well last week i put LED strips in my rear bumper, you all saw the pics. today i put some 10" ones in my overhead console. looks awesome and its a lot brighter....yes yes, i know "this thread is worthless without pics" but i took pics on my phone, but i cant find the adapter to put the memory card in the computer. but anyways...the 2 lights in the overhead console never worked (the push button thing broke) so i decided i would tie the LED strips into the overhead dome light. works beautifully...fades out and everything perfectly, but my question is....when they dim out, theyre suppose to be all the way off, but theyre not. they stay on all the time very very dimly but theyre still on. even when the trucks off, alarm armed and everything. even when im driving they stay on very dimly. doesnt bother me because it so dim, but im wondering why they stay on? the normal halogen bulb never stayed on a little bit. anyways it doesnt really bother me, but i was wondering if i left it for a few days without starting it or even overnight...would it run down my battery? theyre LEDs so they dont take much power but i was still curious as to why they do this and if it will run down the battery? sorry for the long post

 

There must be a trace of voltage on there somehow. Take a meter and put it across the leads to the LED strips and see if you are getting any voltage there. Since LEDs only take a small amount of power, it might be enough to keep them on.

 

so is there a way to fix this other than removing the LEDs? im thinking that there was always some power going through the wires, just not enough to light the halogen bulb. but since the LEDs require such little power, it lights them a very little bit. so if that makes sense, then it shouldnt kill the battery becuase there was always power going through all the time and it hasnt killed anything yet. but i guess time will tell. i i leave the truck sit and it wont start i pretty much no what did it, but we have a battery tester/charger at work, so if worst came to worst id just do that.

 

well heres the pics i talked about on my phone. first pic is a full view of them. looks like LEDs are only wrapped around one sid, but it goes completly around. 2nd pic is showing the lights OFF, but theyre on a little bit as mentioned.

 

lights off

 

mmstar, you could put a relay inline to disconnect the LEDs. You would loose the dimming effect, but it would shut them off when power got too low to trip the relay.

 

When I bought mine, there was a "warning" about this. There is enough current there to lamp the LED. It's always there, just the incandescents don't respond to it. A 100 ohm resistor across the leads should extinguish the lamp. I keep meaning to do mine, but other projects are taking precedent.

 

alright thanks guys.if it ever becomes a problem ill do something about it, but until then theyll just be very dim all the time. oh and sorry about the massive pics! forgot to resize them. didnt realise that you can only see a portion of the pic if not resized.