effective.

Originally Posted by MEVS06

I keep trying to figure out how to distract you when I'm at your place so I can put it in my truck. But I am very sure you would notice it within seconds.... This is a nice setup and very effective.

Two Words..... Metal Detector.....

Originally Posted by rwo978

Finally got vids/pics taken of this, it's been in my garage since the summer. Strobe tubes are new, lens are new, housing was professionally cutdown from a longer unit. Flash patterns are changed via button combination. Not satisfied with the cabling, but it works for now. I'd like to find a longer, single cable capable of running this vs 3 6-wire cables. Vid was taken in low power.

That traffic advisor looks sweet! I really wanted to build one using a whelen traffic advisor frame but I just stuck to using a Federal Signalmaster instead. (posted a few pages back.) Nice work and the cables don't look all that bad either.

Originally Posted by ford-dealer

Chris, that came out really nice! I have something on the bench in "The Lab" that you might just like.... stay tuned!

Thanks David, yeah it was a nice project to work on. I'm very interested to see what you have cooking up in "The Lab". haha. I will definitely stay tuned.

Originally Posted by ford-dealer

I just pulled this from the rear deck of my patrol CVPI. This is a custom Rear deck light that I built.

Started with a 44" flush mount Edge frame. Installed 6ea 6x6 and 2 6x0 400 series. The 2 6x0 are in the center with the voided section(s) on the bottom as it was behind the third brake light. Nothing like having a Freedom INSIDE the car! I built custom brackets for this, which kept it tight to the deck, so once it was installed, the top of the bar was only 1 inch higher than an Inner Edge. The vid was recorded on low power. Those that have seen this know that this is one killer deck light.

Hey now that is cool. I was tempted to do the same to a NOS AdvantEdge I once had but I just couldn't see myself disassembling a nice bar. It now belongs to a very well-know Whelen member. (we all know who he is, lol.) That lightbar looks great....I would have thought it would be an eye sore in your rearview mirror.

Originally Posted by Wheels

Hey now that is cool. I was tempted to do the same to a NOS AdvantEdge I once had but I just couldn't see myself disassembling a nice bar. It now belongs to a very well-know Whelen member. (we all know who he is, lol.) That lightbar looks great....I would have thought it would be an eye sore in your rearview mirror.

It was only an Eyesore for the people behind me! Seriously, it only set 1 inch higher than the InnerEdge we have in another unit. It fit like a glove back there.

I recently rebuilt my Freedom.





Now I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to do with it. I'm definitely not going to replace my current lightbar on my Excursion. I don't want to put it on a wrecker due to a lack of S/T/T lights and the fact that it's only 48". And it's for sure not going to work well on my Mustang convertible.

If anyone is interested, shoot me an offer, I guess. I don't particularly want to get rid of it, but I might for the right offer.

Nothing too exciting, but I got the idea from our installer who does this for Chargers:

I took an extra talon and added it to the Whelen Ford CHMSL so I could reuse it on one of our Chargers. The flash pattern I chose seems to line up with the alternating between the CHMSL, so it looks pretty good.

Originally Posted by Skippy

Nothing too exciting, but I got the idea from our installer who does this for Chargers:

I took an extra talon and added it to the Whelen Ford CHMSL so I could reuse it on one of our Chargers. The flash pattern I chose seems to line up with the alternating between the CHMSL, so it looks pretty good.

Simple yet effective. I like it.