Thread: LED dash lights

Originally Posted by AK83

This is prety So I got bored, and ordered some useless stuff .. like LED globes.

I needed some T10(wedge) types, and whilst searching for, I came across some RBG types with a remote to allow colour selection on the fly.

They're cool. Did you have a preferred colour?

When I got them working, the green looked best .. in that was consistent, clear but not too bright too. I hate overly bright dash lights on dark country roads. This is why I got the dimmer switch to adjust for this.

The, not so white, RGB mode looks cool .. I think a bit better in real life compared to the photo.

Red doesn't really work. Blue was horrible on the eyes.
Orange was OK .. more like the way my std lighting works with the yellowy/warm) pointers.

But in terms of clarity .. the cheapy pure white LEDs look the best now .. the white pointers look nicer I reckon.

I reckon they'll be too bright without the dimmer on long night drives out in the country. Around town tho will be fine.

Actually the reason all this came about was because I lost one HVAC globe a while back and the clock globe was also out.
I replaced with some leds I already have.

Bugger me tho! the HVAC lighting is so bright now in daylight, and even tho it dims with the parkers/lights on in the dark, even in well lit roads .. WAY too bright at night.
When first used, I looked at myself in the rear view mirror, and looked remarkably like an envious and angry Bruce Banner!

So I either need to remove and try to find lower powered HVAC lights(or use normal globes) ... or hope the dimmer drops brightness just enough on the HVAC lights.

The other option is going to be find the wire which runs the HVAC lights and maybe add a resistor into the line.

With the RGB globes, I've messaged the seller that most were DOA, so once they resolve the issue with them, I'll try again. The annoyance with them is that while on the test connector(out in the open) the remote works well, when in the dash unit, two of them struggle to respond to the remote, but one does so more readily. Not ideal.

Cool, thanks for this Arthur, thats pretty interesting with the colours and brightness issues.

Interesting about the lights not responding to the remote when installed. I cant think of anything which would reduce any signals from the remote, although it clearly does!

Originally Posted by Slunnie

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Interesting about the lights not responding to the remote when installed. I cant think of anything which would reduce any signals from the remote, although it clearly does!

Yeah, more so weird, than interesting tho.
I thought maybe the coils that drive the needles may cause some interference or something .. but made no sense. Also the dash is not installed, it's my spare I'm just mucking about with and only two wires connected are the pos/neg for the lights .. all else is cut off.

So what I was doing with it, as the dash I'm currently messing about with is out of car and on my bench .. I can play around with the location of the remote. In car tho only option is from the directly in front of the dash.
it is wireless, and max range is maybe 6 cm away or so .. so very close .. out in the open on the test plug I made for the globes.
When in dash tho, I can get the wireless to work the one globe from pretty much about 2 cm from the plastic screen of the dash.
It's location didn't affect if it worked or not .. worked same on either of the three wedge locations.
Also, as I had all round access to the dash, I had the remote right at the plug on the rear .. on the globe in a sense .. no dice .. just would communicate with the non communicating globes .. but fine on the one that regularly worked.

Once or twice tho, all three worked with the remote. Not at the same time tho .. remembering that distance to the globe through the fascia is critical. So when all three did work, it was do one, then move remote to 'in front of' the next, and then next ..
The weird part is, I took the photos, came back to the dash unit still connected to the battery, so powered up .. and those two annoying globes wouldn't communicate again .. for the next couple of hours

it was getting frustrating to keep them all working. That is, the two that stopped comms just randomly stopped whlst installed. No rhyme nor reason as to what happened.
To confirm that they 'worked' had to be pulled out, placed into the open air test plug, remotely controlled(worked) then put back in the dash again.
Still didn't work! .. arrgghh! .. too annoying to keep mucking about with .. after 1 or 2 hrs of it .. I gave up. But the one that worked .. worked.

I don't think interference was the issue, although the barrier of the fascia was obviously a slight issue .. lowered effective range.
No matter what location I placed that working one, it worked.
I'm thinking it had more to do with the quality of the 'workmanship' of the electronics than anything else.
Other possibility is the remote may have been the issue. Next time(when new globes come) I'll try again with the other remotes they sent me.

Note as per usual with many LEDs is that they are polarity sensitive .. that is not like a std globe. So of course when you fit one, it's invariably fitted incorrectly and need to be removed and refitted the other way around.
I just got a reply from the seller, they're sending me some replacements, I don't expect that the quality of those will be any better tho
Just one other thing about these, and also the white T10 wedgies I have .. they have this softish silicon type dome, rather than how I remember they used to be made of some transparent plastic. So the shell is not hard. it soft gooey stuff.
So It could be that with some fragile electronicky internal components, and the soft shell, could be vulnerable when fitting/removing .. hence why they can be so flaky. The power connections are typical PCB board with plated contacts, and needs quite a bit of effort to fit/remove from some fittings.

One other thing I forgot to add.
They use half the power of filament globes.

I'm confused as to what globes are supposed to be fitted to the D2's instruments. I thought they were mostly 5w, but in the wiring diagram they show a single 1.2w globe. there are of course main globes(I haven't mucked with the other two globes yet).

I just measured current.

My std globes( I assume they are the originals) all measure 0.234amps .. ie. 3w. (battery is at 12.6v)

These RGB globes in RGB mode(supposed white mode! ) only draw 0.140 amps.

Not that this is important info .. just more of an FYI.

Try a new battery in the remote!

battery was new that hour.

"Green. Green is nice"


I HATE when stuff is that bad in quality.