Interior Lights
03-15-2005, 11:55 AM
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Interior Lights Those small little lights in my doors have been out for quite some time...so I figured with spring just around the corner, now would be the perfect time to fix it. Looking for a cool idea though to make the interior of my car a bit more interesting then just replacing those puppies with the stock bulbs. Any colored ones or high intensity ones that you guys have used to replace those with?? Thanks
03-15-2005, 12:24 PM
#2
I've replaced my door lights with a 26000mcd white LED. Lights up the buttons WAY more and still look stock. No pics on this one though, too hard to get a clear shot of it at night. Not to mention the pictures never come out as bright as they look in person.
03-17-2005, 02:24 PM
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Originally Posted by InfiniteReality
I've replaced my door lights with a 26000mcd white LED. Lights up the buttons WAY more and still look stock. No pics on this one though, too hard to get a clear shot of it at night. Not to mention the pictures never come out as bright as they look in person.
03-17-2005, 04:52 PM
#4
Just do a search on E-bay for white LED and you can buy bulk of them. Or if you want a WAY simple way plus be plug and play go here and purchase 2 #74 replacement bulbs. Verify they are #74 bulbs first, but I believe they are.
They also have REALLY cheap headlight bulbs as well.
http://autolumination.com/74.htm
They also have REALLY cheap headlight bulbs as well.
http://autolumination.com/74.htm
03-17-2005, 09:49 PM
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Originally Posted by InfiniteReality
I've replaced my door lights with a 26000mcd white LED. Lights up the buttons WAY more and still look stock. No pics on this one though, too hard to get a clear shot of it at night. Not to mention the pictures never come out as bright as they look in person.
03-17-2005, 10:20 PM
#7
Originally Posted by RobTheHog
How did you get them to show white? I replaced mine and they shine red. I thought the plastic piece was red that the light shines through. I would love to see this. I am toying with replacing my map lights in the rearview with LED's.
Do the map lights and cargo light. You'll love it!
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03-18-2005, 01:35 AM
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Originally Posted by InfiniteReality
I replaced them with white LEDs, but the housings have a red lense so it still shines red. I kinda like the red as it matches the interior. I bet you can drill out the lense pretty easily though and it'd allow white to show through...
Do the map lights and cargo light. You'll love it!
Do the map lights and cargo light. You'll love it!
03-18-2005, 06:30 AM
#9
Swapping them out is really easy, just takes a little creativity and customizing. When I did my cargo light a couple years ago to LEDs, I just took two LEDs, soldered the resister to the positive lead, and then literally just twisted one lead to the negative socket and the resistor's lead to the positive, cheap, simple, maybe not the best, but it works. 
Map lights are even easier, I only have one LED in each as I've never really seen the purpose in having multiple LEDs in there (I used red though, maybe that's why..) and just took an ordinary cylindrical wooden dowel, cut it to the same size as the stock lightbulbs, soldered the resister inline with the LED's positive lead, and then siliconed the leads of the LED to the dowel so the leads were running along the length of the dowel, then just simply pop them into the socket and you're done.
Last year when I did the door lights, I wanted to be able to see the LEDs, so I actually just knocked the plastic out of the little slit that the light shines through, then took the LED and superglued it so the LED was on the interior side with the leads of the LED poking through the slit, again soldered the resisitor inline and then spliced into the wiring for the stock bulb. Lights up the controls and the seat. When I redo it this summer, I'll probably put them on the opposite side of the slit so you don't see the leds, just for something different than what I've had.
I also took my headliner out and drilled 5 holes into the headliner, then popped an LED into each hole, wired them all into parallel, taped them to the headliner, siliconed the wires to insulate them and to help "glue" them into position, and then spliced into the wire that goes to the cargo light. Now when my lights are on, my entire center console lights up.
Headliner:
Door LEDs:
Of course, camera never takes a good picture of how bright and how much is actually lit up. I have a new camera though, so many one of these nights I'll try taking a picture with it; Old camera had horrible exposure settings.
Map lights are even easier, I only have one LED in each as I've never really seen the purpose in having multiple LEDs in there (I used red though, maybe that's why..) and just took an ordinary cylindrical wooden dowel, cut it to the same size as the stock lightbulbs, soldered the resister inline with the LED's positive lead, and then siliconed the leads of the LED to the dowel so the leads were running along the length of the dowel, then just simply pop them into the socket and you're done.
Last year when I did the door lights, I wanted to be able to see the LEDs, so I actually just knocked the plastic out of the little slit that the light shines through, then took the LED and superglued it so the LED was on the interior side with the leads of the LED poking through the slit, again soldered the resisitor inline and then spliced into the wiring for the stock bulb. Lights up the controls and the seat. When I redo it this summer, I'll probably put them on the opposite side of the slit so you don't see the leds, just for something different than what I've had.
I also took my headliner out and drilled 5 holes into the headliner, then popped an LED into each hole, wired them all into parallel, taped them to the headliner, siliconed the wires to insulate them and to help "glue" them into position, and then spliced into the wire that goes to the cargo light. Now when my lights are on, my entire center console lights up.
Headliner:
Door LEDs:
Of course, camera never takes a good picture of how bright and how much is actually lit up. I have a new camera though, so many one of these nights I'll try taking a picture with it; Old camera had horrible exposure settings.
03-18-2005, 07:08 AM
#10
The more LEDs the better. I have 18, 26K in the each map light plus 54, 26K in the cargo light. I wanted better than stock and different looking as well. Now it's a light show in my car. I did some rough calcs with all my LEDs inside and all of htem combined is equal to a 90w light bulb.
03-18-2005, 08:59 AM
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Here they are, resistor already attached... $15 for shipping???
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...category=40019
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...category=40019
03-18-2005, 10:39 AM
#13
Originally Posted by InfiniteReality
If you want ease of installation, just get the #74 LED replacement bulbs. That's by far the simpliest thing to do.
I would like it if I could just plug these LED's in, I havent really done too much wiring stuff
03-18-2005, 12:10 PM
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Thanks for the help guys. I ordered 4 of the super whites today off that website...pretty easy stuff, I'm sure they will look great....well, they'd have to look better than the darkness that's there now.
