Electrical: LED Centre Console Light Upgrade

[Big 240]

So I've been having a play with my centre console light, as it doesn't work.

I quickly realised the 1.2w bulb had blown, easy fix. But the resulting light is pants, so whilst I had it all apart I started thinking how to upgrade it with stuff I have in my garage.

I found some flexible rubber covered LED light strips that I'd removed from a car I bought many many years ago. Trimmed a strip down, fitted in place of the rubbish plastic and voila!

The pics show how they original system works, single 1.2w bulb that sits in the middle of a clear plastic strip, spreading the light downwards. Not the best system, but for the era it worked. I simply used the same power feed for the bulb, and connected the LED strip, wedged this into the aparture where the plastic strip sits, holding it in place with the metal securing clips at each end.

I will do the dash binnacle next, and I was surprised that the colour changes slightly when turning down the dimmer. The pics show the effect to be brighter than it is, it's actually quite subtle.

Standard set up:


How the simple wiring works, the other two bulbs sit inside the rear demister switch and the hazard light switch:


The strip was a little longer than needed so I trimmed about an inch off:


Couple of spade connectors fitted:


Fitted in place of the clear plastic:


Connected to original terminals:


Even in daylight the light is visible:


Night-time view:


Dimmer on half:


Dimmer almost off:

[ihopethatsnotrust]

Looks awesome!

[Big 240]

Originally Posted by ihopethatsnotrust

Looks awesome!

Thanks man, I also recently upgraded the two lights for the heater controls too. I used 4 little led's clumped together as the pic below and put them into the hole the bulb holder goes into, works very well and they won't blow like normal bulbs!

I used heat shrink around them, then also used some cloth tape to enable them to wedge into the bulb holder area.




This technique could have been used for the top down light, however I'm happy either way. I bought a pack of ten for £6 https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B06Y22DQ...roduct_details