Perks of LED vs HID retrofit

• No warmup time
• Less Electrical Draw
• 15,000 hour rated use AKA no burnt out bulbs
• Less wires
• No relays
• Simpler install
• plug and play with newer trucks ( no dash messages due to needing a relay setup) anti-flicker might be required.
• extremely bright hotspot ( on par with Mini D2S 4.0 )
   

this doesn't come without Con's but what doesn't have a con?  

• less width on the output
• have to replace the unit if it fails
• too much foreground light in some application
• Price is higher on the MLED than comparible HID projector kits.

Tools you'll need to do the installation

• Drill
• Flat blade screwdriver to pry with
• 1 3/8" inch hole saw or 1 1/2" saw ( I prefer the smaller to give a tighter fit)  
• Wire wheel to remove old sealant, might not be needed
• 3/4 " drill bit or step drill bit.
• Oven cleaner to remove the chrome ** should you want that.

Parts for the LED Headlight Retro Fit

• Spare headlight housings to work with ****this is highly recommended, but not a requirement.  Having a spare set of headlight housings gives you the ability to take your time during the project.  The spare headlight housings might also allow you to choose a headlight style you like to actually install in your truck.  Keep in mind if you go with non-OEM headlight housings that you will want to make sure the aftermarket headlights housings are of decent quality.
• Headlight wiring Splitter,  If you are using a Quad Beam housing and want to keep the halogen High beam you will need to split the high beam into the Morimoto LED controller.  
• You will need a wiring adapter to go from the OEM headlight wiring into the twin 9006 plugs on the Morimoto control box.
• BI-LED: MORIMOTO M LED kit from a Vendor of your choosing. 
• A roll of Butyl or similar to reseal your housings. 

Start by Removing your Stock Headlights

Removing Housing Lens

Next, you will need to bake your headlight housings to free up the sealant on the housings to get the lenses off.  If you trust your oven choose 225*f -250*f for ~10-15 minutes.  Making sure you check every few minutes to make sure you aren't melting your headlights and pissing off your wife  

You will be able to pull the lenses away from the headlight housing with a bit of work.   Don't pry too much, ensure you work your way around the headlight housing popping the clips etc. 

Once you have one corner of the headlight lens free you can work from that point cutting the sealant as you go.  Note: it might take a few times in the oven to get the headlight lens completely off the headlight housing.

The hardest part will be this corner of the headlight lens as it is tucked in pretty well in the corner of the headlight housing.  Work your way around the headlight housing on the top and bottom to free up any glue up to this point, then you will want to pull the headlight lens up and out as you cut the glue.

Once you have the headlight lens free you will note a sub faceplate to cover up the empty housing.  

This Bezel sits in the empty housing and can be popped out easily. This is a good point to clean stuff up. If you are going to remove chrome AKA "Black Out" your headlights this is the point to do it. Oven cleaner will strip the chrome from the bezels and reflector.  

The Morimoto BI LED Projectors

Here is what the BI-LED: MORIMOTO M LED projector kit will contain.   

Top to bottom

1. Bi LED Morimoto M LED Projector

2. Morimoto LED control Box

3. Silicon and securing nuts.

4. Shroud: you can choose the shroud you want, I decided to use Apollo 3 Black.  It will need to be cut down to fit into the Quadlight.   It will need just a little trimming to fit in the 2010-2012 housings.  

Modifying your Housing to fit the 35MM M LED D2S tail mount.  

Most Morimoto Projectors are mounted to the OEM headlight housing using a threaded Tail Shaft.  This makes for a simple and straightforward install that allows for you to use the OEM alignment points.

Use the 1 3/8" or 1 1/2" hole saw to cut through the OEM bulb mount.   Take it slow so you keep it centered and true.

Next prep your Morimoto projector for fitting.  Put the silicone seal on the Tail Mount, note the silicone seal can be oriented with thicker and thinner sides. 

Put the tail of the projector into the housing.  

slide on the keyed alignment washer and then thread on the nut until tight.  

Flip your headlight housing around and take a peek at your lights.  Center them and make it look right.  Tighten the nut more until the projector is not easy to rotate.  You will still need to level the projectors once they are installed into the truck.

Now Test fit your Shroud into the housing.  Note that the very top of the shroud needs to be cut down to prevent the shroud from being squished.  

Next you will need to drill a secondary hole for your power lead to run into the housing.  There is a grommet provided to use.  Use a step drill bit to put a 3/4" secondard hole into place.   Route the M LED power wire through the new hole and fit the grommet so that the wire loom comes out the back of the housing.

Tuck the wiring away to be hidden behind the covering bezel.

test fit the lense to ensure everything is fitting well.   DON'T seal your lense yet.  You still need to install the housings into the truck and level the cutoff of the projector.  

I actually decided I wanted to keep the QuadBeam light setup so I bought another set of housings and went tthrough the process again.  I used oven cleaner on the low beam reflector then painted it black.  ensure you use paper towel or something to protect the high beam area.  

I also dont like the looks of shrouds so I installed them without them.    I scratched the lens when I was sealing.  I will have to buff it out.  

Next you need to mount the Morimoto M LED control box into the truck.  I prefer to mount it to the back of the housing.  Given the small size of the MLED control box it is easy to find a good place for it.  

Pictures showing of how the LED control box is mounted.  the approx location is in the red area.  I used a rivet to hold it in place.  a nute and bolt would also work.  

Wiring

Connect up your OEM headlight wiring to the Morimoto M LED control box. 

If you are using the Quad beam housings you will need a low beam splitter so the Halogen high beam still operates, but the M LED still gets the signal to flip down the high beam shield.    You will also need to split the OEM plug into high and low beam as well.

If you are using the single beam housings you will just need a OEM plug to 9006 splitter to split the single plug into a low and high beam 9006 harness. 

Here is a very basic wiring schematic for the setups.

Quad Light harness

Make your 9006 splits for the highbeam.  You will need 2.  

The black oem plug is the high beam.   You want to splice your 9006 plugs into the area near my thumb

white/green is hot black is ground

use heat shrink wrap on your splice

soldier your wires

finished harness.

Here you can see the housings put together with %100 plug and play on OEM wiring.  The Blue RTV on the side is covering the rivet that holds the control box inside the housing.   

Leveling your lights

Now it is time to test your lights out and get them leveled.   Find a Level spot with a flat wall ~25-50' away from the truck.   The goal is to make your cut off's as level as possible.  

Here you can see poorly leveled cut off's

Rotate your projectors until you have a nice level cutoff, MAKE SURE YOU MAKE A SMALL MARK to show the projector alightment you like just in case you bump it prior to tightening it down.  Don't worry about the height yet as you will adjust that using the OEM housing adjustments.  Once you are happy with your cutoff then tighten down the retaining nut on the tail of the projector mount until tight and the projector can no longer move.

Once you are happy with the cutoff then it is time to seal up your housings using Butyl.  Follow the directions on the Butyl to ensure a good seal.  Reinstall the housings into your truck and now it is time to aim them.

Output shots

Ok everyone recently I completed a projector retrofit for my old man's 2011.5. I could not find a very good detailed writeup on how to do it so i figured I would make one. This is for Quad headlamps and you will still retain stock high beams.

To complete this retrofit I bought some used housings in the classifieds. That way the truck could remain operational and also I wasn't as nervous about screwing up a housing. Keep in mind this wasn't my truck. I had to repair where the previous owner cracked the mount, but I will tell you how to remove the housings so that won't happen.

Materials
I suggest buying everything from "the retrofit source" they have excellent customer service and everything in their kit is all top quality Morimoto parts.
Projectors- Mini H1 Stage III projectors
Harness-H11 wiring harness
Shrouds- I used mini gatlings, they are good for a 'stock' look
Bulbs- I suggest getting 4500K bulbs because 4300K is the Kelvin rating with the most usable light
Sealant- Add black retro rubber sealant and get a big tube of black silicon sealant.
Heat Gun-With temp control knob if you plan to use it for an oven
Dremel sanding wheel
Solder Gun, Solder, Heat shrink, electrical tape, etc

Headlight Removal
You may need to remove the headlights to help route wiring so here is how to do it.
First remove the two screws from each light, both are near the grill.
Open the access hole in the plastic wheel well. Lift the bar show to release the top of the light.

Now reach your hand throughout the access hole and push straight out to pop the mount out of the socket. Don't twist the light that will break the mount.


Truck Wiring- I will start with truck wiring first because you will need the truck wired to test the lights/wiring before you seal them up.Once again this is why the retrofit source is nice because they send you a nice wiring harness to help wire the ballasts.

All of my wiring is stripped, soldered, covered with heat shrink and electrical tape. 

First you will need to adapt a harness for the OEM input. To do this remove one of the stock input wires for the headlight. This is the three wired plug. Trace the power wire that feeds the low beam. Cut both that and the common ground. Splice in the one short adapter that fits the OEM input portion of the harness. You will need to cut off the female end of the plug. I just soldered it right on instead of using a plug. You can remove the power wire from the OEM screw in seal plug, just dab some black silicon in the hole to seal it up.





Next you need to install the harness in the truck. You will need to extend one of the ballast power wires. Cut and splice in about 2' of equal gauge wire into the longer ballast power wire. This is just so the wire can reach the other side of the truck from the relay mounting point. I spliced it in after installing in the truck to get the length right. 

I mounted the relays with a self tapping screw just forward of the driver side battery.


Mount the first ballast on the shroud of the fuse box as see below.


I mounted the other ballast on the air box. I removed it for easier attachment. 




Run the driver ballast power wire for the passenger side under the fan/radiator shroud.

The other portion of the harness plugs into the ballasts and then feeds the wires that come out of the grommet in the cap. This can get tucked behind the lights when you install them.

Next you job is to prepare the caps for the HID wires and grommet. The pictured one looks crappy but the second one I did this way and it turned out better. 
Use a forstner bit the size of the outer part of the grommet, just to shave away the ribs. Then use a smaller one in the center to cut out the hole, think its 1” but measure first.



I dabbed some silicon around the grommet and in the two unused holes to seal it up good.


Unsealing the Lights
I put tape on the lenses to avoid scratching them while working.
This is the most frustrating and time consuming portion of the project. It involves lots of baking, heat, prying and cursing. 
To start it off you will need an oven to bake the light housings. If you feel comfortable using your kitchen oven go ahead. I have a brand new oven so that was not the ideal option for me so i made one. It used my heat gun, has a divider to avoid direct heat and a thermometer to monitor temp.

To unseal the lights, heat is your best friend. If it is being really stubborn chances are you need more heat. I first started off by working my way around the light with the heat gun slowly just trying to pry the housing back just very slightly. This will make progress after the first bake much better. Then bake the housing for about 15min at about 260 degrees. If it doesn't seem to do much raise the temp just slightly. Once the light comes out of the oven pry away. You will bend and maul the crap out of the housings, it is impossible to keep them nice trust me. Then pry and heat in cycles it may take 5 rounds in the oven to get them apart so be patient. 
I learned that constant pressure prying on the housing will help to release the glue. You should be able to watch it pull away from the lens. Good luck with the separation, once you are finished you are half way there. 

Projector Fitment and Installation
First use a 9v battery to test the solenoid in the projector to be sure it works. 
Now that you have your lenses off its time to fit the projector. 
First remove the reflector that covers the bulb. 
First you will need to sand off the tab that sticks out in the lens with the dremel sanding wheel. 



Next slightly round out the hole just enough for the threads on the projector to slide through. Screw your shroud onto the projector. Place the thinner rubber washer on the projector. Put the solenoid wires through the hole from the reflector. Put the projector into the lens. Be sure to read the label and place the projector right side up.



Use the three tabs washer and nut as shown to tighten the projector. Be sure that the nut is below the three recessed groves.I applied some RTV to the solenoid wires to seal the lenses. The black silicon will work fine i was just using up an old tube. Try to be sure the projector is as straight as possible so less adjustment will be needed later with the cutoff.

Screw down the bulb clamp holder with the 3 tiny screws provided.


Now you will need to wire the solenoid. Use one of the provided splitters shipped with the kit. The splitter should plug into the high beam power plug. One side will power the high beams. Clip the plug off the other side. Then solder the solenoid wires to it. 


Resealing
Now plug each light in to be sure it works. Test the high beams to be sure the solenoid flips. If both work it is time to seal up the lights. 
First do your best to clean off the projector lens and reflector distilled water works pretty good. Regular water will leave spots. Now that they are all cleaned up its time to seal the lights.

Get out the retro rubber that you ordered. Make sure the grove in the housing is nice and clean. Now start laying the rubber in the channel. Stretch the rubber so it as wide as the channel then press it down to the bottom. 



Roughly fit the trim piece and the lens back onto the housing. Put the housing in the oven at 260-265 for about 15-20 min. Once it comes out of the oven press the tim piece and lens into place. You may need to rebake or heat areas with the heat gun to get it clamped together good.



Once its all dried I ran a bead of the black silicon around the outside to make sure it is sealed up good. I don't think it is necessary but it can't hurt.
Now you can put the lights back in the truck. You may need to slightly rotate the projectors from the outside to get the cutoffs to line up nice. You can also use the factory housing adjustments. Hopefully you are happy with the outcome of the project. This is how mine came out.





My Dad hasn't driven the truck in the dark yet but I believe they will be a large improvement all the reviews of the projectors rave about how bright they are. I was also thinking of adding LED high beam bulbs to make it brighter and also so the color of the lights are closer. HID bulbs will change color over time and become slightly more white. 
Hopefully this will help someone one with their project. If anyone has any questions feel free to ask, I have done a lot of research on this and will anwser best I can.

Finally

NOTE WELL: Once that clear lens is off; CLEANLINESS is next to godliness. The Chrome on the inner parts of the plastic lens scratches VERY easily. I handled this very tenderly. 

The only thing you should really allow to touch is a high end detail quality microfiber. A vacuum, making sure your hands/tools/bench/is clean is IMPERATIVE. 


And if you get impatient, and crank the heat up too much; or leave it in too long...

You too, can have a new piece of wall art. 



I managed to turn the orange turn signal into a wavy potato chip. So... off to buy new ones of those (which are un-obtanium, btw). But clear ones exist... So I ordered smoked ones, on overnight delivery... which would arrive on Monday (quite after I expected to be done with this project. 

Oh well. Onto the next step...

New Projector: This thing weighs about 4x what the stock unit does. Quite nice. 





Here you can see the solenoid and the shutter that raises for high beam operation. 



Hmm. Now Houston, we have another problem. The screws are too short. 




See how the screws go through. Technically these hex spacers are threaded; but I needed a secure connection to the fiberglass mounting plate and the housing of the projector. And the nuts that TRS provided are not Ny-lock; and the screws aren't long enough. Well... None of that worked for me. I bought new stainless steel screws and NyLock nuts for each of the screws. No way did I want a projector coming loose. 









with the correct screws and everything bolted together we can test fit the new projector. 











Now here's the crappy part. 

The high beam wire needs to go through to capture the high beam light bulb; and I didn't want to drill a second hole in the backing plate. I decided to cut the wires; solder them together with the weather grommet, and go on. 

I attempted to get the terminals out of the connector and pulling the wires through, but I was unsuccessful and on a time-line. 

This project was already triple the hours I had allowed and we weren't even close to finished. 















Finally. I"ve gotten my wiring done inside the headlights, my projectors installed in both lamps, and now I'm waiting on the wonderful new clear lenses to arrive. 


Back out to the truck to mount the rest of the hardware; the resistor packs, the ballasts, and tidy up the wiring. 

I mounted my resistors on the frame rail. I drilled a small pilot hole and then used self tapping screws on an impact gun to mount these. 


If you look at the top of this picture; you'll see the ballast resting above the headlight. I was able to get one screw into this; and then a strip of double sided 3M tape to secure this. 




 

night shot; no headlights. Look closely, you can make out the lit parking lot on the left and the one streetlamp. 



Low beams with fogs


Low beams without fogs


High beams



Low beams with fogs


Low beams without fogs


High beams



The improvement is absolutely earth shattering. There is no Porsche, Audi, BMW, MB, Lexus on the road that has been light than I do. The beam pattern is so sharp and clear; it throws such a wide cast. I do not get flashed for having my high beams on; and the cut-off is astounding. 

The high beams are like turning on the sun. 

It's a HUGE amount of effort to do this. I NEVER *want* to do this again. But I'm willing to bet that I would, if I bought a new truck. 

The improvement is absolutely astounding.

1.Disconnect and isolate the battery negative cable.

2.Remove the four plastic push-in fasteners (1) that secure the upper radiator seal to the grille support and both fender ledges.

3.Remove the two plastic push-pin rivets (2) that secure the upper radiator seal to the radiator.

4.Remove the upper radiator seal from the vehicle.

NOTE: It is not necessary to remove the grille from the front of the vehicle to service the front lamp units. The illustration shows the grille removed only to assist in clearly identifying the locations of the front lamp unit mounting provisions. 

5.Remove the screw (1) that secures the upper mounting tab of the front lamp unit (2) to the Front End Module (FEM) carrier (also known as the radiator closure) (4).

6.Using a socket with a magnetic insert or with a small piece of butyl tape inserted, reach down between the grille and the FEM carrier to access, remove and retrieve the screw (3) that secures the lower mounting tab of the front lamp unit.

7.Remove the fastener that secures the tab at the bottom of the access panel (2) to the front of the front wheel house splash shield (1).

NOTE: The illustration shows the back of right front lamp unit and slide lock with the slide lock in the locked position. 

8.Reach through the access opening (1) of the wheel house splash shield and lift the slide lock (3) upward far enough to disengage it from the lock post (2) integral to the back of the front lamp unit housing (4).

9.From the front of the vehicle, grasp the outboard edge of the front lamp unit firmly and pull it straight forward to disengage the ball stud (1) from the plastic grommet in the FEM carrier.

10.Pull the lamp away from the front of the vehicle far enough to access and disconnect the two wire harness connections from the park/turn signal bulb socket (4) and either the headlamp bulb (2) on vehicles with dual headlamps, or from the headlamp pigtail wire harness on vehicles with quad headlamps (not shown).

11.Remove the front lamp unit from the vehicle.

Exterior

Cab Lights:194NA

Reverse: 921

Cargo Lights/3rd break light: 921

2010-2012 License plate: 194
2013+ License plate: 7440

Tail lights / Brake lights: 3157K

Rear Lamp Bar: 194

Side Marker Lamps Dualy: 194

Headlights

Dual Headlights

High/Low: H13

Turn Signal: 3157K
 

Quad Headlights

High beams: 9005

Low beams: H11

Turn Signal: 3157NA

OEM Projector Lights

Low beams: HIR2 / 9012 

Fog lights: H10/9005

https://dudesdieselperformance.com/i-30533376-dudes-diesel-performance-tow-mirror-light-harness-13-18-ram-1500-2500-3500.html

Alright, so i know many of you have seen the tow mirror running lights done before, and this solution is specific to the 13-18 trucks. On the old way of doing this, you must run some wires inside the cab and through the doors which is a royal PITA to get into the doors. And this must be done in both doors, plus there is cutting and splicing factory wires, which some people don't care about, others do. Being that i just spent a boat load of money for the truck, i didn't want to be splicing wires where i can avoid it. That is where this wire harness comes in. It is completely plug and play, with no cutting or splicing required. It is easily removed, and easily blends into the factory harness. My harness is a pre-production set, when these are readily available, i will post a link on where to get them. (I have no affiliation with the manufacturer or seller, so i will update this with a link when i get notified that they are up for sale.) Now, lets get into the this

Here is the harness as supplied. The black connectors that are separate in the picture will need to be placed onto the factory harness, while the factory connectors will be placed on the opposite side of this harness to make things fully plug and play. This process takes about an entire second, and will be shown in this thread

Next Remove the Door Panel by following the directions in this article.

Now we are looking at this guy, the door module, which is located towards the front of the door, the handle trim piece is actually blocking view of this in the previous photo. The 2 connectors we need are the Blue and Black one. Do this one at a time, so as not to mix anything up



Let's start with the black connector. Insert a pick into one side of it, and use a screw driver on the other side in the access hole to slide it out. When inspecting the connector, you will notice that there is a retainer piece that must be relieved to allow the inner connector to slide out of the outer connector. I found the best way to do this was with the pick, as shown here



Now, on the opposite side use a small screw driver (or other small skinny object) to press out the inner connector



Once removed, slide on the provided black connector to this connection. Then place the removed connector onto the other side of the harness. Once the connectors are fully assembled, plug the harness connector into the door module, and the door harness into the new harness. Repeat on the blue connection, and now all the hard work is done. Check function to verify nothing is messed up while you have the door open. Now that everything is connected properly, secure the wiring with some zip ties, and trim the zip ties, because we are tidy folk here. Once that is done, everything looks pretty again, and we want our trucks to look pretty (even on the inside where nobody else will see them)



Now take a step back, and look at it. You can hardly tell anything aftermarket is going on there. Now question yourself as to why you didn't pre-order the Kicker speaker upgrade kit to do at the same time. Because look at that speaker, it looks so much better suddenly. And if you wanted to upgrade the speakers, this gives you the perfect excuse (it's only 4 more screws per door)



Now reassemble the door panel, in the reserve order that you took it apart. Then, you are done! No running wires, and messing with the door harness connector under the hinge that will make you cuss and grab a beer while you think about your decisions. Nice and easily done, with basic tools. Enjoy your work! (and probably tell me to go wash my truck, which will happen later today)





Here is a video showing the function. The lights are at full brightness during running light mode (which i like over partial brightness of some of the other ways of doing this) The lights are being powered through the interior lights circuit, not the running lights. So they will turn on when you open the door, and not when you remote start the truck. They also fade off with the rest of the interior lights, and stay on for a couple seconds after exiting the vehicle.

For vehicles without interior LED lights in the door panel, this mod will cost you a little more, but it will be worth it. You must purchase Alpha OBD and turn on the feature in your door module. it will only take a minute or two, and is really easy. Plus there is a lot more you can do with Alpha OBD, so you should just go ahead and get it anyways. If you need help with Alpha @Jimmy07 knows a lot about the program, and can help you get done what you need done. If you are on the fence about getting the program, check out this thread to see what a lot of people have been doing with it

https://www.cumminsforum.com/forum/2...justments.html

As always, enjoy, and let me know if you would like to know more. I will update with purchase location once i have that information. This is one of my favorite things to do on these trucks, and now it is super easy to do. Cheers everyone!