LED floor lights.........
 

Heres what I'm wantin' to do.I thought maybe ya'll might help me out.I want to install under dash floor lights in my '05 Ram.What I'm looking for is how to wire them to the headlight switch so that when I cut my headlights on,the floor lights will come on and stay on.Is this possible? I'm not real good with complex wiring stuff.The simpler the better in my case.Thanx a bunch fellas.

I've done a lot of car customizing...I got some great directions. Bear with me one minute while I spend the next 30-45 min. typing it out.

Sweet!

Step 1: Locate your mounting points.

Your mounting points are going to be set back far enough underneath your dash to where none of them shine in your face. Believe me, it's very distracting while driving. Under the seats and on the front of the seat frame is also a good Idea. I will post up pictures of good mounting positions. Look at your options for sizes while you do this too. Too big and it will never fit right, too small and you will have a hard time finding a good place. Measure and plan out where you want to put them. You can drill screws into things, drill holes, wire tie them up. Whatever you choose to do and whatever looks like the best way to hold it in place where you want it.

Step 2: Order your parts.

There are a lot of different options out their, so shop around for the best price. Be picky too. It's your vehicle and you want it to look nice. Check the specs on what you order and measure mounting hole distances. Plan this part out good enough and your install will go smooth. Make sure to get some extra wire ( 16 Gague speaker wire works really good) too because you will need it. It's ok to get the lights with the car outlet plug. You will be cutting and sizing wires anyways. Wire loom, wire ties, electrical connectors, shrink tube or electrical tape, and an external relay would be good to buy too.

Step 3: Mounting the Lights

You did all your planning and everything should go smooth. Locate and make sure you got each light for each place you want to put them. Lay out your install marking holes and checking behind things making sure you won't drill into any wires or interfere with any of the other vehicle controls. Check clearances and everything else before drilling your first hole. You can also use wire ties if you want. Now that you know how it will look, start drilling your holes. Most lights have wires coming out of one side. Make sure you have the wire facing the front drivers side. That's where your access through the firewall is. Get everything mounted up and sturdy. Nothing loose or shaking around.

Step 4: Running the wires.

Start with the furthest light from the front drivers side. Remember - To get the lights to work, all they need is one power and one ground. It's alright to ground your light close to the light and just end up with one wire going through the firewall. Make sure you scrape the area with a knife or screwdriver or something giving you a good metal to metal contact. When running wire through carpet it's best to be able to lift up the carpet. On occasions where you can't do that, A coat hanger works great too. If you need to cut into the carpet to run a wire, make a small X in an inconspicuous place with a sharp knife. maybe half an inch at most. Push your straightened coat hanger through to the other side. Make a small sharp hook, 1 inch long, at the end of the coat hanger. loop the end of the wire around the hook and wrap it in electrical tape. Pull the coat hanger out the other side. When running your wire, every time you come to the next light, you will want to tie that light into the wire you are running. Two ends in one butt connector, then one in the other. Put the heat shrink over it and either using a heat gun or lighter, shrink it around the connection. At least one inch from each end of the connection, make a loop to keep stress off of the connection and tape it up tight. Make sure you are tying off your wire with wire ties as you go along the way. Secure them good and out of the way. You will need to go through the firewall. There is one spot where the main harness goes through. Use the coat hanger and poke on through it making the hook and loop again and taping it tight. Then pull the wire through gently.

Step 5 : Intermission

My fingers hurt. I'm gonna take a break for right now.

Step 6 : Wiring

To activate the coil of the relay, you will want to tie into the fuse box. Locate the fuse for the tail lights. They make fuse jumper connections to tie into blade style fuses. You can use one of those or strip the wire long enough to be pushed all the way down by the fuse. Pull the fuse and turn on your lights. Check with a meter to see which side has 12vdc power then turn the lights back off. You will want to put your wire on the side of the fuse that does not have any power. That wire will run to the coil side of your relay. The other side of the coil goes to ground. After disconnecting your battery, you run a power wire off the main power into the fuse box to the switching side of the relay. On the NO or normally open side of the relay, you connect to the wire you just ran through the firewall. Tape up and mount the relay, tie up any hanging or loose wires. Put the wire loom around it if you wish and reconnect the battery.

Or you can just tie them in at the bulb connections using a t-tape splice connector. LED's dont draw that much power, so tapping directly to the headlight line at the bulb won't effect anything for your year truck. If you tap into your tails, your LEDs will illuminate whenever your parking lights are on. If you want that, you could splice into your front corner lamp. Just easier than going to the back of the truck.

A full 5m of the brightest LEds out there(5050), draws slightly over 3A. You'll never put 5m of those in your truck unless you want daylight in there. The standard LED's at 150ct per 5m will draw less than half of that. If your going color, it will be even less.
You can pull the headlight relay out of the fuse box and wrap your wire around the switch power leg and plug it back in as well. You dont need a seperate relay or anything like that for what you want to do.

I wired mine to my cig lighter. But they were on all the time once the truck was turned on. I didnt mind it.

Use the tail lights and not the head light. If you use the headlight relay, when you put on your brights, they will turn off. The brights turn off the headlights and fog lights. I like separating power to anything I add onto a vehicle from the rest of the system.

I appreciate the time and help from everyone.I looked around on the web today and found this.I was just wonderin if anybody has an opinion about them.They almost seem to easy..............

http://www.ledunderbody.com/Blue-2pc...hting-Kit.aspx

There is a wire that is in the little pull out door on the side of the driver side dash you can see with the front door open. I believe this is an orange wire (or at least is on an '04). This wire is hot with driving lights. It's the wire I tapped into for the light in my gauge in the pillar post. Super easy to get to...