High intensity LED gauge lights

[Kenom]

OK, as indicated before, I'm a Light freak. I've got flashlights, lasers (powerful enough to light yer cigarette) and Light gadgets EVERYWHERE. I have decided to check out the inside of the gauges so that I could see exactly how hard it would be to replace the stock incandescent lights with LED's.

Now, that being said, I've seen TONS of LED mod's on pretty much every single stinkin thing on the planet, including our V-max's. However, never have I seen anyone using the newer LED technology, but instead just simple 5mm LED's. I've been following LED technology for a long time and seen as they have developed over the years. From the Luxeon at 45 lumens, to the newest big boy on the block, the SST-90 at 2200 lumens. I just absolutely had to use some Cree XPC's I had laying around to increase the brightness of the stock lights in my instrument panel, specifically the Neutral and the Gas lights. I had one green and one red, determined the resistance resistor I needed to achieve the target current of 300ma off 12v, and wired it all together. It's not pretty, but given the size of the LED's and the space limitation, I didn't have much option. I do want to note that with the limited current I chose, the LED's are only putting out about maybe 100 lumens MAX. far from as powerful as they CAN be.

We all know how to take apart the instrument panel so I won't go into that unless it's absolutely required of me. I'm good at step by steps, but I usually go into TOO MUCH detail.

Here is the stock light we've all seen.

all I gotta say is MEH! These were taken not in full sunlight, but slightly overcast.

Ok stock light not so impressive.
The Cree isn't a hugely powerful LED but it is better than most. about 200 lumens max.
Here is the setup so you can compare.

and with the cover back on.

Now this was with the bike NOT RUNNING. When the battery gets charged up a bit more (all this fiddling with the engine not on drained it) I will take some pictures of the lights when it's running and at night.

Whatcha think eh! woot!

BTW, I removed the Heatsinks because I figure they will be running such a short amount of time that the heat won't be an issue. That and the space requirements made it difficult.


Oh, and another mod I did while I had this off was I stuck 2 color change LED's behind the dials along with the stock bulb to add a little variety. I'll also get a video of this when it's darker. I didn't see much with it light out as they are pretty small LED's

 

[bikedave99]

Looking good! Great mod!

 

[Kenom]

Here is a video during daytime. It's a bit washed out because it's so bright outside. It will be more impressive as it gets darker, however you do get a chance to see the RED gas LED working as well.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3175365/Lights.wmv

Thanks for the Kudos

 

[maxrom]

Hy
I`m a LED Monkey mod Monkey creasy unstopable monkey:rofl_200:

I do every mod myself
result is; personolise UNIQUE!!

I realy like wath you do
And any link of new product is god for me

My front position/flashher are mody
now serching at GOOD PRICE YELLOW 1156/3156 or 3157/1157 flat set LED

ciaow

 

[Kenom]

Hy
I`m a LED Monkey mod Monkey creasy unstopable monkey:rofl_200:

I do every mod myself
result is; personolise UNIQUE!!

I realy like wath you do
And any link of new product is god for me

My front position/flashher are mody
now serching at GOOD PRICE YELLOW 1156/3156 or 3157/1157 flat set LED

ciaow

Maxrom, I'm in the process of putting together a Heatsinked assembly that you can swap out the stock bulb in your front and rear turn signals with an Amber Cree XP-E. The lumen output on that will be about 250 lumens. This of course will be about twice as bright as your stock bulbs and you never need worry about replacing them. This is to allow for those that like the stock turn signals and want it to be LED> Total cost on these will be about $8-$10 each.

Here is the datasheet on the LED>
http://www.cree.com/~/media/Files/C...d Modules/XLamp/Data and Binning/XLampXPE.pdf

 

[06VMAXIMUS]

Great mod! Look's kick-ass!!

 

[RaWarrior]

I've always thought the stock idiot lights were awfully dim as well, though it never occured to me that the indicators use the exact same bulbs as the gauge lights.

Do you have any suggestions on other LED lights for the gauges/lights? As you've seen here the "bright gauges" mod uses 74-x type LEDs that swap directly for the incandescent. If there's something better out there let us know.

Looking it up, the standard 74x are 2 lumen, the 74HP are 6 lumen and the HP3 are 10 lumens. You said that Cree is 220? We have a LED spotlight at work that has a 150 lumen LED and that spots things 1/2 mile away. Seems a little overkill for a neutral light, lol.

 

[Kenom]

I've always thought the stock idiot lights were awfully dim as well, though it never occured to me that the indicators use the exact same bulbs as the gauge lights.

Do you have any suggestions on other LED lights for the gauges/lights? As you've seen here the "bright gauges" mod uses 74-x type LEDs that swap directly for the incandescent. If there's something better out there let us know.

Looking it up, the standard 74x are 2 lumen, the 74HP are 6 lumen and the HP3 are 10 lumens. You said that Cree is 220? We have a LED spotlight at work that has a 150 lumen LED and that spots things 1/2 mile away. Seems a little overkill for a neutral light, lol.

Nah, I just said they were capable of that output. That is overdriving the LED and I didn't want to create that much heat or produce that much light. I've got it set at about 60-100 lumens. I think it would be a bit distracting at night to have it that bright. Might blind ya!

My honest opinion for a direct replacement would be a white XP-G. Since the lenses are tinted, they would put out about 100 lumens (some of that will be lost in the lens) and be incredibly low power consumption. I didn't have any of those on hand or I would have done that instead. The LED is only 3.5mm wide and incredibly bright. I've got a XP-G flashlight doing about 400 lumens.

Since this LED is so small, you can make a heastink and direct plug assembly. You don't have to worry about snuggin the wires in between the rubber boot and the contacts like I did in this mod.

I'll get to work on a direct fit replacement.

 

[Kenom]

Another source for incredibly cheap *(money wise) LED lights for automotive applications are here.
http://www.dealextreme.com/c/car-led-light-bulbs-712

One warning. DX takes an incredibly long time to ship something, so while you may save money, don't order it if you expect it <1 month. I ordered an android tablet that took 3 months for it to finally arrive. Well worth the price I paid to wait that long.

The bulb is a T5 on DX I THINK.

 

[Kenom]

Boy, you really don't get a feel for how bright this is, until it gets dark out. Yes, it's visible during the daytime, which it really wasn't before, but MAN is this bright.

Sorry for the large file size, but anything less an the quality is just too horrible.

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3175365/darklight.wmv

And here is the color change light. It's not very bright, but I can solve that later.
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3175365/changin lights.wmv

 

[Kenom]

Here is a quick and dirty replacement with a dual color change led setup. This is for behind the Tachometer so that it shines on bottom and top. Incredibly easy to use this setup to add pretty much ANY LED you want.

 

[RaWarrior]

I bet you'd have some buyers here if you wanted to make a small run of such LED replacements.

By color change, do you mean they cycle through a few colors smoothly, or change at set intervals, or what?

 

[Kenom]

well, I've taken a video of the color change. I wish I could keep all three synced. If I had used all 3 LED's from the same source, they would stay synced. However, I only had 2 from one source and another from a different. I've got more on order and will be making up some lights for those interested.

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3175365/changin lights.wmv

BTW, that setup cost me a total of $1 to make.

 

[Kenom]

Got bored today, so decided to throw together a simple T board with a Luxeon Rebel LED.
Nothing special, but it's to prove concept for pretty much any LED>

 

[Kenom]

I will be soon making some driving lights to fit my engine guards. Nothing really fantastic... stupendous is more like it! Here is an example of a SST-90 flashlight compared to someone's headlights....

This is the size of the LED

 

[RaWarrior]

Cool stuff, the color change is neat effect. Personally I'd probably find it kind of distracting actually out on the road at night, the stereo in my truck has a color-change mode where it does that and I find it annoying, I set it just to match the other dash lights, a pale green.

How efficient are those "super" LEDs though? Read some thing about how some cars are coming with LED headlights now, though they only use a little less power than the incandescent they replaced and wasted a lot more energy as heat. That the efficiency drops of rapidly as light output increases.

 

[Miles Long]

I will be soon making some driving lights to fit my engine guards. Nothing really fantastic... stupendous is more like it! Here is an example of a SST-90 flashlight compared to someone's headlights....

This is the size of the LED

Greetings Kenom -
What's your occupation? Why the love of LED's? (not that there's anything wrong with that)
I'm interested in lighting advancements as well. A HUGE pet peeve was lifted off my shoulders when LED Christmas lights became available, so I could finally turf those damn incandescent strings, with the "one hour or less" bulb life. But I digress...........
Anyway, what I would like to do is find a LED replacement for the lamps being used in my El cheapo Blazer driving lights. Unlike most other driving lights of this size, they came equipped with MR16 sealed 12 volt halogen bulbs. These bulbs are primarily used for home lighting applications , so are readily available at all hardware stores, in voltages from 20 to 60 watts, and on internet sites in different voltages and also beam configurations(narrow to flood). Currently I'm using 35 watt bulbs, and they light it up surprisingly well.
Do you know of a suitable LED lamp that replaces the mr16 halogens?
Also, down the road abit, I would like to hide my driving lights completely - by putting them in the scoop extensions (currently occupied by horns).
Would the SR90s be good candidates for this application?
Thanks in advance

 

[Kenom]

Cool stuff, the color change is neat effect. Personally I'd probably find it kind of distracting actually out on the road at night, the stereo in my truck has a color-change mode where it does that and I find it annoying, I set it just to match the other dash lights, a pale green.

How efficient are those "super" LEDs though? Read some thing about how some cars are coming with LED headlights now, though they only use a little less power than the incandescent they replaced and wasted a lot more energy as heat. That the efficiency drops of rapidly as light output increases.

The color change is barely even visible while your looking at the road. If it were going to be distracting, I wouldn't have it on the bike.

To compare LED to incandescent bulbs, you really need to compare lumens/Watt. Or just basic output per Watt. Sure the LED's are putting out a LOT of heat, but have you ever tried to grab a Halogen lamp after you shut it off? They are incredibly hot as well. My personal favorite LED the Cree XM-L is currently at 100 lumens per Watt. The SST-90 is just over 100 lumens per watt, but rated at a lot more watts than the xm-l. The average Lumens per watt for a standard MR16 is 15. The peak wattage of a XM-L is 10W, the peak for a MR16 is 50W, peak for the SST-90 is 40W. If we do the math, we see 100 x 10 = 1000 for the XM-L, 15 x 50 = 750, 100 x 40 = 4000 for the SST-90. The MR16 needs to be replaced frequently, the LED's don't. As to efficiency, I can't really speak on that. I know that they do drop off as you go up in power. If you want more information you can look at the specific datasheets on each LED.

I know that's not a direct comparison to the headlamps, but it does give you an idea. I'm sure a little research would tell you the basic lumens per watt of a standard halogen headlights. My basic search on the net indicates that the range of output for a standard H4 bulb (typical replacement for motorcycle headlights is around 800-2000 lumens. The higher being on hi beam.

Greetings Kenom -
What's your occupation? Why the love of LED's? (not that there's anything wrong with that)
I'm interested in lighting advancements as well. A HUGE pet peeve was lifted off my shoulders when LED Christmas lights became available, so I could finally turf those damn incandescent strings, with the "one hour or less" bulb life. But I digress...........
Anyway, what I would like to do is find a LED replacement for the lamps being used in my El cheapo Blazer driving lights. Unlike most other driving lights of this size, they came equipped with MR16 sealed 12 volt halogen bulbs. These bulbs are primarily used for home lighting applications , so are readily available at all hardware stores, in voltages from 20 to 60 watts, and on internet sites in different voltages and also beam configurations(narrow to flood). Currently I'm using 35 watt bulbs, and they light it up surprisingly well.
Do you know of a suitable LED lamp that replaces the mr16 halogens?
Also, down the road abit, I would like to hide my driving lights completely - by putting them in the scoop extensions (currently occupied by horns).
Would the SR90s be good candidates for this application?
Thanks in advance

My occupation is currently unemployed, but I've owned my own business selling lasers and High intensity flashlights for a number of years. All began when I was a security guard and I hated the output of a standard Incandescent flashlight. I then found out about LED's and have been following them ever since. This was back when the first High intensity LED was first released the Luxeon. Not a very impressive LED but was capable of 35 lumens/Watt or thereabouts.

You can find LED replacements for a standard mr16 bulb here:
http://s.dealextreme.com/search/mr16

I personally would go with this: http://www.dealextreme.com/p/3w-mr16-180-lumen-white-led-light-bulb-12v-dc-13842?item=149 and replace the stock LED with a XM-L and new driver which can also be purchased at DX.

As to placing the LED's behind teh scoops, that may be doable, would just have to find someone to machine you a setup that will fit in there.

 

[dlopes]

I have been wanting to do this to all of my lights, but I want to make my plastic covers not clear totally, but foggy clear and use colored LED's. Does anyone know where I can buy replacements or get some made?

 

[AMechEng]

I was thinking it would be cool to use some of the high power 3 watt red leds for a brake light. The trick to make them super intense is to use tight angle lenses like a 30 degree. The XP-E lenses are very small and will easily fit in any tail light assembly. You can also get stars that have three emitters mounted on them from cutter (Australian supplier, google it) if you want to go REALLY bright. For white emitters looks at the X-MLs and spring for the top bin LEDs.