Eclectic Electronics

How to replace car dome light with LED dome light?

Posted: 16 Jan 2011 12:00 PM PST

It’s certainly baffling why automobile manufacturers still haven’t migrated to using LED dome lights for use inside vehicles. LEDs generally consume less power than equivalent lighting using other technology. German automakers Mercedes Benz and Audi are now even using LEDs as daytime running lights, but that’s presumably more as a precaution for added safety rather than illumination. Traditional dome lights used in vehicles are yellowish orange in color and offer very poor illumination. This is a fact that more often than not, makes it hard to scour or search for things you accidentally dropped.

Changing your normal dome light to a LED-type is a breeze.

If you have an overhead dome light like the one pictured below, the diffuser cover is commonly held just by clips. You can simply pry it off with your fingers after pushing the switch either to the left or right side.

One end of the two connectors where the fuse-type bulb is held, is usually springy or bendable. Take due care not to replace your old bulb if you recently kept it on for a while, that thing is hot!

After removing the old bulb, insert the fuse-type adapter in place of it (if it doesn’t work after connecting everything, simply insert it the other way around).

Then connect the wires from the fuse-type adapter to the wires from the LED dome light board. There’s only two ways you can connect this thing and there’s absolutely no damage that can be done, even if you happened to connect it the wrong way and tried to turn it on and voila!

As you can see from the photo below, there is a very significant increase in illumination when using a LED dome light.