Off-road LED lights

[salts001]

Has anyone placed off-road LED lights in the lower part of the bumper? This space measures 7.5" x 2.5" which would be perfect space for an LED light bar on each side of the license plate. I am still trying to figure out how to mount a light. The bumper brace does run above but there must be an alternative rather than drilling into that. I would most likely place the light behind the opening.

 

[nima]

for those with adaptive cruise control its almost not possible as it would (partially) block the ladar. But carid.com website has these LED lights with 900 lumen brightness which look pretty cool, and useful. However if you're actually going offroading you'll need more than just those LEDs, perhaps some roof mounted folded sun as they showed in the very last episode of Top Gear! lol

 

[salts001]

I don't have that feature so no issues there.
Ha, I definitely not taking this thing off-road. It's mainly to light up the dark roads by me. I think keeping it behind the facia will give it a clean look and not so awkward looking. Just my thought.

Here are some lights I was considering:
http://www.roughcountry.com/6-inch-led-light-bar-pair-70806.html
http://www.rigidindustries.com/led-lighting/106312
http://www.kchilites.com/light-type/led/c-series-led/c-series-led-light-bars-sizes-10-50.html

 

[nima]

The first link seems to be the brightest, but I like the look of the bottom link. They are all pretty bulky though, I guess thats what you'd get with high output/lumen lights.

 

[Viperi]

there are some "knock offs" out there comparable to the industry leading rigid. google some off road forums

 

[meme405]

Rigid or bust. We outfit all our work pickups with Rigid industry lights all the way around. These are trucks which spend their entire lifetimes on remote construction sites in the back country of Canada. Never had a problem with their lights, and even the one time we had a light bar get taken out by a big rock, rigid warrantied the thing no questions asked (even though it was obviously not the light bars fault).

 

[Kanedean]

I don't have that feature so no issues there.
Ha, I definitely not taking this thing off-road. It's mainly to light up the dark roads by me. I think keeping it behind the facia will give it a clean look and not so awkward looking. Just my thought.

Here are some lights I was considering:
http://www.roughcountry.com/6-inch-led-light-bar-pair-70806.html
http://www.rigidindustries.com/led-lighting/106312
http://www.kchilites.com/light-type/led/c-series-led/c-series-led-light-bars-sizes-10-50.html

Wow, these lights don't come cheap.

 

[Bklynjohn718]

I have a led light bar just under where you want to put yours. I get mixed reviews about it. When i use it in the appropriate areas im in, it works very good.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A

 

[jbaker1121]

I've seen them exactly where you are thinking of putting them, a few 2nd gens in my area have done it. I personally think it looks very tacky, like a wanna-be LED driving light strip that so many people have been putting on their cars since they got popular a couple years back on production models.
I wouldn't do it unless you really need them. (Yes I get it, some people just want to do it to do it) but I think those utility LED bars that people throw on jeeps and utility trucks belong on jeeps and utility trucks. if you need more light output, upgrade your fog lights.

I've looked into deleting the factory round fog lights and putting in an LED strip much like the ones I am talking about, and the ones you're linking to, in order to give it that OEM look much like some productions models have had.

^of course the above is just my opinion. If you want to do it, go for it. Best way would be to build brackets that have a hidden mounting point behind the bumper so you don't need to drill into the bumper plastic. One guy by me actually mounted them between the "fins" in the lower opening

 

[salts001]

Thanks for all the input!!
This is something I want to add purely for functionality because I do spend some time driving in the places where there aren't lights and cars for miles during the seasons. At the same time I want the positioning to be clean and flow with the rest of the car. It would be a shame to add something that's obnoxious looking or protruding.

Meme - I agree, as I have been reading further...tons of positive reviews about Rigid
John - what brand and size do you have?
Baker - when you thought about deleting the factory fogs...was it just too much work? I've thought about replacing the factory fogs with a high output LED round's instead I converted to HID setup.

 

[Viperi]

i think it will work well down there. to hid it a bit, you could put a light tint overlay on it to "blend it in" Also retrofit source makes some led projector style fog lights for nissans. might be a bolt on

 

[jbaker1121]

Thanks for all the input!!
This is something I want to add purely for functionality because I do spend some time driving in the places where there aren't lights and cars for miles during the seasons. At the same time I want the positioning to be clean and flow with the rest of the car. It would be a shame to add something that's obnoxious looking or protruding.
...
Baker - when you thought about deleting the factory fogs...was it just too much work? I've thought about replacing the factory fogs with a high output LED round's instead I converted to HID setup.

Viperi's idea is similar to what I had for my plan to mount some driving lights in the vents, tint to hide them when not in use...

My plan was to delete the round fog lights entirely, and sort of in its place have the Sebastian Vettel edition FX / GTR LED strips, for an OEM look. In my thread I have some mock ups a few tens of pages back I think, but I just didnt really get around to or have the time to do such a project. My idea was to remove the round lights, and extend those small horizontal fins that are in there, then have the LED strip be on the middle fin...

here's a mockup I made a couple years ago when somebody else was thinking of putting an LED strip in the same spot you are thinking of:


vettel edition LED look:



I wanted to put my LED where the stock round fogs were, I thought they would look better there, but can't find the photoshops I did. basically they would be in the middle vent, on this part: (take out the round hole, add in fins to make the teardrop shape have 3 fins in it, with the LEDs in the middle portion)

 

[salts001]

Here's an update, I picked up a pair of lights from AuxBeam. I've only done a mockup and once the rain passes I will get out there to run the wires and mount the light. Looks like I will just screw it right up to the aluminum bumper. As for the switch, I plan on placing it in the blank slot next to the headlight angle adjusting rolling switch. Does anyone know if its easy to access? I see several screws in the footwell area and the rest I assume are clips.





I found an aluminum right angle bracket laying around.


I was thinking about taking a dremel to the plastic facia just to move the light forward a little more.

here is the link to the light:
https://www.auxbeam.com/77718404

 

[jbaker1121]

sort of gives it a EMS vehicle look. Have you considered tinting them so it blends in better?

 

[nima]

sort of gives it a EMS vehicle look. Have you considered tinting them so it blends in better?

lol the EMS look! I was thinking of installing a 28000 lumen light bar right in between the roof rails so I can use it as high beam for the idiots on the road! haha

 

[matrixx860]

Putting the high beams on someone while driving may cause an accident you know, just saying let the authorities handle the idiots.

Sent from my SM-N920V

 

[salts001]

sort of gives it a EMS vehicle look. Have you considered tinting them so it blends in better?

Not yet, still working on the install process but once mounted then I can get a better feel for it.

 

[nima]

I get your point, but "Authorities" can't find their ass with both hands even if they had a map and a flashlight!

 

[myron02]

Not yet, still working on the install process but once mounted then I can get a better feel for it.

good job on mounting those. Did they come with that angle bracket?
I wanted to do this for a while now, I do alot of night driving in winter in the mountains, and these would help with seeing the wildlife for sure. Do some pics at night with them on from inside, I wanna see how wide they light up the surroundings

 

[gicastro]

Salts001, I love it. I've been thinking g the same thing but I was afraid it would look tacky. Not too bad on yours. I would tint them a bit to make them blend in more.