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Installed LEDs in Heater Control/Buttons

25K views 89 replies 28 participants last post by  Albertbrs 
#1 · (Edited)
I have had decent luck swapping out the burnt heater control bulbs with leds, and also a burnt esp button bulb with an led bulbs. For the leds I bought them off ebay, they are 3mm and came with resistors needed to run at 12 volts. Dont ask what resistors they are because I have no idea, they all came shipped together from the ebay listing.

One of the burnt bulbs. The stock bulbs are NOT led.



LEDs and resistors I used, from off ebay.



LED and resistor being soldered together.



testing LED and resistor on a 9 volt battery to make sure it worked.



LEDs soldered on the board. Resistors I used heat shrink tube over them.



Rubber boot thing installed on the board with the LEDs thru them.




Test run of the first led I installed. To make sure it was soldered on the right way, have to make sure the + lead is on the correct side. If the LED works on the 9 volt battery but not soldered on the board then just switch it around on the board and resolder, should work then.



Blue LEDs installed in the heater control unit.



Blue LEDs installed in the esp button and other 4 buttons above the heater control unit. Pix blow, much better in person seeing it. See how much brighter those 4 buttons are with the leds in them compaired to the pic above with the stock bulbs in them.





Guess my cam sux taking pix at night. The new blue leds are awesome, no more stock green color. And they are 10x brighter than stock.
 
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#44 ·
I did this on another vehicle I owned previously. I went from the amber/reddish dash, shifter etc. lighting to all green using led's and the gel cellaphane i am speaking of. Timmy is thinking of the hard colored plastic that is used on theatre stage lighting. What i speak of is pretty similar to what is used to give the speedo clusters color and is super thin and flexible like glad plastic wrap. It takes some experimentation with different color plastic and led bulbs...but it does work and is not dimmer.
 
#45 ·
^^^Ugh, dont get me going on the speedometer lighting, lol. I want it all blue in there but think that one is impossible. And I luv how the srt has the rings around the gauges, but isnt the mileage and compass setting thing still in green on them?
 
#48 ·
I want to install an led behind the "Information Center" now. The letters are see thru just like the buttons are. Going to try and just tap in an extra led w/resistor behind it glued to the cuircut board. Might need two though to get the lighting even.

 
#51 ·
^^^ So far from my research I think the smd (surface mount diode) leds would make the climate control brighter. I have been reading up on leds and there is alot to know and understand, like they perform brighter when cooler, the rated viewing angles need to be taken into account when picking a "brighter" led. I think thats why smd chips appear brighter because the viewing angle is greater than the regular leds.

Im still trying to understand all the things written on this site about leds. There's some good links on the page.
http://www.superbrightleds.com/cgi-bin/store/index.cgi?action=DispPage&Page2Disp=/led_info.htm
 
#53 ·
Here's the thing with those smd type leds or any surface mount chip, the soldering is extremely hard to do with a regular soldering gun. Im now researching reflow soldering, which is basically putting a small dab of solder paste on the board, lay the chip/led leads in the solder paste and heat it up with hot air so the solder gets sucked onto the contact making it perfect. This is now the direction im going in.

These are the led chips I will be trying.
http://www.oznium.com/plcc-2
 
#54 · (Edited)
Wanted to share this informative read I just came across. I am awaiting my blue smd leds to arrive and get to work. With this read im confident all the existing leds in the WK can be swapped out easy enough. Reading this I realized the "compass/display" below the speedo can actually be changed from green to whatever leds you want. I thought it was all part of an electronic board but its actually back light. sweet....

http://www.evilution.co.uk/294
 
#56 ·
That site was great with alot of usefull info and pictures. It made me very motivated knowing I can swap out all my stock leds with different colors, I want all blue instead of the green in there now. How did you know I went on there? I see this is your first post.

I am getting pretty decent at soldering with my pocket type pen butane torch/soldering iron. But those chips are so small it still turns out sloppy. I researching reflow soldering, and going to try it using the soldering paste. I found a thread showing how to convert a desoldering suction tool into blowing hot air with a fine tip.
 
#57 ·
Google sends me an email every few days letting me know where links to my site have been posted. Easier than looking at the logs to see where people come from.

Well, if weird smart car owners can follow this info then you should have no problem.

Sloppy soldering isn't necessarily a problem, mine started of really bad and so far I have only had 1 not work due to my soldering and I have soldered at least 400 SMDs now. The important part is a good solder gun, clean and resined contacts and a decent solder. The 0805 LEDs (shown in the link) are only 2mm long, the tip of my soldering iron is bigger than that but I've had no problems at all with those (apart from actually handling them).

You can solder SMD multipin chips by hand too. Just apply solder to all the pins, don't worry about bridging the pins. Once they are all soldered down, use solder wick and your soldering gun. The solder wick removes all the bridges.
 
#58 · (Edited)
^^^ So far I have never used resin but realizing I should. From what im understanding, the resin will clean the contacts and make the solder get "sucked" onto them correct? Like I said, im very new to soldering electrical boards, i've done plenty of copper pipe soldering work with a blow torch but working with such small parts is new. I tried the regular type led's to replace the stock regular bulbs in my car gauges, until I realized the stock led's are so dam small. Anyways, im actually glad you were able to see i went on your informative site so I can bug you for info and tips now. You def have a great write-up and helped me out alot already. You should post that page on here, on how to swap out stock led's. I know Hamze from this site was wondering how to do this mod when he pulled apart his door controls and saw the small led's.

Where do you order your led's from, any specific site you recommend that are good and cheap?

Odd, but I tried to give you a +Rep but didnt go thru. Maybe its because I was referring to your web site. hmmm. Well, +Rep anyways. Lol.
 
#60 ·
Yes, using resin is important, it cleans the contacts and increases the capillary action on the solder so it gets sucked between the SMD and the contact quicker and therefore reducing the heat transfer.

I'm not sure how much I can help you with the best place to get PLCC-2 LEDs because I'm a Limey and not a Yanky so the places I buy from are about 3000 miles away from you. I get mine from www.rapidonline.com which is a UK company. I tried loads of suppliers and theirs was the best quality. I have bought some real bad ones from Ebay sellers so if you do look on there, search for Osram PLCC-2 as they are very good quality so should be OK as long as you don't get sold fakes.

You could try RS Components too but you'll find plenty of resellers if you search for Osram or Kingbright plcc-2.

Obviously having no knowledge of your vehicles means I don't know what LEDs it requires. If they aren't PLCC-2 or PLCC-4 then if you can show me what they look like and the size using digital callipers I might be able to work out what type they are.

I'm not worried about rep lol. You can post whatever you like as long as I don't get in trouble for your excessive repeat posting about the same thing lol.
 
#61 ·
Im pretty sure the stock leds in my Grand Cherokee are PLCC-2. I have a set of dial calipers at my work I can use to measure them exactly. I was on kingbrights site last week but seems they only want to sell reals of leds in lots of 1000. I only am looking to buy about 50. I will now keep an eye out to buy Osram ones from your info. Thanks.
 
#62 ·
You can't really buy direct from the manufacturers as they want you buy loads, you need a reseller. If you can't find any just let me know, they are only small so I can always get them and send them on to you as postage is minimal for that sort of weight.

Blue are the most expensive and they are only about 30p each (50c).
 
#65 ·
Update: I have had a few blue LEDS burn out already. I believe it was because I covered the resistors in the shrink wrap. Since then I have changed them out without covering the resistors themselves in the heat shrink and they have been working perfectly. I think the heat shrink kept the heat in when they were on.
 
#68 ·
you got me totally motivated timmy. i got some blue 3mm leds and resistors on the way and im teaching myself how to solder this weekend. hopefully all goes well. great write up man
 
#69 ·
you should have no problem bro...i just did this and it was cake, just took some patience! Do work!
 
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