lighting upon keyfob usage?

So this has been something I have never really questioned heavily but kinda do wish for from time to time. On my lesabre, every time you lock or unlock the car via remote, the exterior lights will come on or flash. It can be extremely useful as an indicator or to just make the ground visible at night. However on my riv, only the interior lighting will light up when I use the remote. I've read that other guys' cars light up on the exterior so what's up with mine? Or is it just another '95 difference?

llamalor2112 wrote:

So this has been something I have never really questioned heavily but kinda do wish for from time to time. On my lesabre, every time you lock or unlock the car via remote, the exterior lights will come on or flash. It can be extremely useful as an indicator or to just make the ground visible at night. However on my riv, only the interior lighting will light up when I use the remote. I've read that other guys' cars light up on the exterior so what's up with mine? Or is it just another '95 difference?

check your owner's manual to see how to set "personal choice" programming. If your Riv has Personal Choice you can set the exterior lights to light and horns to chirp - or not - point is, it's in the manual.

And thank you to the fastest resolution in history! haha I'll go check it out! It's always the most obvious things that seem to elude me

And apparently the 95s only offer interior courtesy lighting via remote. Just to answer the question

llamalor2112 wrote:

And apparently the 95s only offer interior courtesy lighting via remote. Just to answer the question

...I did say "if'

sorry it turned out you don't have it.

The device at this link might be a useful gadget if you want to wire something that's triggered by the remote and stays on for a while then shuts back off. You'll have to figure out how to wire it in. The idea is, find a circuit that changes state momentarily when the remote is used to unlock or lock the car, and jumper that perhaps thru a generic automotive relay to this device. The link also shows schematics so you can figure out how to wire it up:

http://www.wolstentech.com/products/timedelayrelay/timedelayrelay.php

You might want to make it turn the headlights on for a time. Or you could get some LED modules from Oznium (http://www.oznium.com) and put them around the car's floor pan and perhaps even inside the taillight and cornering lights, the device I showed will hold 10A continuous - you can light A LOT of LEDs on 10A. Just a thought.

There are others like this you should be able to unearth with a Google search. And you might want to have a look in the JCWhitney catalog on line (their printed cat is actually easier to use for gadgets but I have not seen one in a while).

Happy soldering.

Sir, you may have just given birth to a new sickness here I've never thought about that but I think that'd be a really unique and frankly downright awesome mod. Just need lambo doors and a smoke machine and it'll be like getting into a spaceship! Seriously though thank you!

llamalor2112 wrote:

Sir, you may have just given birth to a new sickness here I've never thought about that but I think that'd be a really unique and frankly downright awesome mod. Just need lambo doors and a smoke machine and it'll be like getting into a spaceship! Seriously though thank you!

Actually I suggested it for practical reasons.

You want exterior lighting with the heads and tails coming on when you unlock the car. You can splice up things to that it will work. A better plan is to get the factory service manual and figure out how to trigger teh lighting control module to light stuff up for you.

I am not a fan of the lambo doors and such. That's a lot of weight to add for no functional helpful purpose. But the LED perimeter lighting buys you a few things. You can get the car and its surroundings lit for short money (the oznium modules are inexpensive and waterproof) and it won't take much wiring to do if you use one of those time delay relays. Every time the remote is triggered you can trigger the relay in turn and it would light up those LEDs for a while. Doing the perimeter lighting that way spares you the headache of modifying the factory electrics only to have something go wrong down the line. So I was thinking that if you wanted perimeter lighting the LEDs might be a way to go. That's all, just a practical way to get waht you are looking for and not introduce downstream problems.

Believe me I'd never treat my ride like fast n furious rig with all that. It was just the initial thought of a full perimeter lightup as my imagination ran away with things. Really, with complete control over placement and wiring, its an extremely practical idea! I've always found front and tail lightup at night useful and this way I could add full side lighting even! A very straight forward and clean solution I would've never considered!

Yeah I am thinking if I was in your place that's what I'd do. I used the Oznium modules to improve the trunk lighting, got a pair of the small encapsulated LED bars, they come with 3m tape, I stuck them on the reinforcing rib that runs under the rear package tray and connected them in parallel to the trunk light switch by running a speaker wire (I think 24-30 ga - it's thin) to it thru the existing plastic loom (there was room). All looks factory except day or night you can always see all the way in the trunk due to the hidden lighting on that reinforcing rib.

That's something I might steal from you actually since I've been having that gripe about the trunk light location on this car. Bright out front, dark in rear (of trunk). Was also considering similar methodology in lengthilly placed leds along both sides of the car under the weathergaurds to illuminate beside me as well as front and rear. And now trunk as well because that's just plain useful! In fact I may try that for the first run

The Riv's trunk is cavernous and let's just say once in a while one or more grocery items stayed in the trunk overnight,,, fortunately no chicken parts... not a problem since the new lights went in. Cool thing is you can get them with different color balance. Warm to match the incandescents or cool to match sunlight. I chose cool, when I open my trunk during the day it just looks like the sun is shining into it through you (no shadow!) and at night the illumination in the deep part of the trunk is conspicuously bright. They are at http://www.oznium.com/led-modules.

Ha!! Yeah I'd definitely opt for keeping rotting food from eluding me
My lesabre has a nice light that shines from that back area but nothin on the trunk like the riv so when traveling or full load it gets covered up and you can't see anything so having both sounds perfect! And outsmarting that shadow cast gasball in the sky sounds pretty good too now that you mention it haha