Installing Hella 500s Behind the Grill

The Dodge Ram 5.7L HEMI© has a good amount of room between the radiators and the grill. It also has two very conveniently located cross members which make a great mounting point for behind the grill off-road lighting. This is a pretty easy mod, and the Hella 500 lighting kit I received has very nicely done installation instructions. I ended up wiring mine a bit different though because I wanted it to be a completely independent setup. The downside to having it completely independent is that I could forget to turn them off and kill the battery overnight.

One thing you have to remember about doing behind the grill lighting is that the grill design (especially the 2005 PW honeycomb design) isn't conducive to flood or fog lighting because it doesn't allow much lateral light escape. This means the lights you choose need to be driving lights / pencil or spot beams.

I didn't have a big enough deepwell socket to get the lights torqued down properly so the alignment is off. Once I get the right socket, I will not have both lights converging exactly on the same spot, but maybe a couple to four feet apart. The lights were also pointed down a little, so I need to raise them a bit.

For two 55w lights, they do pretty good. Getting on a back road with no traffic it really lights the distance up quite a bit.

Click on a picture for a larger, higher resolution view.

Lights off with hood closed	Low-beams and Hellas on single point
Wiring done, they're on	Got the ground (blue) and relay power
Nice long wires for easy routing and install	Drilled two holes 12" from centerline
Another angle	Probably the only time these lights will have covers
Head on (some alignment) no fogs	Using the hood latch to center from
A little black Rustoleum paint	Head on
Here's the grill before	Same, but no flash
High-beams and Hellas on single point	Low-beams, fogs, Hellas on (with flash)
With the hood opened	Low-beams
Head on no fogs	Temporarily wired switch
LED lights up when on	Here's what's in the kit
Another angle with them on	Quick check to make sure they're even
No LED light when off