# Door panel LED's



## skalberti (Aug 20, 2013)

I noticed tonight that my door panels are not illuminated, other than the window switches. Is there supposed to be a strip of LED's above the door handle that illuminates it? If so I'm wondering if I turned them off during coding? If that's possible, anyone have the code so I can go back and turn on? I've gone back and double checked everything and don't believe I turned them off.


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## tmehanna (Jan 23, 2009)

There is a strip of lights under the door trim panel that runs the length of the door

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## snj1013 (Jul 13, 2011)

You have the extra LED strip is you have the Ambient Lighting Package. Not sure if it is standard for 2014, but used to be optional. You might check your Idrive settings for Lighting and see if you have an option to turn it off.


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## skalberti (Aug 20, 2013)

snj1013 said:


> You have the extra LED strip is you have the Ambient Lighting Package. Not sure if it is standard for 2014, but used to be optional. You might check your Idrive settings for Lighting and see if you have an option to turn it off.


Yes I have them, you can select modern for white light or classic for orange light. What I figured out is, even with the brightness turned all the way up, they're extremely dim!


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## octopump (Apr 26, 2008)

skalberti said:


> I noticed tonight that my door panels are not illuminated, other than the window switches. Is there supposed to be a strip of LED's above the door handle that illuminates it? If so I'm wondering if I turned them off during coding? If that's possible, anyone have the code so I can go back and turn on? I've gone back and double checked everything and don't believe I turned them off.


Increase the backlight/ ambient light intensity using the wheel right of your Light Switch.










Could you post a pic of what your ambient lighting looks like when turned up to max? You mentioned it's "dim".

Is it this bright? If it is, then you want it be even brighter?


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## skalberti (Aug 20, 2013)

My dash lights are that bright, but the footwell and door panels are no where near that. To adjust the footwell and door panel brightness, that's done under Sertings>lighting>interior and that setting is turned all the way up. The dash illumination wheel next to the light switch only adjusts the dash lights and I always leave that all the way up.


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## octopump (Apr 26, 2008)

So they changed it for the LCI. I am thinking it's different "hardware"/ LEDs strips to accomodate the fact that now they can be orange or white.

For prior year models, that wheel adjusts the ambient lighting/ instrument cluster/ iDrive screen/ center console buttons backlight intensity all at the same time and max is too bright for my taste for instance.

I have never seen anything relating to the LEDs in FRM. Looked for a while to increase the intensity for the B&O sound package white LEDs. Just recently, the latest integration level seems to have made them brighter but even with the latest version, I still can't find anything in FRM.


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## skalberti (Aug 20, 2013)

octopump said:


> So they changed it for the LCI. I am thinking it's different "hardware"/ LEDs strips to accomodate the fact that now they can be orange or white.
> 
> For prior year models, that wheel adjusts the ambient lighting/ instrument cluster/ iDrive screen/ center console buttons backlight intensity all at the same time and max is too bright for my taste for instance.
> 
> I have never seen anything relating to the LEDs in FRM. Looked for a while to increase the intensity for the B&O sound package white LEDs. Just recently, the latest integration level seems to have made them brighter but even with the latest version, I still can't find anything in FRM.


Well in FRM of the LCI you have "modern" and "classic' lighting settings. However I also found a "sport" setting and coded it. It had no affect on the lighting. Sport appeared in the Idrive and you could select it, but the lights didn't work. So with the brightness all the way up, the "classic" setting is brighter than the "modern" but even still classic is not as bright as other BMW's I've seen. 2nd pick is the classic and last pic is modern. If you look closely in the last pic, you can barely see a white line.


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## octopump (Apr 26, 2008)

Look into HU_NBT as well. Perhaps it needs be done in there or another module in conjunction with what's in FRM.

But I would take it in. I have never seen this and I don't think it's "normal".


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## elan (Jun 8, 2013)

I love the ambient lighting in BMW. Gotta get it to work.


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## abomb (Feb 1, 2004)

I just picked up a 2014 535xi and it's the same way. In complete darkness I can see a little bit of light on my hand when it's over the shifter but it's barely noticeable. Switching from classic to modern changes the light color but it isn't brighter. My first night in the car I figured they did away with the ambient lighting until I found the iDrive setting


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## skalberti (Aug 20, 2013)

abomb said:


> I just picked up a 2014 535xi and it's the same way. In complete darkness I can see a little bit of light on my hand when it's over the shifter but it's barely noticeable. Switching from classic to modern changes the light color but it isn't brighter. My first night in the car I figured they did away with the ambient lighting until I found the iDrive setting


But even with the brightness turned all the way up in idrive, it's still too dim. That's a fail BMW

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## outie (Nov 23, 2009)

Just wondering if anyone has found anything related to this issue. The LCI F10's ambience lighting is extremely dim. There are 2 controls - the instrumental cluster dial next to the light switch, and the brightness control in iDrive.

Both settings are directly related to each other. The dial is like the "master", and the iDrive setting controls the brightness of ambience in respect to the dial. So the max brightness is only achieved if and only if you maximize the dial as well as the iDrive setting. Even so, ambience is still quite dim / barely visible. This is very different than our E92 and E89 where ambience is clearly visible.


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## JacksonY (Nov 5, 2008)

My LCI F02 is the same... subbed for some answers too...


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## wrigley (Nov 6, 2013)

On my 2014 F30, setting FEM_BODY -> 3070 -> AMBIENTE_NACHFUEHRUNG to nicht_aktiv makes the iDrive ambient light brightness setting independent from the dial that sets the instrument cluster.

Regardless, I've always thought the ambient light was sufficient, along the lines of post #5.


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## JacksonY (Nov 5, 2008)

wrigley said:


> On my 2014 F30, setting FEM_BODY -> 3070 -> AMBIENTE_NACHFUEHRUNG to nicht_aktiv makes the iDrive ambient light brightness setting independent from the dial that sets the instrument cluster.
> 
> Regardless, I've always thought the ambient light was sufficient, along the lines of post #5.


Does this make the ambient light any brighter? Because in my F02 LCI, it is significantly dimmer than that of my late E65.


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## JacksonY (Nov 5, 2008)

I was looking at FRM, under "3045 COLOUR_SWITCH, 20", I found a bunch of various setting but I am a little confused, hopefully someone more knowledgable is able to enlighten me?

The part I am most confused is that it seems some value are in HEX while some is in DEC %? (Is it at all common that value are mixed value type? or should I assume its always HEX?)


More specifically, the following entries are of most interest.

CS_AMB_BRIGHTNESS
Kommentar=Ambient brightness Obergrenze für die Umgebungshelligkeit
Comment = Ambient brightness Upper limit for the ambient brightness 
Default Value = 64 (seeing as the below setting is a HEX value, thus I assume this setting is also in HEX, which makes this 100)

CS_AMB_MIN_BRIGHTNESS
Kommentar=Min Amb brightness Untergrenze für die Umgebungshelligkeit
Comment = Min Amb brightness Lower limit of the ambient brightness
Default Value = 0A (In decimal this is 10)

CS_AMB_MAX_OFFSET
Kommentar=Max amb brightness offset Helligkeit für PWM-Ausgang in Prozent physikalischen Wert 20% ... 80%
Comment = Max amb brightness offset Brightness for PWM output as a percentage physical value of 20% ... 80% 
Default Value = 30 

CS_AMB_MAX_OFFSET is where I am most confused, is this a HEX value or a decimal value? HEX would mean 48% which is a little odd, but if it is a percentage value, meaning 30%, then maybe I have found the solution to our LCI dim ambient light problem? Or does this setting mean something else all together? since I dont really trust Google Translate.

I am no expert in electronics, but I do however have some understanding. LEDs are very easily burnt with over-voltage, but PWM means pulse-width modulation, which essentially making the LEDs flash which creates the illusion of dimming, since LEDs doesnt dim as such. So in this particular case, the LEDs are only on for 30% of each duty cycle, with a 100% value meaning always-on. Which will result in it appearing brighter.

If my theory is correct, then there shouldnt be an over-voltage problem, but I just dont understand the mixing of hex values and decimal values, because shouldnt the value FF(255) be 100%?

However it is very cold here and I dont have an indoor garage, so I am unwilling to actually code this into my car as of this moment, if anyone is willing to try this on their car, please report back on your results, otherwise I will try it when the weather warms up... :rofl:


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## skalberti (Aug 20, 2013)

The COLOR SWITCh is for the F10's to switch from classic orange to modern white light in the foot wells and door panels. If you don't have both colored LEDS, nothing will change after coding. There are a couple other names listed in the drop down window if you go in to edit in E SYS. Whatever name you pick it will still display white light. 


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## JacksonY (Nov 5, 2008)

skalberti said:


> The COLOR SWITCh is for the F10's to switch from classic orange to modern white light in the foot wells and door panels. If you don't have both colored LEDS, nothing will change after coding. There are a couple other names listed in the drop down window if you go in to edit in E SYS. Whatever name you pick it will still display white light.


Is this reply directed at me? My F02 has both classic and modern LEDs and my previous reply discuss the potiential ability of changing the brightness of our ambient lighting and not the colour.

However, in my personal opinion, doing away with the iconic BMW orange is a little silly, besides, your various buttons would still be orange. But I would not deny the ability to make my lights pink :rofl: just for the fact that I can... whether I would actually use it would be something else...


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## wrigley (Nov 6, 2013)

JacksonY said:


> Does this make the ambient light any brighter? Because in my F02 LCI, it is significantly dimmer than that of my late E65.


I don't think it changed the brightness, just separated the two controls. Brightness was never an issue for me.


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