Mopar LED Bed Lights Install?

[JRD]

Got this done on my 2020 Bighorn 1500. Thanks to everyone that shared their knowledge. It really made this easy. The jumper wires suggested worked perfect. Programed with Alfa all is good.

I wish I could use jumper wires for mine

 

[Driver]

No programing is needed.
No harnesses needed.
No switch is needed.

You can use any 12v led light, not just mopar.

All you need to do is identify the wire that supplies power to the cargo light.
It is accessed through a removable panel in the left rear floor. It's in a large bundle of wires running front to back.

Don't recall the color. Some say its white with tan tracer. You can pull your cargo light to verify.

The other beauty of this approach is NO switch needed, as they'll automatically turn on and off with the tailgate!

Easy peasy

 

[ZLamb98]

Recently, I‘ve looked into this more than I care to admit. Deciding between OEM bed lights, aftermarket, or some combo. I’ve read many comments here that the OEM lights are not very bright and others that aftermarket led strips are too bright. All subjective I guess.

To answer your question, there is a connector in the rear that should have the upstream wiring for the bed lights. With the kit you might be able to pin the connecting connector here instead of running up front; assuming terminals are the same size. You‘d have a lot of excess wire to deal with. Or if you don‘t care about wire taps / keeping totally OEM / it being reversible, you could tap the upstream wires.

Here is a description of connector and pin locations.



As an alternative to the Mopar kit, you can buy the bed Lights and required harnesses separately for roughly the same $ as the kit. This would be truly PLUG and play; no pinning/tapping required. Would still need to program. Harnesses required depends on model year and options. Attached are the part numbers needed for 2021 without Rambox, in case that’s your situation.

I ended up doing OEM lights. Bought the left light and left harness. I found the one light alone to be bright enough and went ahead and bought the right one. Made my own right harness with some spare wire and tapped into the left light wiring. They function same as OEM (light switch included) and if I ever want/need to remove, I can take out lights and put old harness back and it’s factory again.

There are tons of threads here that describe options if you don’t care about altering factory wiring or OEM functionality.

I know this is an old thread, but the 2019 ram has a different part # for the jumper harness which is backordered. But I'm pretty sure the trucks have the same part # on the tail lights and the bed lights. Is there a way to verify if i could use the 2021 harness or not?

 

[_Vito_]

I purchased the two lights and two jumper harnesses and it was a very quick and easy install.

68488851AB	Jumper Wiring, Left
68523847AA	Jumper Wiring, Right

I used the following for programming, and it worked flawlessly:

Foseal WiFi OBD2 dongle
VXSCAN FCA 12+8 Cable Adapter from Amazon (red and black)
AlphaOBD for PC


One note: I accidentally clicked one light in before I put my bed rug in and it was very difficult to get the light back out. I ended up bending the snap that holds it in, backwards and cracked the clear lense a little around the edges. Also, the lights dont really click into place with the bed rug due to the added thickness but there is enough friction in my opinion holding them in place. I am very happy with the install and everything works as if it were factory installed.

Thanks to all who posted part numbers and installation information!

So those two harnesses and the lights and it all worked? Do you have all 4 part numbers i would need. I have a 24 Laramie and I’m seeing all different part numbers on here and don’t wanna order the wrong ones

 

[skbtenn]

Considering doing this but just wondering how bright the Orem lights are? Can anyone comment on that? If they are not bright I don’t see why you can’t use the jumper harnesses and some led strips under the bed rails.

 

[Firepup216]

Has anyone installed on a 2020 using the jumper harness that are listed above? Is so any issues? I’m assuming you just replace the harnesses with the existing ones and add the lights. Then flash with alpha obd?

 

[DamnRamFarmBoy]

So , like i often do because i just love my trucks ,i got sucked into video on youtube about installing the bedlights. I had a 2014 1500 and bought a harness kit (68285766AA). Came with two lights , harness, mounting hardware and a bunch of zipties. I hadnt had a chance to install it before i decided to trade it in. I ended up getting a 2024 2500, and it didnt have the lights already installed but has the cut outs for them , so i thought i would be good to just install them on this truck with out all the harness , just basically use the lights and mounting hardware , and buy a switch since it has a place for that too.

Well i looked unter the truck and it does not have all the factoory plugs installed for any of it. The harness i mentioned above only has two wires , a ground and one beige wire. The guy in the video just tapped into a white wire with a beige or brown stripe i believe on the left side of the dash wich basically tied into the power for when you open the door or turn the knob to activate the the third brake light beams. no oprogramming needed. But i really like the switch funtionality after seeing it on some other new rams and in videos. I really cant believe that the wiring for the plug and play isnt there (that i can tell). Kinda seems like too much trouble at this point for a couple of lights. I just hate messing with the wiring on such a new truck. Anyone need a kit like this Pm me. If i were gonna do it i think i need a different kit anyway to support the switch and all.

 

[royceah]

Hopefully I didn't miss this in the thread. Has anyone used these parts to wire in an aftermarket light (LED strip, black/red wire) instead of the OEM lights?

I’m also curious if anyone has done this. I’d like to try as the led light strips seem much brighter.

 

[vincentw56]

I’m also curious if anyone has done this. I’d like to try as the led light strips seem much brighter.

Lots of threads on here about adding extra lights to the bed. Just need to use search.

 

[Code2medic]

I put as OEM set in mine ran the harness and programmed it I did pig tail into the OEM harness for the bed lights I installed and power and negative for led bed light under the rails. So if I push the button on the bed lights or open a door the led strips also function like the factory.

 

[royceah]

I have had a couple of guys DM me asking for pics of my "factory harness" installation and how they connect. Here are pics as best as I could capture. Let me know if there are questions.

Thank you for the pictures. What’s the trick to remove the drivers side red harness? I move the yellow clip and pulled on the red harness but it doesn’t budge at all.

 

[Cwrong]

Has any one had the issue of pushing button on light and it causes the rear turn signal to flash but not turn bed lights on? Went through and tripled checked wiring was connected to correct spots in kicker panel harness and reran alfaobd programming.

 

[Quietpeen]

Has any one had the issue of pushing button on light and it causes the rear turn signal to flash but not turn bed lights on? Went through and tripled checked wiring was connected to correct spots in kicker panel harness and reran alfaobd programming.

did you do the mopar kit or just order all the parts from this thread. I know the early version of the mopar kit had the wrong pin # in the instructions.

 

[Cwrong]

did you do the mopar kit or just order all the parts from this thread. I know the early version of the mopar kit had the wrong pin # in the instructions.

I got the mopar kit from dealer. Pin #'s instructions say are C1 pin 5 and C7 pin 16.

 

[Quietpeen]

I got the mopar kit from dealer. Pin #'s instructions say are C1 pin 5 and C7 pin 16.

you would think that your dealer would have the updated version with the correct instructions by now but maybe not. Check out this video and see if it fixes your problem.

 

[Cwrong]

you would think that your dealer would have the updated version with the correct instructions buy now but maybe not. Check out this video and see if it fixes your problem.

The videos instructions corrected the issue. Thank you very much.

 

[KDN]

Has anybody installed the Mopar LED bed lights themselves? Watching the video from infotainment I have a few questions. When they pin the wires to the C1 and C7 connectors, there are wires already pinned there from the factory that he just removes. Any ideas on what those wires are for? Looks like pulling them out doesn’t cause any issues, or am I missing something?
Thanks!

I installed the Mopar factory kit today. Had to run the new harness to the driver firewall. Be careful unpinning the default wire pins easily damaged. I had to use the dummy pigtail since the new harnes connector pin did not lock in place. Conected the battery and now the interior cab lights will not turn off.

 

[Code2medic]

I installed the Mopar factory kit today. Had to run the new harness to the driver firewall. Be careful unpinning the default wire pins easily damaged. I had to use the dummy pigtail since the new harnes connector pin did not lock in place. Conected the battery and now the interior cab lights will not turn off.

sounds like you didn't connect it to the right pin outage one in the instructions is wrong its been talked about some where prior