Since we have a stage on this bot, we better have lighting.
I recieved a strip of lights from makerbot, thanks to my brother-in-law, and thought it was too many bright lights. I saw that the light strips could be cut and decided the stage needed 2 strips of 3 to make the stage light up without having the rest of the bot overly lit. I then attached the lights to either side of the heated tip on the clear plastic Z platform.
Next I had to solder them together. I had some extra wire left over from the original bot build (ribbon cable), so I split it up and wired it to the properly identified buss strips (they have a convenient solder hole already available.)
Last I had to make them light up. I wanted to attach them to the extruder controller, so that I did not have too much wires that needed to flex (as this will eventually make them break). The extruder control does not have a 12v source easily available, so I had to solder some pins onto the board to allow the LEDs a place to connect. I tried to connect them at the power LED area, but that just led to the desoldering of the surface mount peices. Plan B: solder the pins to the 12v regulator chip. The contact is much more solid and although the space is limited, I was able to solder my leads onto it and get the strips to act as my power LEDs.
The result is beautiful. Especially at night.