wgeee7478

Thanks hotbox, I'm guessing that they are 0805 SMD LED's. I'll eventually look into it. Good luck on the soldering, it's not hard actually, but you will need the proper equipment and lots of practice.

Max2k

I did mine to green with 1206 LEDs.



Make sure to put them all in the same way.

Max2k

It seems my edit button has disappeared.

The LEDs aren't as bright as that picture makes them look, the light is pretty diffused.

wgeee7478

2 Max2k (aka the LED master)...That looks great. And yeah, the camera has the same effect on my white ones. The picture shows the individual led's brighter than if you were to see them in person. At night the light is diffused and looks great. I still recommend this method to anyone who wants to permanently change their clock color, rather than using markers.

I was planning on another project involoving replacing the LED's with RGB ones. I wanted to mimic the JDM 9 color change speedo by using either a PIC controller or pots to tune the backlight to different colors. But for now and the near future, this project will probably be put on hold because of priorities.

BoomBox757

that would be hot, if you do the color changing speedo do a diy write up

dgHotLava

once the article is in the FAQ section it should not be edited....
thats why there is no edit button....

BoomBox757

why not?

Max2k

That's understandable, here's a more accurate picture:



This is pretty much what it actually looks like. You can see the 4 individual LEDs because they're brighter and bigger than the stock ones were.

Doing the 7 color gauges would be seriously sweet. I was just going to print out a new backing for them with light green substituted for the current orange in the fuel and tach hatch marks.

hotbox05

i just got my lil leds for the clock. uh oh here coime when i either make it work or mess ____ up lol. one way or the other right?

Max2k

Just don't use too much heat and put all the LEDS on the same way.

hotbox05

i've got a 30 and a 20 and a 25 watt iron. which is best?

couped

I just finished converting my clock to blue. I used these LEDs:

http://www.eled.com/product.asp?cata..._ID=EPL3015PBC

They were a tad too bright for me so I folded up a piece of wax paper and put it inside the hole behind the clock to help difuse the light. It looks really nice now. I will try to get pics up soon

Thanks for the excellent writeup!

bulldog2g

This is a quite useful thread. Thank you to all who have posted accurate info.

rivetdragon

Alright I did the whole sodder thing and mine doesnt work at all. none of the four LEDS wll come up. I did get some 1106 leds, but i am believing that my Big ol' fingers and too much solder made a thrilling screw up. I am gonna try one more time.

Is there a specific polarity assignment on the board? top or bottom.

wgeee7478

LED's only work in one direction, make sure the polarity is correct. The PCB has white arrows on top of each LED to tell you which direction to place the LED's.

Minsk99

Getting a LED witha wide viewing angle will also help with more even light distribution. I saw some 1106 SMD online with 120 deg. of view. Also the luminescence is important. I would think in this type of application that its better to have a wide viewing angle then very strong luminescence. wgeee7478, what wavelength , Iv(mcd) type and Iv(mcd) min were you using?

wgeee7478

Most standard surface mount LED's have approx. 120 degrees of view. I purchased my LED's from a local electronic store and unfortunately they didn't have a data sheet to give me so I don't know the mcd values. However if what you are looking for is a more subtle diffused look you can get surface mount leds with a "diffused" lens rather than a "clear water" lens. Another method would be what was mentioned earlier and that is to use some semi-transparent paper (cookie baking sheet or tracing paper) directly behind the LCD screen to provide more of a light filter.

rivetdragon

Thank you wgeee, I am gonna take them apart, and try again!

kgzero

Hey wgeee7478,
Well, I finally took a look at the speedo leds, and I have decided that I will not remove them. I am not good enough at soldering to remove those bad boys. As for the radio lights, there are just too damn many of them. Oh, well, maybe I will practice on something for a while first.

wgeee7478

Alright no problem, thanks for the effort. I would suggest old computer motherboards, video cards, network cards, memory module, etc... to get plenty of soldering practice. You won't be able to test it but at least you'll get to the point where at least the solder job looks professional. Just make sure you have the proper basic tools and then you can expand as you see fit.