Looking for ideas on adding white LED DRL’s to the front of 2018 Ram 1500 Limited.

[corneileous]

Just as the title says, I’m looking for ideas on what to use for a white accent DRLs like what a lot of the new cars have in their headlights. I’m not really looking to buy new headlights or nothing and even though as much as I would love to tear apart my headlights and just replace the turn signal LEDs with those switch back ones from diode dynamics that are both orange and white but I’m just not comfortable with taking my headlights apart so that option’s out.

I’ve found quite a few options of lighting like this but I have no idea where I would put them.

Anybody have any cool ideas I wanna share? I guess one place I can put these is on the blanks that originally came with my truck that go with the bumper holes where the OEM tow hooks go but in order to do that, I’d have to get rid of my toe hooks. My grill would be kind of a pain because it’s not the original cross hair design, it’s the one that’s closely resembles the rebel grill in a way.

 

[crazykid1994]

You could backlight the grill. Or do small leds in the bumper valance. Another member did the bumper balance similar to clearance lights for a big rig. Can’t remember who or I would link it. I backlit my grill with purple. Unless you are trying for something more practical than I’m out of ideas. Like the lights you posted you could still mount behind the grill but lighting would be reduced slightly.

 

[ramffml]

Personally I'd just "do it right" and buy a set of morimoto headlights; the entire housing etc, it's all plug and play and makes your truck look more premium. I'm not a fan of adding lights randomly to a truck.

Morimoto are not cheap, but that's the entire point.

https://www.morimotohid.com/09-18-ram-xb-hybrid-led-headlights-morimoto?quantity=1

Just my 1 cent as a Morimoto customer.

 

[corneileous]

You could backlight the grill. Or do small leds in the bumper valance. Another member did the bumper balance similar to clearance lights for a big rig. Can’t remember who or I would link it. I backlit my grill with purple. Unless you are trying for something more practical than I’m out of ideas. Like the lights you posted you could still mount behind the grill but lighting would be reduced slightly.

So what lights did you use behind your grille?

I dunno about drilling holes in my air dam but if I had a 3/4-ton or a dually with cab lights, I wouldn’t be opposed to those little bullseye lights but those would have to be orange tho, not white.

 

[corneileous]

Personally I'd just "do it right" and buy a set of morimoto headlights; the entire housing etc, it's all plug and play and makes your truck look more premium. I'm not a fan of adding lights randomly to a truck.

Morimoto are not cheap, but that's the entire point.

https://www.morimotohid.com/09-18-ram-xb-hybrid-led-headlights-morimoto?quantity=1

Just my 1 cent as a Morimoto customer.


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Yeah, I hear ya but I just can’t see droppin’ a grand or more on a whole new set of headlights when I do like my factory ones even though they do lack a specific feature that a lot of cars have come with for more than a decade.

 

[crazykid1994]

I used led tape light and ran a relay triggered off my driving lights to turn them on and off so I didn’t have to run a switch in the cab. The grill has an air damn inside it to guide air into the radiator. I don’t have any pictures of how I mounted them but I used the air damn to mount my led tape light. But it’s more for looks on my truck because purple leds are not bright.

 

[crazykid1994]

Found a picture. This is back when I first installed the lights in 2019

 

[Phirebeard]

I put the Diode Dynamics RGBW kit on mine. One on the top and one on the bottom. https://www.diodedynamics.com/rgbw-multicolor-grille-led-kit.html

 

[corneileous]

Found a picture. This is back when I first installed the lights in 2019

I like that. Purple’s one of my favorite colors, too. I might actually do something like that some day just for kicks…lol.

So where did you get those lights? I’m sure they’re automotive-grade and waterproof, correct?

 

[Mike Townsend]

If you are just looking for DRL's you can you AlphaODB and turn your brights, low beam or parking lights into DRL's.

 

[corneileous]

If you are just looking for DRL's you can you AlphaODB and turn your brights, low beam or parking lights into DRL's.

Oh I know, I just really like the white LEDs like a lot of the newer cars have and being how much of a pain in the butt it is to replace the headlight bulbs, I don’t even want to use either of those as DRL’s and being that I’ve heard conflicting stories about whether or not it’s a good idea to use the front signal LEDs as DRLs, I really don’t even want to use those either but as I said in my opening post, if I felt more comfortable doing it, I would just go online and buy the aftermarket LED boards that switch back-and-forth from orange to white that would replace the stock orange LEDs in my factory projectors; I’m just not too keen on having to take them apart in order to do it.

 

[crazykid1994]

Google Superbrightleds. I put white in the bed of the truck tapped into the cargo light and also did white under the rocker panels tapped into the footwell lights to light my steps up. They are not really “automotive” lights. Just waterproof led tape light that are 12v dc rated. They come in different quality and brightness so you’ll have to do some research before buying on the type of led used. I can solder so I did all the wiring myself. I used some that were less bright under the rockers since it was just for the steps. The bed I found as bright as I could.

 

[Mike Townsend]

I wanted ones like the new cars too so I finally bit the bullet and bought some AlphaRex Lux headlights. I love these things. They came with their own LED bulbs and the upper and lower LED DRL's. The lower one is a sequential turn signal.

The after market LED strips are a good route to go also. Like you I don't feel comfortable cracking open my headlights either.

 

[Cargasm]

If you want to go with switchbacks but not comfortable opening up your headlights check your local junkyards. Buy a set of used headlights, open them up, if all goes well buy your switchbacks and install them. Then you don’t have to worry about ruining your headlights or rushing to get them done and back on the truck. Worst case scenario you send them back to the junkyard.

 

[corneileous]

If you want to go with switchbacks but not comfortable opening up your headlights check your local junkyards. Buy a set of used headlights, open them up, if all goes well buy your switchbacks and install them. Then you don’t have to worry about ruining your headlights or rushing to get them done and back on the truck. Worst case scenario you send them back to the junkyard.

I guess that could probably be a pretty good route as long as the junkyard didn’t want to charge me an arm and a leg for a pretty decent set considering these premium projectors are like damn near 1300-1500 bucks brand new.

I remember years ago, pushing probably 15 years ago when I had to replace a 16 inch stock aluminum wheel on a 2004 dodge Dakota that even though it was in pretty good shape and listed for 600 new, it still cost over $125 which is about the average cost those days for a pretty nice aftermarket wheel.

 

[MoparFin]

Headlights with DRLs from eBay, grill from Amazon. Both wired to a fuse that is hot when running. I forget which one I used.

 

[corneileous]

I found these on Amazon and after making a call to Putco and finding out they don't make this product anymore for the Rams, they did say these would work for my truck but I'm just curious if anybody has used these and if they're worth the price this place is selling them for. I don't think Putco sold these for this high amount which makes me think this place is selling them at this price because they're not made anymore so does anybody know where I might find some like these? Thanks.

 

[corneileous]

Well guys, thought I‘d update the thread….my search for some white LED DRL’s still continues and after looking at a lot of potentials, I’m really interested in these from SparkSmith in the 9-inch size because they are very low profile and since my premium grille is gonna be just way to complicated and probably not look right with light strips in them, I‘ve decided to use the top area of the black plastic bezel pieces that surround my tow hooks to mount my lights too but I’m curious about how these would work if I connected the DRL portion of the lights to my dedicated DRL circuit that goes to the factory premium projector headlights.

According to SparkSmith, these lights have their own drivers and controllers built in to them so that when you use the simple method of connecting the DRL wire to a circuit in the fuse box with a fuse tap that‘s only live when the ignition is on and then splice the other wire into the turn signal wires going to the headlights, the white DRL’s will go through an animated start-up sequence as soon as you turn the ignition on and then go to solid white. When you activate either turn signal the appropriate light will automatically turn off the DRL on that side and then the orange LED’s will work in a directional turn signal and then go back to solid white once the turn signal is switched off.

I really don’t have an issue with hooking them up this way but due to the fact that I want the DRL‘s to work like factory DRL’s by not turning on while the transmission is in Park, I want to hook them up to the factory DRL circuit but I’m curious about how they’re going to react while being controlled by the body control module in the truck. I know they'll still go through the start-up animation every time the shifter is moved out of park due to the BCM killing power to them when shifting into park which is fine but two things I’m primarily curious about is one, I’m assuming I‘d have to make sure the DRL dropout is disabled since the lights dropout the white DRL’s on their own and two, how the lights are going to react once the headlights come on for night driving and the BCM kills power again since that’s what its supposed to do. I’m assuming the turn signal portions will still work as normal even if there’s no power to the white DRL’s, correct?

I should also add that probably around the first of the year this company is supposed to be introducing a new product that is just like these except these new ones will, aside from the ground wire, have a third power wire that when connected to the marker(running) light wires, the white DRL’s will automatically turn into a dimmer set of orange marker lights. If I waited to go with those, I wonder if still running the white DRL’s to the dedicated DRL circuit would cause undesired results.

At this point I could be happy with either set but it would be kinda cool to have extra front running lights.

 

[corneileous]

Well those lights from Sparksmith are the ones I decided to go with. After talking with their tech support again, it turns out that the new version they’re coming out with won’t actually have the orange running light feature like I thought they were so I just decided to go with these. Now I just have to decide if I want to connect the white DRLs to the dedicated DRL circuit or just connect them to an ignition-on fuse in the fuse box because if I want the white DRLs to stay on even at night, I can’t use the truck’s DRL wire as a power source unless there’s a way to disable the function within the BCM with Alfa OBD that turns off the DRL’s when the headlights are on.

But the other thing is, if I use the fuse box as a power source then the lights will turn on with the ignition and not when the transmission is shifted out of park which is kind of what I preferred but then again, I think I’d rather have the lights stay on at night more than I’d like them to wait to turn on when the transmission is shifted into Drive or Reverse.

Thanks for everyone’s input.

 

[A_mod_too_far]

Fog lights with drl is easy compliment to headlight drls, they are like 150$ on Amazon and anything looks better than the factory fogs. Should check out boosted motorsports on youtube he did a pretty sick combo on his blue 1500.

And then theres the various grill light arangements. The most basic and best looking one is the trx style marker lights across the top, that one take minimal modification.