Rear lights - green indicator bulbs?

[bristolbaron 11]

mark, the amber LEDs defintaly work..

if you go to the top of the gloucester road and keep going unitl you get to the texaco there is a shop just before the petrol station that sells them...really not far from my house!! message me if you need better directions!! (glad u finally found some new lights! :lol:)

 

motaman! i was getting confused, thinking of the texaco in bishopston, not filton!

[Kick Up The Rs 0]

what value resistor is needed?

 

Do a search as I did a calculation for the resistor somewhere.

[stevef182 0]

bristolbaron, yeah thats the one! couldnt remeber its name, to be honest i try to frequent it as little as possible, i think the staff are rude and clueless..(really sorry if anyone on here works there..but its true) but if i get desperate its quite handy! do you know any better stores similar near us?

[Mark_Storm 0]

I had a look at the bulb holder and there's loads of places to solder a resistor on so I'm gonna have a go at this at the weekend and try a few different ones. Anyone know of anywhere in Bristol I can buy resitors? Is there a maplins anywhere?

[stevef182 0]

mark, if you find somewhere let me know, i need to do mine...??

[andy35554 0]

i have had a few goes at these

green leds (32 leds total) where rubbish!! could not believe it

orange bulbs seems too "red"

clear bulbs painted with green glass paint - ok but not very bright, maybe my paint job..

now someone is saying orange leds???

anyone know where i can buy green bulbs 21w as mine are nearly white when on even though they look green

ta!

[Mark_Storm 0]

Went to Motaman yesterday and they want £13 for 1 amber led with about 10 leds! Have bought a pair of ebay for £7.20 inc p&p with 35 leds and also bought a set of resitors so when they all arrive I'll have a go and see what happens.

 

Steve, the set comes with 10 of each type of resistor so if I get them working I can do yours as well

[dr_mat 0]

Note that although overall it's a good thing (imho) using LED lights, I believe they're not valid for road use, so you might get pulled over or fail an MOT for them - if the car wasn't fitted with them at the factory, at least.

[Mark_Storm 0]

Possibly, but then how would they know? As long as they flash orange then they have no real reason to check, unlike my blatent red ones at the mo!

 

If this is the case though, do I still need to swap them back to the originals for the MOT?

[dr_mat 0]

Just like everything else MOT-wise, depends on the tester.

It's obvious that you're using LEDs though - try it and see. Most places would be able to tell just by seeing them switch on and off straight away.

[andy35554 0]

orange leds are the future, cant believe how good they are!

[dinkus 10]

If you've got red-tinted indicator lenses, then you do need green light to make the result orange (look up subtractive colour mixing if you don't believe me).

 

Apparently Pug 206's use green bulbs in the red indicator lenses, so you may be able to get them from a Pug dealer. No idea whether they'll fit and/or if they're the right resistance tho.

[Kevin Bacon 5]

It's obvious that you're using LEDs though - try it and see. Most places would be able to tell just by seeing them switch on and off straight away.

 

Precisely. Instant on / off.

 

Very few LED sellers will actually tell you they are not street legal.

 

Regardless, I have just bought a load to play with. 3W Cree single LEDs for the rear + front indicators, 3W Cree Stop/tails, 30 white LED clusters for the reverse, 4 LED amber clusters for the side repeats, and 1W luxeon stars for the side lights. Oh and the obligatory 555 timer based IC relay flasher unit to replace the stock mechanical flasher relay (stops the LEDs flashing too fast).

 

The only snag with the LED flasher is there's no clicking, so you can either wire in a common or garden 4 pin relay in series, or just hook up a little buzzer of some such.

 

The 3W cree LEDs are plain ridiculous. I thought 1W luxeons were blinding, you should see the Crees in action. Watch this space.

 

The reason why they're not road legal (retro fit) is because the LEDs have to comply with strict government approved Road sign grade LED standards and very few do......but I'm going for it anyway, feck em, as they say.

[staffs_til_i_die 0]

Anyone got a definitive solution to this? How did you get on Mark?

 

Am no good when it comes to wiring stuff up. Can just about manage a plug... :?

 

Any chance someone could add a solution to this to the wiki? (i.e. what resistors to buy, what bulbs and how to fit it all together).

 

Or just stick on this thread.

[bristolbaron 11]

I had a look at the bulb holder and there's loads of places to solder a resistor on so I'm gonna have a go at this at the weekend and try a few different ones. Anyone know of anywhere in Bristol I can buy resitors? Is there a maplins anywhere?

 

maplins at the bottom of gloucester rd. by the arches.

[Mark_Storm 0]

Resistors from maplins etc won't work. They do but burn out very quickly (3-4 flashes). I bought a pair of resistors from Autobulbs, £5.50 + £1.50p&p, soldered them in and job done. Bulbs were about £7 off ebay from a guy in Hong Kong so £14 all in all

[yeti 0]

Maybe i'm just lucky or maybe this is a lot of uneccessery fuss about indicators flashing redy orange but i have yet to be pulled for my indicators, i have red sprayed rear lights, with standard bulbs, they indicate completely red, i fitted them in december and cover 400miles(ish) a week in my C i put it in for an mot back in march (i think) and the car flew through without an issue.

 

I understand you want your cars to be legal to the letter of the law to avoid unwated police attention but surely this is in the same catogory as wheels which stick out of the arches and plates with incorrect fonts/spacing/colours etc which seems to be generally accpeted as ok on here. I dont want to piss anyone off but i just cant see what all the excitement is about?

[daytona600 0]

I bought a pair of resistors from Autobulbs, £5.50 + £1.50p&p, soldered them in and job done.

 

Hi Mark, I have the same amber LED's as you I think. eBay, Hong Kong. Tested them on hazard lights and they look great. I have red tinted rears but you would not know when they flash. Trouble is on indicators they flash twice as fast as on hazards.

 

Can you tell me the part number and a URL for the resistors please. Also if you could post a pic of them in-situ that would help us all out.

 

Thanks m8ty

[Bendy 0]

Maybe i'm just lucky or maybe this is a lot of uneccessery fuss about indicators flashing redy orange but i have yet to be pulled for my indicators, i have red sprayed rear lights, with standard bulbs, they indicate completely red, i fitted them in december and cover 400miles(ish) a week in my C i put it in for an mot back in march (i think) and the car flew through without an issue.

 

I understand you want your cars to be legal to the letter of the law to avoid unwated police attention but surely this is in the same catogory as wheels which stick out of the arches and plates with incorrect fonts/spacing/colours etc which seems to be generally accpeted as ok on here. I dont want to piss anyone off but i just cant see what all the excitement is about?

 

im with you on this, ive never had a problem with mine being sprayed and flashing red/orangey, got it through 2 mot's and used to go from northampton to surrey every w-end. m1,m25 and through a few towns. never ever had any issue's from the old bill. and long may it continue!! :lol:

[Mark_Storm 0]

I actually stole the idea from another thread I found on here:

 

http://the-corrado.net/.archive/forum/viewtopic. ... obulbs.com

 

Its got the link to the resistors on autobulbs and a picture of them soldered into position. Make sure the contacts are clean before you start or the solder just won't take, I just rubbed them down with some sand paper which worked a treat.

[daytona600 0]

Thanks Mark but the link does not work. Do you have a contact number for Autobulbs?

[Mark_Storm 0]

Link still works for me, try copying this into the address bar: http://www.autobulbsdirect.co.uk/produc ... 656&page=1

[andy35554 0]

The resistor required to stop them flashing fast is a 5.6 Ohm (or 6.8 Ohm) 25 Watt resistor. You need one for each lamp you replace with an orange LED. I have done mine and they look great. I guess maplins should be able to get these for you, If you get a larger than 25w ie 35 watt or 50w these will work fine. lower than 25 watt will get too hot and "burn out" eventually. Connecting them is easy too, about 10 cm wire each side on the resistor and use a multimeter to find the earth and "flasher" connections on the back of your light cluster (when its plugged into the rear lights) - you will see some flat connections on the back of it. Female spade connectors on the resistor wires will plug into the back of the lamp holder.

[daytona600 0]

Thanks Andy & sorry for the late reply. I really appreciate it.

 

I will head down to maplins next week and post my results.