is it dark?

 

haha no not the actual ac button but the spinning dial that turns the fan on or off.Goes up to 4 for power. Than thing is not activating at all just spinning i put the ball bearing back and the spring back no luck

 

Ok I fixed it a post on page 2 details It, if it doesnt click its because u are putting it in the wrong place the part with the ball bearing goes on ther bottom in the grooves then the spring then the metal peace sign thing then put it back in.

 

Ok ladies and gents I found a seriously easy way to mod with no breaking of lights or soldering. All you need are some prewired LED's with the resistor already there, some wire connecters and one additional piece of wire, " I used 16g speaker wire"

I guess I should say do this at your own risk and I am not resposible for mistakes bla bla.

So, when you pulll the dash cover off you have to disconnect three wire looms.
One small white one on the left
One bigger Gray one in the middle
And one big white one on the right.. This is the one you are going to have to work on.

With the loom facing you, you wil notice two rows of wire.
On your left should be a white wire with a black line.
This is the ground for the entire loom.
You need to cut this wire approx. mid way.

At the end coming from the car, connect one butt connector.

Now is where that one piece of speaker wire comes into play. I separated the wire so you have one wire."not two" Normally positive and negative.
Now at the end of that wire crimp a quick connector male or female your choice.
At the other end of that same wire twist it together with the white wire with black stipe.
Now put the white wire back together using the butt connector already installed.
*****

Now looking at the same big white wire loom locate a green wire on the top row.
It will be second from the right on the top row.
Cut this wire half way back.
Next crimp a quick connector to the side of the wire coming from the car.
That is all you need to do with that wire.
***

Next remove your standard lights, as shown in previous page.

Next use a quick connector to crimp both positive wires of your LED's together.
Also do the same to the negative side.
****

Fix your LED's how ever you want to so that the glow into the pod. I used double sided tape.
***

Plug your positive LED connector to the Green Wire and the Negative wire to the white wire.

Put is all back to gether and Presto! your new LED's will turn on When your turn on your parking lights and your headlights.. and only then.
Sorry for the wordy how to but it got dark and I did not want to take crappy pics of the wires in the dark. This mod took me about 30 min. And that is including testing the wire loom to see what wires to use. I'll try to post picks this weekend. Sorry for the gramatical errors.

Good luck!

 

I just did this using the gren Pilot Gel Bulb Covers I picked up at Pep Boys using the original DIY. Completed in 15 minutes and it was dark out! Look o much better than the amber garbage.....

Now that I know how to pull that part of the dash an LED in the cubby is next!

 

Used the exact gel cap bulb covers posted by MacMaster on page five of this post. I had to get mine from pep boys and got raped on the price of $3.99 per set of two covers. The local autozone didn't carry them anymore because they did not move fast enough. They work great for me in red. Not sure if anyone else has posted this, but you can use those same gel caps to cover the bulb in the easy bake. It's the perfect size. Thanks to all who contributed to this thread. Red looks great with the blue led lights on the auto-dimming mirror.

Thanks again.

 

I could not find the gel caps at any auto store near me, and didn't feel like ordering online, so i went to the local craft store and bought some stained glass window paint, i got it in the form of a pen: (click for bigger pic!)


The Lable says: Vitrea 160, its made by a company called Pebeo... *This is a transparent paint* The same brand sells very similar looking porcelin paint aka not transparent so anyone who goes shopping for these make sure you grab the right one.

Cost me 3.99 and i just basically colored the little bulbs. I stuck em in and its a nice bright lime green. I waited a couple hours for the paint to be set *enough* to try out, but not fully set in case i needed to recoat it (or in case it sucked). I missed a tiny little spot on one of the bulbs that just so happened to make the center dial yellow-white ish, so i used a tiny bit of rubbing alcohol on a paper towel to remove the paint and i just recoated it.

Once this other bulb is dry i'll take some pics for you guys. There were a LOT of different colors available, and im absolutly sure that they would work great on white LEDs too to get a certain tone of orange, green, blue, purple, etc. There was a lighter blue pen there that im positive would provide an indigo look.

 

what store did u buy the pen from?

 

Awesome write up guys just saving for later

 

Just finished installing red LEDs into the AC controls, and have to give props to this thread. The color looks amazing, but it does fade as it reaches the left and right side of the controls. I guess it's back at it tomorrow to try to even it out. Anyone have any tips or solutions on evening out the light?

 

The LED that has the prewired resistor is the #74 LED and you could get it from www.garage1217.com and it goes into where the halogen bulb is. Also you have to break off the small tab at the bottom of the LED. This LED is flat on top which progects a little better than regular LEDS.

 

I am not the greatest tech guy here.

I was wondering if there was a LED that I can use without having to sodering

 

what are you gonna use it for?

 

for the ac control

 

read my post before your first post.If you got and Q's pm me!

 

Ok, I think I figured out how to distribute the light more evenly, at least a little more evenly.
I installed real super white LED's in place of the crappy ol dindgy yellow lamps from the factory as indicated in this thread. I was reading how some of us were having problems with the edges being dark.

this is not a complete fix, but it helps.

I dont think i read about anyone doing this yet, if i missed it andsomebody has already done this, sorry.

ANYWAYZ....

Disassemble everything the way you would to remove the old lamps,

In addition to sanding the round head flat, sand an angle on the leds using sandpaper or a file.
Make the angle on the inside of the led's to where it angles to the center of the dash. this helps reflect light to the opposite side of the led which is the dark part we currently have.

After you have the angle, sand the rest of the led to make it look like a frosted bulb.

Next...
There is a clear plastic piece that distributes the light to all of the dials,
Take it out, (its not too hard, you gotta remove another piece first, and be careful with that ball everyone keeps losing) sand it down as much as possible to make it a frosted piece of plastic instead of clear. This helps distribute the light evenly acroos the plastic.

I tried this and it helped distribute the light more evenly, it doesnt have those hard bright spots in the center anymore. The center is still brighter than the outter edges, but it is not such a harsh contrast. Smoother througout.

I might try and paint the back of the plastic white around the round areas toward the outside of the piece of plastic to see if that helps reflect light even more

I think the only way to light up the ends as much as possible is to run a couple more LEDs, which means more wiring and soldering....

Anyways, hope this helps or inspires better ideas

 

in theory this idea is really cool, but i just did mine and im not so impressed

 

has anyone found the bulb cover condoms online? i cant find them anywhere.

 

Here is a pic of my white led's sanded down and everything, installed...

As you can see it is still brighter toward the middle of the dash, but its not as bad as it was before I sanded everything.

 

ditto.

the blue bulb covers didnt work out too well and werent nearly as blue as my cathode lighting