Interior dome lights on randomly at 5% brightness

I was driving on the highway this evening and after about 45mins, all 4 dome lights came on at a really dim power level. While they were "on", the lights operated individually without any problems, and all 4 would turn on to 100% brightness if I used the master dome light switch on the dash — but interestingly they would not turn 100% off even if I set the switch to OFF.

After 10-15 mins of being "on" at like 5% power, they went off completely as normal. Do you think it was some sort of interference? The highway had a carpool lane that tolls cars/counts the number of passengers at certain checkpoints so I thought maybe that equipment did something? I dunno.

These are VLED amber bulbs that I've been running since 2020, and haven't had this happen previously (that I noticed at least)

I'm mainly just curious if anyone else has experienced something similar before?

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1st pic is the low power anomaly, 2nd pic is the light on as normal.

 

I know this is going to sound weird.
I had some issues with my alarm going off by itself in the middle of the night a year ago.
Something was triggering an open door and setting off the alarm.
No doors were opened, but the dome light came on for no reason.
I saw it in my ring camera.

You might try pulling the overhead console and looking at that circuit board.
There are some VERY close connections that might be grounding out and giving you the dim lights.
I ended up separating some of them and my issue went away.
It might have been a coincidence, but the random door alarms stopped after I did that.

Maybe someone will chime in with a better solution..

 

INTERESTING, I havent ever pulled the console so it could be some dust or something up there causing some issues maybe. Thanks!

 

I also noticed one of my aftermarket LEDs wasn't seated properly.
It is VERY easy to bend those contacts out of shape when sticking the bulbs in and out.
That might be an issue too.

May not be it at all, but it's worth a look.
Good luck..

 

I had this same exact thing happen when I added LED's to my interior. I ended up pulling the footwell LED and everything went back to normal.

 

Some LED lights tend to have some “bleed” to them. I notice my son’s third brake light in his Mustang (which we swapped a nice LED) would be very dimly lit most of the time. Barely perceptible. I’ve seen it on my dome light in my 2000 also.

 

Did you ever find a solution to this?
@junior

 

In general, LEDs take very little current to illuminate. If you had and moisture across traces it would be enough to cause what you are seeing. Since the door switches probably connect to the body control module it most likely them not causing the problem. My guess is the overhead lighting circuit board has dust and moisture or worse. Mouse piss.

 

it’s definitely moisture related. Because I went out and looked again and they are now only barely illuminated 1-2% maybe.

I don’t see any signs of mice, but that’s never out of the question.

 

I didnt but mainly because I havent noticed it happening again. But what @Retired...finally and you are saying about humitidy makes sense. Where I'm at especially is pretty damp in the winter/spring. I wouldn't over think mice, there'd be other signs too