Over the weekend I installed LED light panels in the frunk and trunk. They replaced traditional LED strips. There are two panels in each location. Each panel draws nearly 1 amp when lit, so that's 2 amps for each location. Evidently the load was too high for whatever controls these lights (both are wired into the OEm frunk and trunk lamps). They are not fused. Are these CAN bus controlled? Puzzling.
24 Watts for an interior general lighting lamp load sounds high. Maybe it should shut down. What was the draw of the previous 'traditional LED strips' in each location, total, that did not cause a shutdown?
I have since discovered that those lights are regulated by the body controller which is responsible for shutting them off when the load gets too high, like a circuit breaker. It then resets itself after a time lapse. The previous strips were under half an amp max.
24w of LED lighting sounds like enough to illuminate a large room. That'd be 6 chandelier bulbs. I have around ten feet of strip lighting on a bookshelf that doesn't use 24w. Four of these is nearly 100w, which would be a very bright incandescent bulb, in LED, it should be blinding!
Couldn't we use a 12V relay with a low draw primary tied to the existing light wire and then power the secondary of the relay from a tap on an always-on 12V power wire?
Probably was overkill, and the car knew it Replacing them this weekend with more conventional, low power LED strips.
Seriously. I light a pretty large bedroom with three 9W LEDs (Each 60W Incandescent-equivalent). Artsci here has roughly the same amount of lighting for the frunk! :biggrin: Cracked me up. I do think it's interesting the BCM can monitor the current used by the lighting channels, though.