Espresso bar: IKEA LED cabinet light hacking.

What the heck, we hacked everything else from IKEA. Why not make some LED lights we had leftover from our van build work for under-cabinet lights in our espresso bar? This little project may or may not have used a (very) old power cord that was labeled 'VCR' I found in a bin of random power cords. I have mentioned I save things just in case they come in handy. Because they always come in handy. Even twenty-year-old power cables, apparently.

What's cool, though, is the project was a success. We have cabinet lights!

That's my inspector signing off on my work as he always does. Yep, it's up to code even though it may not look like it.

Speaking of code, I knew I had to somehow fit the IKEA transformer into an electrical box I had stuffed in my giant bin of electrical do-dads. Miraculously, it did. Just barely.

Yes, that black cord is the VCR cable. I had to break out a utility knife to shave off two corners in order for the female plug to fit into the 120V receptacle on the transformer.

The somewhat surprising thing is that my completely hacked contraption worked! Before snipping off the end of the cord with the plug I tested everything. In the photo below that is, in fact, a soldering iron and solder. I hadn't used that thing (branded Radio Shack which I bought when I was just out of high school for some car stereo stuff) in a long time.

I wired the VCR cable to the switch in the double-gang box above the countertop and screwed the electrical box to a stud just below the wall cabinet.

I'd have to wait for the paneling to be installed before making the final connections to the little LED pucks. In the meantime, the lights were ready to go.