Alright I have a 1997 dodge ram 2500 sport. This used to be my dad’s truck but I got it as a graduation gift. But ever since he has owned it there has been headlight issues that he never got around to fixing. Whoever had this truck before made a complete disaster in the engine bay of wiring and I have no idea even where to start with fixing the headlights. As of right now only the running lights work. I’ve looked at the wiring diagram in my Haynes manual and I’m still completely stuck. I’ve been messing with this for a couple days now and i definitely have realized I’m gonna needs some help on this haha. And these are not the OEM casing. It’s got some aftermarket crap that I don’t even know where to begin with.

 

Alright I have a 1997 dodge ram 2500 sport. This used to be my dad's truck but I got it as a graduation gift. But ever since he has owned it there has been headlight issues that he never got around to fixing. Whoever had this truck before made a complete disaster in the engine bay of wiring and I have no idea even where to start with fixing the headlights. As of right now only the running lights work. I've looked at the wiring diagram in my Haynes manual and I'm still completely stuck. I've been messing with this for a couple days now and i definitely have realized I'm gonna needs some help on this haha. And these are not the OEM casing. It's got some aftermarket crap that I don't even know where to begin with.

 

Some creative wiring going on there. The trucks with the pull headlight switch are prone to melting the switch and the way to fix it is to add relays for the headlights. Possibly this was done already and that's why the wiring looks so convoluted. The other thing is to make sure you have the correct headlight bulbs. They should be 9004, 9007 look similar but have a different pinout and filament arrangement. Many if not most aftermarket LED light vendors don't know these intricate details and the lights don't work as expected.

 

Someone really grafted into the OE wiring to wire those sport style headlights. Is that a true sport optioned truck?

I added sport headlights to my truck several years ago by purchasing the sport headlight assemblies and I ended up using a relayed harness to ensure I wouldn't have a future issue with the electrical current needs of running the 4 bulb sport headlights on my truck without frying the stock headlight switch and wiring in the dash. I purchased the relayed wiring harness from these folks and it works well - https://ceautoelectricsupply.com/pro...ut-fog-lights/

Several other places sell a similar relayed headlight wiring harness (Gino's Garage, Amazon, LMC Truck, etc.). These relayed headlight harnesses assume that the factory headlight wiring is in good working order, as they plug into one side of the working factory headlight wiring harness.

 

Good point, I believe the quad headlights for the Sport model didn't appear until 1998. So a 1997 would need some additional wiring to make them work.

 

Yes it is a true sport. And I’m definitely going to check out those harnesses because like I said I have no clue what this person did. It’s a complete mess. Thank you!

Also I’m going to have to check and make sure that the factory harness is still intact. A lot of stuff is hacked up in there so I’m hoping it’s okay.

 

I will check out the bulbs in the morning to make sure. 👍Thank you!

 

Download the service manual for your truck from here. Wiring diagrams are in section 8W. (accurate wiring diagrams at that....) There will be some differences, as the quad headlights didn't show up until 98, as noted above. I would be checking the headlight switch as well, as with the additional load of dual headlights, I'm gonna guess your switch is likely melted.

 

Be sure to check the headlight switch in the dash as well as the wiring harness behind the headlight switch. The brass/metal connections and the wiring must be checked closely, as the wires tend to melt as well, in addition to weak connections at the connectors..

 

would this harness I found on Amazon work? I can’t really spend $200 right now. Trying my best to find the cheaper route lol. But yeah I just need to know if this is the right thing.