LED bulbs

-

Yote

Well-Known Member
Joined
Aug 30, 2015
Messages
1,404
Reaction score
730
Location
far eastern Colorado
Re: 72 demon
Installed LEDs in tail/brake lights. One burned out instantly the other lasted about a minute. I realize they were cheap China stuff , but did I miss something else needed in the installation?
Yote
 
They should use a digital flasher unit, but if they burned out that fast I doubt that was the issue. Most likely it was the quality of the LED bulbs you bought, but you might want to check the voltage that you're getting at the tail lights. Outside of having too much voltage, or a lousy ground, it's just the quality of the bulbs you bought.

These are supposedly the best. Brighter, longer lasting, less voltage, DOT legal.

Red for tail lights
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HWS7XGW?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=ox_sc_sfl_title_2&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

white for backup lights
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HWS7TQG?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=ox_sc_sfl_title_3&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER
 
X2 on www.superbrightleds.com

BIG no no for the cheap Chinese LED's. I had 194 wedge LED's from a Chinese Ebay seller. 8 months later half of them burned out, 4 months later they all burned out.
Not good since these were for my Chevy K2500 dash lights. The rest decided to burn out at 0430 in the morning on my way to work, talk about bad timing.
 
LEDs are voltage and amperage rated. you are suppoosed to run them in series to devide the 12V into manageable xV chunks, ie 3 5V in series to operate off a 12v source. They make 12V also but more common is the cheap 2.1V 15mA they need resistors to live! use this calculator...
http://led.linear1.org/led.wiz

for instance 5 in series with a 220ohm resistor, in 8 parallel banks would equal 40 LED array that will survive/
13.5V
|
|-----~|
|-----~|
|-----~|
|-----~|
|-----~|
|-----~|
|-----~|
|-----~|--gnd
 
They should use a digital flasher unit, but if they burned out that fast I doubt that was the issue. Most likely it was the quality of the LED bulbs you bought, but you might want to check the voltage that you're getting at the tail lights. Outside of having too much voltage, or a lousy ground, it's just the quality of the bulbs you bought.

These are supposedly the best. Brighter, longer lasting, less voltage, DOT legal.

Red for tail lights
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HWS7XGW?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=ox_sc_sfl_title_2&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

white for backup lights
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HWS7TQG?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=ox_sc_sfl_title_3&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER


Those are the ones I have, they work great and are very bright.
 
It kinda depends on what you installed, and it depends on what voltage your car is at. Check your voltage with a good multimeter, should 12-ish volts (although it's likely too low, regulator issues are common).

If you just stuck LED's in there, yes, they'll smoke and you'll need to follow the advice posted previously.

If you bought drop-in bulb replacements and you pass the tests for proper voltage....you bought cheap, you got cheap.
 
I bought mine off amazon, there like 36. a pair but they do the job and can be seen. You get what you pay for.
Philips (12899RX2) Red P21/5W LED Exterior Bulb

Sold by: Xenon Corp
 
Have digital flasher , good ground, multiple SMDs in each bulb (27 I think) , will check voltage but am beginning to agree with the cheap bulb view. THANKS FOLKS
Yote
 
If you install them backwards, they simply don't work, so nothing you did. Some expensive ones may work either way. Presumably, they were rated for 12 VDC use. Pishta is talking about designing your own assembly w/ raw LED's. I use LED's several places. Dash ones help a lot in my M-B cluster where the LED's shine forward into the "light tubes". I use in my A's too since I don't like melted plastic from incandescent's and shouldn't have to change ever. But, they don't dim as well. I did have a problem where some LED's bridged the bulb holder in my M-B and caused a short circuit that smoked a cluster trace. The M-B holders look like Mopar, but connect slightly differently, and shouldn't be an issue in a Mopar holder.

I use LED's in some tail-lights, especially for running lights when I have multiple bulbs and figure an LED will give a better chance of lasting forever even if dimmer (some light is better than none). Like you, I tried some ebay ones from China that failed in ~1 sec. They were real neat-looking w/ integral brass heat sinks, and surprisingly cheap (~$2 ea, wonder why). Other ebay ones from China have worked fine, other than one in my M-B climate switch started flickering recently.
 
Pretty much everything but the headlights are LED here and my dash lights dim almost normally, but once the voltage gets down pretty low they cut off when the incandescent bulbs would have dimmed a little more.
I run a 12v to 3.3 volt transformer chip off my dash lights circuit from the headlight switch/dimmer and power the multiple LED's in my dash and gauges.
This way the transformer allows me to add more raw single LED's anywhere if I want more or better light in specific area's of the dash and gauges, like when I added a clock that matches my other cluster gauges. (Drilled a small hole in the case and inserted the LED.) then added it to the 3.3 volt circuit. (now the new clock light looks like all the others and dims with the rest of the dash and gauges.

As far as tail and brake lights, I replaced my OE backup lenses in my four lens bumper with matching tail/brake lenses and doubled up on the brake and turn lighting by tying them to the two original lights.
All four lenses light with brakes, two on each side for signals and just the outer two for tail lights.

For tail and brake lights I used 4 of the Superbrite red 12 LED bulbs separated from their sockets and mounted the LED section inside the bulb housing facing directly rearward.
(Dart has angled sockets so I just soldered about 3 inches of wire between the bulb socket and the LED section so I could face them straight back). and a dab of RTV keeps them in place nicely.
3 years so far and not one burnout anywhere, and they use so little amps my dash or headlights don't even think about flickering when the four brake lights come on.
Obviously much brighter than all stock bulbs also.
The last little trick was to tack a credit card sized lexan magnifier inside each lens that magnifies the 12 LED's by 100% so they fill the lens more fully instead of just having a round spot in the center of the lenses about the size of a tennis ball.

This is the kind of stuff that happens when I am bored and want change something on my car.:D

I like high definition gauges and lighting so you can see the gauges lit on the bench at full power (3.3v), and the full assembly in the car during the day unlit.

Man, some day I need to get rid of that column gear indicator. :D
 

Attachments

  • ledtail.jpg
    39.1 KB · Views: 229
  • gaugeslit.jpg
    17.4 KB · Views: 254
  • dash.jpg
    32.4 KB · Views: 244
Just for fun I dismantled my "burned out" LEDs . Took each strip , each with ten smd's hooked them direct to car battery. They all worked !!! Did not use diodes or resistors (whatever they are) from origional . My research showed that "12 v " LEDs will operate at a variable current i.e. 10-15 volts. The higher current will just shorten life expectancy. Cannot understand yet why assembled " bulb" failed
 
most led's have a wide range of voltage 8-32 volts dc stick with "cree / feit"
 
Just checking on something before ordering. Assuming I am getting ~12V to the current break/turn-signal lights the LED Lights, Bulbs & LED Lighting Accessories | Super Bright LEDs 1157 (red) should just be plug and go correct?

Is there anything else I need, or is it really that simple?

Yep just put in and go! The only thing I had to replace was the turn signal relay to a more LED friendly one. Once I switched everything to LEDs.

Make sure you get the brightest ones!
 
Last edited:
Just checking on something before ordering. Assuming I am getting ~12V to the current break/turn-signal lights the LED Lights, Bulbs & LED Lighting Accessories | Super Bright LEDs 1157 (red) should just be plug and go correct?

Is there anything else I need, or is it really that simple?
You need an electronic flasher. The old type with the mechanical "points" won't work correctly with the LED blinker bulbs. I think most replacement flashers are electronic now. I bought my car 12 years ago and someone had already put one in it. You didn't ask, but get the bulbs with at least 200 lumen brightness. The cheaper ones just don't cut it. SuperBrightLEDs sells some good quality bulbs.
 
If anyone is wondering. I went ahead and put in some 1157 LEDs in the tail lights this weekend. Turns out someone may years ago already changed out the flashers to digital ones, because they worked right away and were much brighter than the old bulbs. Can't believe I didn't do this a long time ago....
 
-
Back
Top