virtuetovice Posted January 12, 2011 Report Share Posted January 12, 2011 They came from eBay, I splurge-bought them super cheap from a China seller I've bought a lot of good stuff from. The headlight bulbs did not work at all in my car. They hooked to the harness and fit the lamp housing perfectly, but would not light up when I turned on my headlights. I've tested the bulbs on a 12v source and they work just fine, they're bright as fuck actually The brake light bulbs worked when the headlights were turned on, but would not go brighter when the brakes were pressed, or illuminate when I tested turn signals. The turn signal indicators in my dash lit up solid and the relay wasn't clicking. What I'm wondering, is if there is some sort of circuit that looks for a certain amount of draw that the LED bulbs are not quite reaching?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mra32 Posted January 12, 2011 Report Share Posted January 12, 2011 Thermal flashers use a klixon type device. Basically the current draw of the bulbs passes through the flasher which heats up. This heats up the contactor which springs open (thus disrupting the circuit) when it has gotten hot enough. It cools and closes the circuit again. Usually when you get led bulbs for turn signal applications like in brake lights and stuff, they will give you a big fat resistor (usually the ceramic type) that you have to wire in to make the same current draw for the flasher to work. You can do that or get a solid state flasher from a newer car in the jy or auto parts store. For the headlights, I'm a little stumped. I would suggest finding the headlight relay and listening to it when you turn the headlight switch on. Listen to see if its rapidfire opening and closing. Disclaimer: This is general knowledge and I cant confirm if this applies directly to our cars Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jonpro03 Posted January 12, 2011 Report Share Posted January 12, 2011 As for the bulbs getting brighter with the brake lights, I had to wire a couple of bulbs to come on when I pressed the brakes. The transition from dim to bright wasn't obvious enough at night. I had 2 lights on for parking lights and a 3rd would light up for brakes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
virtuetovice Posted January 12, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 12, 2011 So if things were done correctly[i'm pretty talented with basic electronics and wiring] and the relays were phased out, the bulbs should work correctly? I probably would have ended up doing just that because I had a hunch that was the case, I just didn't wanna start fucking with things that ended up having nothing to do with why these wouldn't work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GOT2B GM Posted January 12, 2011 Report Share Posted January 12, 2011 Try flipping the bulb? LED's are polarity sensitive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carkhz316 Posted January 12, 2011 Report Share Posted January 12, 2011 Try flipping the bulb? LED's are polarity sensitive. x2. Also, there could be too much of a voltage drop from the battery to the actual headlights. Every splice, connector, and switch is worth a .1V voltage drop. You can get upwards of a dozen different junctions in the wiring which does add up. And since LEDs rely on a steady forward voltage, by the time it goes through all the car wiring, it may not be enough. This is the same reason HID's conversion kits have problems with flickering and such. They need a nominal 12V's as well and sometimes don't see that through the stock wiring, thereby necessitating a switched to straight battery feed via a relay for less voltage drop. Oh, and as mentioned, for the turn signals: a electronic flasher from the parts store will suffice. There is no need to current limit the LEDs for the extra load with the resistors like the companies always try to get you to do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
virtuetovice Posted January 14, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 14, 2011 (edited) So yeah, I got the headlight bulbs to work. When I decided I didn't like the color, I took them out and one broke apart from me wiggling it. Turns out the "bulbs" are made up of several circuit boards, each with 3 surface mount diode LEDs. The circuit boards were in parallel so each one can be run separately on 12v safely. Going on a whim I soldered three of those boards in parallel and voila! I had myself an AWESOME replacement for festoon bulbs. I like this color WAY better on the inside.[never really liked the color of regular festoons anyway] I'm going to end up replacing every single interior bulb with these circuit boars...because there are plenty. What's even better, is I emailed the guy saying they didn't work in my car and he refunded me saying I could do whatever with the bulbs because it would cost more than my refund to ship them back. So...free interior lighting upgrade. Edited January 14, 2011 by virtuetovice Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
white4d96 Posted January 14, 2011 Report Share Posted January 14, 2011 Pics? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slick Posted January 15, 2011 Report Share Posted January 15, 2011 Festoon?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
intern8tion9l Posted January 16, 2011 Report Share Posted January 16, 2011 Festoon?? like the rear seat lights Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
virtuetovice Posted January 18, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 18, 2011 These are the bulbs after being pulled apart. Easy as cake to solder together in groups of 3. The circular ones went in the front floorboards. As I said, bright as fuck Still though, the pic does this light very little justice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carkhz316 Posted January 19, 2011 Report Share Posted January 19, 2011 Links???? $$$$s????? Looks good! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AL Posted January 19, 2011 Report Share Posted January 19, 2011 X2... I think I may do that as well Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
virtuetovice Posted January 19, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2011 http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=220716026509 $4.39 total, you get two bulbs per order. I think those regular interior bulbs cost more. Info that you might find useful: I can't remember if it was the headlight bulbs or the tail light bulbs that had positive and negative marks on each individual circuit board. Turned out those marks were backward for some reason. On all of them, positive is closest to the resistors on the back. Also, I tested each board using an 18V battery and they seemed to take it well, so no worries about blowing them. I didn't bother with making it easy for the LED's to "snap in", I just soldered legs directly from the newly made bulb to the contacts on the interior lights. My logic: most LED's have an expected life of 30,000 hours. An interior light is never on for more than 5 minutes per day. If my math serves me right, that comes to about 30 hours per year. So after about 1,000 years of daily use the bulbs will be dead. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Twenty Posted January 19, 2011 Report Share Posted January 19, 2011 Glad to see they work! These have been on my list for a while. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
virtuetovice Posted January 19, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2011 (edited) They don't work well as headlights or brake lights, but they make DAMN good interiors with a little...persuasion. This little mod is highly recommended for anyone not exactly satisfied with their current interior lighting, especially 1st gens since I know for a FACT the lights...well...they suck. Quite honestly the GP overhead light was a sad attempt at better lighting which is why it's in my Cutty. Edited January 19, 2011 by virtuetovice Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mra32 Posted January 19, 2011 Report Share Posted January 19, 2011 You might be onto something...and imagine your whole hood lit up when you open it. And your trunk! You'd have to either get a plunger switch for the hood or hack into the mercury switch. If you wanna try that, be careful about the switch. One time i discharged my battery when the hood light fell from its mount and dangled down all night, staying on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
virtuetovice Posted January 19, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2011 I was thinking the same thing. The cutty has an underhood light that has a manual switch on it, so it'd be super easy. I was also thinking about removing a few LED's from the boards and using them to replace those microscopic bulbs on the inside of some of the illuminated switches, I just have to experiment and see if these are any good for dimming. I've already left my interiors on all night to test for battery drain and it was almost like nothing was left on. Even if I hadn't gotten the refund, you can't beat the price. If you were to go out and buy all regular bulbs for your interior it'd be WAY more expensive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mra32 Posted January 19, 2011 Report Share Posted January 19, 2011 (edited) I think im gonna go the route of getting a whole bunch of leds either loose ones or smd on a tape reel in one or two different colors and go to town. While I appreciate the trunk light and the hood light, why not have a bunch more light output without shadowy areas Edited January 19, 2011 by mra32 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AL Posted January 19, 2011 Report Share Posted January 19, 2011 I am very interested in this too Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
virtuetovice Posted January 20, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 20, 2011 Go for it man, it's totally worth it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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