Alright, I've been googling and looking through various Acura forums including this one looking for solid info on replacing these lights. Well, not all I listed, but might as well add them with the bunch. They are all scattered and always have different info depending on which Acura and whatnot so I made this topic hoping to get solid info all in one place specifically for the ILX.

Anyone who has replaced any of these lights, can you take the time to say what you replaced, with what (as well as whether they are error free plug in play or required additional work)? Also links to the product if possible! ; ;

Also need stock number of lights.

Is DRL h8 or h9? Is there any DRL LEDs out there that do not require resistor hookup? I have no interest in replacing this until there is an error free that does not require resistors if that is even possible.

Fog is H11 right? From what I've read there is no error issues with these?

No clue what Reverse light number is. This was my main issue for this topic. I bought a cree LED reverse light, works fine except it does not fit into the housing, and it is surrounded by what I assume is machined aluminum. I turned it on just for 10 seconds and it was warm. I was thinking it might be a bad idea to file this down to get it to fit so I am looking for anyone who has bought reverse LEDs that plug in and fit fine with no errors.

Thanks everyone who replies! Very much appreciated!

 

Fogs are H11, you can also easily do the H9 conversion which has a greater output and there are no issues. Easiest install I've ever done.
Lows or headlights are D2S if you have the premium package, a little difficult to install if you've never change hid bulbs before.
DRL's are 9005/HB3, I believe there are DRL's without the resistor hookup that work for other cars like the TSX but I haven't heard anything about them on our car.

 

1 ~ Universal Dome LED (adjustable) for rear interior dome light.
2 ~ 921 socket high power LED for reverse lights
4 ~ 194 front facing LEDs for license plate and front footwell lights
2 ~ H11 socket 360 degree LEDs for foglights
2 ~ 9005 socket 360 degree LEDs for DRL

The front interior lights are already LEDs

 

Do you have this setup already? Pics!

 

I canceled it in favor of go fast parts but I took the time to confirm each bulb size.

 

Thanks for the part numbers, Trent. And thanks for the conversion info tech, had no clue that was possible until I read your post and then I looked around. Seems simple enough.

Do I have to worry about some type of error on the dash for installing any type of LED for reverse lights?

 

I have installed LED DRL and LED fog lights, with a LED stripe on the headlights (white). The DRL are very nice and white during the day 100 times better than those yellow stock, but the high beems arent even noticed..LED omits brighter but not directed in distance wise. So im going to hit the garage up and put two projectors in. I will definately post pics of the process and keep everyone posted. And i blacked out the tail lights with the red LED strip on top, you can find those in Autozone, like 24.00 for the set. They are awesome i love them, they light up in a sequence on turn signals and flash twice when you brake. Im not home but i will post details of my purchases and pictures along with bulb sizes n such

 

I upgraded my license plate LEDs tonight. Very good output and definitely an improvement over OEM. I'll test tomorrow night if it at all helps with the rear view camera at night. Install was a breeze, but broke one of the trunk clips putting it back in.

 

Looks great my friend! There's an iJdmtoy located like half a mile away from me. I might check it out for footwell/interior lights

 

Pics or it didn't happen.

 

if someone could provide instructions for changing the foglights it would be great.

i have a set of yellows just waiting to go in, and i cant figure out for the life of me how to do the swap.


thanks!

 

If it is anything like older hondas/acuras you should be able to just twist the back panel and pull the inner housing out with the stock bulb attached. Just put the new bulb in and twist the inner housing back into place.

Please secure your car with stands before getting underneath it though.

I'm working so I cant current check to see if they pop out like that but Id be willing to bet they do.

 

Changing the fog light bulbs is really easy and Acura provided a step by step in your owners manual. The housings actually come out of the bumper so no need to get under it.

 

How do you take the housing out? From the front of the car or the bay?

 

From the front, there is a screw hole in the plastic face. Let me take a gander in a few minutes and ill get back at ya


*** if you're looking at the driver side fog housing it's a small hole on the bottom right. If you're looking at the passenger side it's the opposite.

 

I took your list Trent and went shopping on eBay.

How hard are the DRL's to get to then? Headlight have to come off the car?

 

Nah, it's fairly simple, for the driver side you'll need to pull the battery off its bracket. Just for an easier go at the back of your headlight.

 

Awesome! I was worried the bumper had to come off.

 

If you need anything else let me know!

 

Is the front housing method just for bulb replacement only? I assume you'll need to take off the bumper for HID fogs.

 

Really yeah it's just meant for bulb replacement but you might be able to do something ghetto in there with a HID install.. for a clean HID install you'd at least want to jack the car up and take off all the motor's splash gaurds to be able to reach behind the bumper.. .. easiest(& BEST for a quality job) would probably be to remove the bumper as a whole.

 

Well the 9005s are replaced and the reverse lights are replaced too.

The 194 bulbs I ordered ended up being T10s... they don't fit the footwell, not even close. I figured I could use the T10 bulb in the trunk area and that was a no go as well.

 

Installing fog HIDs should be easy if you jack the car up and install them. Then lower the car and go from the top to actually mount the ballasts. I dont want to run HIDs because I dont want to mount the ballasts to anything. lol
Where are you guys mounting them? Any shots?

With the integra I fab'd some aluminum brackets that I secured to a screw already being used by a ware harness. Made it look real clean because I didn't have to drill any additional holes.

 

Okay decided to install my foglight led bulbs today. I bought these from vleds:

http://www.vleds.com/bulb/h-series/h...11-1-pair.html

Didn't realize Vleds is in WA so I had to pay sales tax. and its in Bellingham- no way I'm driving 2+ hours to save 5 bucks. But I did the cheapest shipping and it literally came the next day- ordered in the morning, they shipped it at noon, and it arrived the next day.

I went with 5k white to get closer to the blueish look, and assuming 6k white is much more whiter. But what do I know, I could be wrong. Either one won't match up to the HID regardless, but oh well. I decided not to do the h9 because I figure I don't want to be anymore blinding if I'm going to be using led on the foglights. But it turns out, the h11 itself is much brighter than the halogens, so in the end, turns out I didn't need to do the h9 conversion.

Anyway, for people like me who are new to tinkering with their cars (despite owning 5 cars I've never even remotely bothered to change even something so simple as lights on my previous cars- but then I did change the oil myself, but I digress) despite the fact that this is a simple thing to do, it still was somewhat a hassle. More so than I expected.

I apologize beforehand in correcting your Trent but the screw hole in the lower right of the foglight is not a screw hole, its just a hole. The screw hole to remove the plastic housing is directly under the bumper. There is a hole that goes all the way up. Unless of course there is different models and styles, in which case I apologize, but in my case, the screw hole was underneath the bumper. That was the easy part. Removing the plastic housing was a slight pain, and it amazes me how simple cars are made where they use plastic tabs to keep everything in place. I almost broke the tabs trying to remove the black cover. It doesn't easily pull out the way the owner's manual describes. Far from it. There are about 4-5 tabs holding it in place and you either have to depress each one or wiggle it out or force it out. Whatever works for you.

The actual replacing of the bulbs was simple, but I would suggest instead of following the manual where it says to remove the tab to pull out the coupler, then twist out the bulb, instead twist out the bulb THEN remove the coupler. Much more easier that way.

Well, here are some pics. Passenger side still has the halogen, driver side replaced with the LED. Sorry about the glare from outside, I had to open the garage and pull out the car a bit.



Here is a shot with both replaced:



My reverse lights are coming monday, far more simple a job than the foglights so I won't bother to post anything about it, but one of these days I might suck it up and install my DRLS along with the resistors. I just don't like the idea that I need to have the wiring harness loosely strapped around the engine.

 

Yeah I put the reverse lights in already. Pop the bottom left and Bottom right tabs on the trunk lid lining. Then you can get to the bulb holder and you just twist and pull, then replace the bulb and reinstall.

I got my rear dome light and trunk light installed yesterday. Just waiting on the new 194 bulbs to show up and then i am all done with LEDs.

 

Looking good Shigastu!

BTW, I just installed Blue Lamin-X onto my Fogs the other day. I gotta say i was a bit skeptical at first cause it was a darker blue and didn't fit well, but it looks great during the day. You wouldn't be able to tell unless you went in facefirst. I say it has about a 30% increase in blue at night. Ill try to get better pictures but for now.. Sorry, I really needa get a better camera.
Before After

 

Oh that's cool. Knew about the yellows, didn't know they make it in blue. I'm assuming with the LED, the laminx will be fine and won't be subject to being burned. I'm tempted to do that but then now it looks even more blue than the HIDs. Hmmm.

 

You guessed right (when you thought you were wrong)
The higher the output the HOTTER it gets. 5k is how hot they are burning.
3k=near halogen slightly amber
4k=white
5k=white with fade to blue
6k=bluer still, slightly purple

So if you wanted to match your HIDs you want 4k probably. 3k would look more like the DRLs or the stock foglights. 5k you obviously see the color, 4k is right inbetween and the whitest of them all.

 

No worries about them melting or burning. They were made to be run with halogens and HIDs... I dont believe LEDs go hotter.

 

Stock are about 5K
3K is yellow

 

I still need to change my DRLs but figured I should post this for any new registers or lurkers out there.

Footwell/Dome light/Trunk light LED

I ordered both the blue and white package sets awhile ago and installed them. This was before I knew each bulb number or was too lazy to research them so I just ordered the set. In the end, I decided to go with blue except for the trunk light. Originally I installed the xenon white for the dome light but unfortunately, it makes the maplights look non LED. The maplights use a warmer, yellowish hue LED so it didn't match up with the xenon white dome light, so I instead slapped in the blue to match the footwell blue lights.

http://store.ijdmtoy.com/Premium-SMD...-acura-ilx.htm

Here is the footwell lights:



Here are some shots at night of the blue dome light when I unlock the door with remote unlock:




And here is the shot of the white trunk LED. Sorry the trunk was empty except a blue umbrella so I threw some random things in it. Overall, it is not as bright as stock, but you can see pretty clearly so I kept it:



Reverse Lights

I didn't go with VLEDs because they didn't print the dimensions on their lights.

0.63" diameter lights are too big for the housing, so whatever you choose, be sure it is much smaller than that. I went with these:

http://store.ijdmtoy.com/Plasma-High...t15_sku326.htm

Here is a shot at daytime (overcast)



And one at night.



Even if I do install the DRLs, I don't think I'll update this post. I will update it though if ever I find DRLs with built in resistors. But I doubt that will happen.

 

^any improvement in backup camera visibility?

 

Unfortunately I do not know yet. Since I was taking the pic I didn't see the backup cam. I'll be heading out tonight for dinner and a movie so I'll check how it is then.

 

Scored on some 194 at lexenauto.com . they were cheap too

 

I beg to differ. The oe bulbs in the projector are whiter than I had on my integra and I had 5k then. So 4k sounds much more reasonable.

And yes. 3k is an amber color ranging from bright yellow to deep amber. Thanks for reiterating what I said.

 

k

 

OE TSX HIDs are 4300k. I figure we have the same. Don't you?

 

Most factory bulbs now a days are Philips 85122+ bulbs. They do burn at 4300k hence the slight blue color in the cutoff.

You can buy bulbs that are D2S on ebay in 5000k or 6000k pretty cheap but are generally half the life span of OEM grade bulbs.

 

Alright, looks like I have to update this after all for new lurkers and new registers seeking drl info since I can add hopefully some useful info if you didn't already know that I could not find from all my google searching.

DRL replacement

I bought this set from ijmdtoy the first week I owned the car but didn't install it until now. It comes with its own decoder harness. This harness is different from the ones I saw long ago which requires grounding and connection to the battery terminal. It doesn't need any of that.

http://store.ijdmtoy.com/9005-LED-Da...d_sku45_r2.htm

Its far more easier to install than the others I saw. Just looking at the diagram is all you need to know to install it:

http://store.ijdmtoy.com/Install-LED...ight-a/229.htm

My biggest concern in installing the DRLs which made me delay from doing so for a month were the heat coming off of resistors based on searches I did awhile ago, but now I'm assuming this was all from DIY built resistor wiring. I ran the DRL for over 10 minutes and the gold resistors did not get hot at all. In other words afaik it is safe to attach with double sided mounting tape.

A shot of it finally installed:



Some extra things to know I suppose...

On the passenger side, tuck the wire connectors that connect with the stock coupler and that connect with the LED bulb into the metal tubing to prevent the wires from accidentally hitting the alternator belt:



And here is my suggestion on where to stick the resistors:

Passenger side:



Driver side:



Once you place the engine cover back on, it will hide the resistors.

Oh and one last piece of info in case you are like me and did not pay attention before. The DRLs do not turn on if your handbrake is on. But you can take the handbrake off to turn on the DRL, then pull it back on and it will stay on. So don't make the mistake like me and think it wasn't wired properly due to this.

I think that's about it. I'm finally done with this topic.

 

Shigatsu, did you get the blue or the white DRL package from IJDMToy? I see they have 2 options I'm leaning towards the blue but don't want it to be too blue. I see your DRL's kind of have a bluish tint to them.