Custom LED dome lights

[DMC5180]

Your soldering skills, with these micro tiny components, still amazes me.
Very cool.

Yeah, tell me about it. I've gotta learn how to do that one of these days.

I'd love to see the tools used for this stuff. Perhaps a short video demonstration.

I'd like to build something like that for the rear license plate lights. I have LED festoons in there now. But the Frame insert blocks off a fair amount of the light because of the Position of the Festoon contacts. The light needs to be concentrated in the rear half of the lens. A Board could fill that area easily.

[content22207]

Don't buy bulbs with hemispherical LED's -- you're just wasting your money.

5050 SMD's have 3 circuits per element. A 6 element SMD bulb actually has 18 circuits. That is why they are so much brighter.

This is what my license plate looks like with 12 5050 SMD's (two 6 element bulbs -- 36 circuits):
LicensePlateLights.jpg

Bill Robertson
#5939

[DMC5180]

The LED's I have are a few years old Technology now. I know there are better options out there today. Bill, did you build those rear lights also?

[Bitsyncmaster]

Don't buy bulbs with hemispherical LED's -- you're just wasting your money.

There is a place when you do want those. My third brake light is one use. But when your trying to illuminate something close you a need wide angle light source. The ones I used for the dome are 110 degree in a 1208 package. These are pretty large for SMT and all you need is a good temp controlled iron with a small tip, small dia. solder, tweezers and a board clamp is nice.

[Ozzie]

Don't buy bulbs with hemispherical LED's -- you're just wasting your money.

"Nonsense!"


My SMD LED taillights work just great, thanks.
Off the shelf technology, in a blister pack, no less, plenty bright - even in the daylight.

[content22207]

Ummm, SMD's are not hemispherical....

My tail light bulbs are SMD too (brake function):
TailLightMod_BrakeLightsOn.jpg

This is what they look light during the day:
DaytimeBrakesOff.jpgDaytimeBrakesOn.jpg

Your license plate bulbs do look a little dim.

Bill Robertson
#5939

[Ozzie]

Your license plate bulbs look a little dim.

Running warm white festoon LED in there (SMDs, btw), plenty bright, but got darkened in the picture with the Photoshop swirl edit.

Just a preference note: I lean towards warm white LEDs, over typical LED colors. That's what I use on the plates, engine bay and dome light housings. To me that color gives the car a more 80's retro look, rather than the typical cold-ish, slight blue, color of the typical LEDs.

FYI:
Last year for my work, I got to attend a 2 day conference on LED technology, with many presentation from large manufacturers of LEDs. It was very interesting to hear the progress and the technical aspects of LEDs. On color: when they go for pure white (or as much as possible), they bin the resulting batches just like Intel does with frequency capabilities of CPUs. OEMs can buy the bins by color, where the whitest ones are the priciest. Typically the blue ones are the most plentiful from a batch sort, and thus are sold very cheap, which explains why you see them so much.

[content22207]

My license plate bulbs are 7000 Kelvin, thank you very much -- very un-blue.

Bill Robertson
#5939

[Ozzie]

My license plate bulbs are 7000 Kelvin, thank you very much -- very un-blue.

Bill Robertson
#5939

"Ummm" that would be, very blue-ish white.
...and they look blue-ish on my screen, but hey, there's nothing wrong with that look, color preferences are subjective.

Most alternative consumer lighting that tries to replace incandescent are labeled as "warm white", which is about 2700 K.

Here is a reference:
"Color temperatures over 5,000K are called cool colors (blueish white), while lower color temperatures (2,700–3,000 K) are called warm colors (yellowish white through red)."

[content22207]

"Warm white" SMD's produce about 10% fewer lumens than "cool white" -- something owners looking for maximum output should keep in mind.

Bill Robertson
#5939