2017 Kia Sedona - What is the secret DRL code?

I am wondering if there is any way to activate daytime running lights in this car. I am told by the dealer that there is nothing that can be done but I find it hard to believe they make a different car for Canada where DRL are mandatory. Could I buy a Canadian part to put in my car? I have called and emailed Kia customer service but they only read out of the owners manual.

I always turn my headlights on manually when I get in the car and turn them off when I get out.

3 Likes

My wife’s Tucson has a cluster of switches on the right side of the steering wheel that access menus that control various settings. Your Sedona probably has something similar and maybe you can find what you need by trial and error. That said, I predict you can’t because it doesn’t make sense to allow a government mandated feature to be turned off. More likely IMHO the relay or whatever that controls the DRLs is bad.

But that is the case. Why I don’t know but our Ford Fiesta does not have DRL but the same car in Canada does .
@BobMoran Put ( adding DRL to vehicle ) in your search engine and you will see videos and articles about adding them . Then you can decide to do that or have it done. I may do the same but not until the warranty is over.

DRLs are a requirement in Canada and optional in the US. There may be a fuse or a relay or software that turns it on. If the manual does not say how to turn it on or off, it is not a user feature. Look in the manual for a picture of the fuse boxes and look for a fuse or relay spot marked DRL. If it is there and empty, install a fuse or relay. That may be enough.

Or the easy way is to simply put a piece of matching tape over the light sensor on the dash. The car will think it is night all the time and turn the head lights as well as tail lights on. The only difference will be the head lights will be 100% instead of the 60% or so. In drizzle or low light conditions that are not dark enough to trigger the lights, I have a piece of matching material I just put over the light sensor. Never need to worry about turning the lights off when I shut the car off.

one my coworker is paranoid somebody is watching him over his laptop camera, he is using something like this:
http://shorturl.at/ceENS

I wonder when they start doing such things for car light sensors :slight_smile:

Maybe, but maybe not. All of my cars also dim the dash illumination when it thinks it’s night time. That might make reading the displays much harder. Manually turning the head lamps on/off might be the best solution in that case.

That sounds so “prior century-ish” :slight_smile:

True, but when I mistakenly leave a baseball cap over the sun load sensor in my truck, I can’t read many of the displays when the sun is shining. It’s very distracting to lean over to see them until you realize why they are so dim…

True but then don’t the dash lights dim when you manually turn the lights on anyway? But then I only do that in low light situations like drizzle, fog, light snow, where it’s not dark enough for the automatics to work. Can’t have everything I guess without trading cars.

Who said anything about turning them off? The OP wants DRL’s. Since the dealer told him its not possible I"m guessing he doesn’t have DRL’s. And when did the government mandate DRL’s :question: Our 2017 Camry has the option to turn them off.

If they can be turned off then it’s possible the previous owner did so and that would mean the OP can turn them on again, which is what he wants. I was under the impression they were mandatory but apparently that’s just in Canada.

The dealer has told him the vehicle does not have DRL. And not all vehicles have the option to turn off.

The dealer told him “there is nothing that can be done” which isn’t the same thing as “you don’t have DRLs.” Knowledge and competence vary among dealerships. His Sedona may well not have DRLs but that hasn’t been demonstrated yet.

I have a 2019 Nissan Frontier, which is also sold in Canada. There is a spot in the underhood fuse & relay block for a DRL module. However, there are no connectors in the cavities. So it’s not a matter of plug & play for my vehicle. There are aftermarket options available, using separate lights.

No, it uses the sun load sensor to control instrument dimming. Now that you mention it, I had cars before that did dim whenever headlamps were turned on but I think it was before all this automatic detection stuff…