LED lights that actually fill up the door light lens.

[Shep]

Absolutely. Pull the rubber housing out of the door, rotate it so the light socket is turned 90 degrees (in other words, rotate the rubber housing 90 degrees either direction), reinstall it into the hole in the door, reinstall LED. Test and enjoy .

Thanks for the tip! I'll be sure to do this one when I get my D back.

By the way, let us know how the other LED's you bought work out when you get around to installing them.

[Bitsyncmaster]

Thanks for the tip! I'll be sure to do this one when I get my D back.

By the way, let us know how the other LED's you bought work out when you get around to installing them.

The best way to get the light to disperse is to move the LEDs as far from the lens as possible. I did that by removing the socket and gluing in custom LEDs. I could do even better with these wide angle SMT parts now.

[SIMid]

They are SMDs. I kinda said that in my first post .

Sorry, I just read the title.

Should try the ones like I have that have them all facing forward, than side on. And as Bits, said, push them as far back as possible. I have pics of my installation, all on FB.

[RIUM+]

One of the other big things you can do to even out the light spread is to paint the inside of the light housing white. A latex/acrylic-based house paint is fine for the job, it'll bond to the rubber without damaging it or flaking off. The internal light reflections will increase the brightness plus even out its spread.

The same can be said for the tail lights. Use a small brush & paint as much of the sides white as you can reach. I need to get around to uploading those before/after photos, but that's probably for another thread...

[Citizen]

I had been thinking about this problem for a while now. I finally (and coincidently today) decided on putting in a very thin defuser. What to use? Construction paper! That's right, construction paper. Extreamly cheap. Just cut to size with sissors.

My lenses are the standard red in back, yellow in the middle, but non-standard blue in front (looks way cooler than four yellow lenses, especially at car shows when it's dark out), so all three colors in construction paper are needed. As of today, I have them all.

Anyway, I'll try to get before and after pictures, and post here later.

Thomas

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[Citizen]

Anyway, I'll try to get before and after pictures, and post here later.

Well, sorry for the kludgy hack job on the attached photo, but it shows all six shots. All on the left are without the defuser, and on the right are with the new defuser. All photos have the smooth side of the lense on the outside.

I don't think the camera does the pictures justice, as the defused LED's look much better looking straight at them, albthough a little dimmer. Still, looks pretty darn good at night.

Thomas

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DeLo-Door-LEDs.JPG

[Shep]

Do you guys think wax paper would be opaque enough to disperse light effectively? House paint sounds like it would block quite a bit of light, as would construction paper. I won't be doing much night driving, but I may be doing some driving around dusk, so for me it needs to be bright enough to see when there's still light out.

[Dangermouse]

I think he meant paint the inside housing white, not the lens (what would be the reflector part of a headlight, say)

[Shep]

I think he meant paint the inside housing white, not the lens (what would be the reflector part of a headlight, say)

Ah, I misunderstood that one then. That makes a lot more sense. Thanks for the clarification!

[Citizen]

Do you guys think wax paper would be opaque enough to disperse light effectively? House paint sounds like it would block quite a bit of light, as would construction paper.
[SNIP]

Maybe what I used is not actually construction paper. It's more of like colored printer paper, same thickness as copier paper, and not used for building stuff. You can see in the picture using the "colored" paper that very little light is lost.

Thomas

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