I've got a few questions about LED's. First off what site sells the brightest ones, I got a few off autolumination.com and they're bright but I'm not very satisfied with them so I was just looking for some brighter ones. So I was wondering if anyone could direct me to a site that sells brighter ones.

Also I was wondering if you could swap out the stock tail light bulbs for some LED bulbs and what size or number they are. Thanks guys!

Ah crap shoulda posted this in the lighting forum

 

Try posting this in the lighting forum I'm sure your going to get a better response there.

 

ebay

 

Simply replacing bulbs with LED's on a regular bulb base does not produce acceptable lighting. You end up with a small red spot inside your taillight. Nothing short of a custom-built flat board of LED's fixed inside your taillight lens will produce acceptable results.

These were the 1157-replacement bulbs I tried from superbrightleds.com They were supposed to be better because they had wide-angle LED's facing straight back, and then an array of smaller LED's around the sides. In reality they were junk.

Here are my taillights, LED on left and stock 1157 on right:


And here are the brake lights, again LED on left and 1157 on right:


As you can see, almost no difference on the LED between tail and brake function. And the 1157 tail light is brighter than the LED during braking. The 1157 brake light is IMMENSELY brighter. The LED did not fully illuminate the housing like the regular 1157 bulb did.

Of course this was at night. During the day time, you would only see a red dot inside the lens for brake lights, instead of the whole housing illuminating. These are NOT safe at all.

 

I had the same experience as Patrick. I had LED 'bulbs' (12-18 LEDs in a stock type bulb fitting) and all I got was a bright red (and amber) dot that did not effectively disperse light. I even had the bulbs with LEDs on the sides to help in the reflector, and it didn't matter. At night it was pretty useless, and in the daytime it was downright dangerous. I couldn't see my own lights in the daytime. I switched back to regular bulbs after a short while.

Definitely retrofit an LED setup from an OEM car, or have one made, if you really want LEDs. The bulbs don't cut it, it's very unsafe.

 

same as patrick as well... i bought extra headlights for my retro....it was cleared and had to buy amber lights....LED is very dim and not visible

 

Good info fellas, thanks for the heads up too. I would have looked like an idiot...more so than I do already lol. Anyway is it worth retrofitting an LED set-up on there? Like is the output brighter than the standard 1157 bulb?

 

sure, if you have an array of LED's directly behind the lens, taking up the entire area of the lens (not even using the reflector housing at all). But that of course takes time and work to do that.

 

Yea hm... that sounds like a lot more work than I can do right now b/c of school.

Hey Patrick, I've noticed you keep mentioning what you did for your headlights, I was wondeirng if you could show me a picture of how it looks, I'm thinking about retrofitting HID projectors in mine too.

 

How do leds compare to the 194 bulbs I was thinking of putting some in my corner lights. Would they be okay for that or are they not safe for that either?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by hometheaterman &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">How do leds compare to the 194 bulbs I was thinking of putting some in my corner lights. Would they be okay for that or are they not safe for that either?</TD></TR></TABLE>

I had some 194's in my taillights and they were weak as hell, I switched back quickly. You'd be better off with the amber bulbs, maybe they make the chrome plated ones to clean it up, but the LEDs aren't good.

 

Ok thanks. I have bulbs in there now but was just kind of wondering how LED's would look. If they aren't as bright I'm not sure I want them.

 

http://www.civicforums.com/for....html

anybody know where he got the LED's he used in that DIY? Or at least where I can buy bright ones like that?