Topher707

here is what i have been working on for the past week or so..
sorry for the blurry pics... cant seem to get it right.








I am thinking about changing some of the white to blue... i also have to re-do a few things.

OntarioTL

Its not easy to take pics....but use your headrests as a tripod to keep the image still and use the timer on your cam....if you have one....that how I do my pics....

But the LEDs look good....almost as good as mine!!! LOL

cyde7399

Both of the colors look good. I was wondering about doing the white. I want to do blue.... but im afraid my car will be too much blue. A nice clean white could look pretty good.

How is the work so far? Are the sunroof, vsa, foglight, etc buttons very tough? Which bulbs are you using?

VoLLy

iTrader: (8)

yeah better pics from the headrests would make your conversion look much sweeter.

gaping46and2

iTrader: (2)

Looks real good so far. First navi LED conversion I've seen, was wondering what it would look like.

Topher707

i fucked up doing the navi... somehow, the soldering iron made contact with the plastic around the screen... so its slightly melted. im going to buy a new plastic piece... I dont think acura sells them separate, so i may have to buy a whole screen from ebay or something.

fsttyms1

I just did the LED conversion on mine 2 weeks ago. Only thing i wish was that the inst cluster was a little more vibrant blue like the rest

joe80055

Holy shit, you did your nav screen?! I mean, shit.. i thought i had the balls to do the radio.. but I'd be scared to touch the nav. Dude, make a DIY for this; I'm interested How much is the whole thing costing you? I spent no more than $30 for my entire interior.

I bet the smell of the smoking soldering iron's getting to your head too. lol

Topher707

i havent touched the inst. cluster yet... I bought special LEDs for it, and im waiting on some help from a buddy of mine...

yea joe, I finally started on my interior led conversion... what 6-8 months after talking to you about yours!? haha.

Meh, the navi screen was easy. Just a few bulbs.. there really is no DIY. If you can do a radio, you can do the rest... and this is coming from me.. The first time i ever soldered was when i created the DIY door handles a few weeks ago. I then moved up to the radio (following gaping46and2's DIY: https://acurazine.com/forums/ramblings-12/attn-angelcl-186556/).. if you or anyone, can do that, you can do the rest..

Topher707

More pics and better pics.. I also changed the sunroof, cruise, and fog light buttons.

Fogs, cruise/vsa, sunroof




Security light (its bright as hell)




Mirror


Memory seats


Climate control and navi




and heres one, just for fun

69tl

can you guy tell me where to get the LED and which kinda exactly like the part #, because i went to couple web site and they have whole bunch of different kinda of led and i just don't know which to get....thanx in advance for the help

vzuptnguyen

how do you know which one is positive and which is negative on each the buttons and switches?

fsttyms1

You dont need to. All you need ro know is the positive of the led. Once soldered up correctly and installed if it doesnt light up you just simply take out like a normal bulb and put in the other way. (plus the directions from ledautomotive tell you which way is +)

02TLSfan

It's ironic, this is the same thing I am in the process of doing, same color scheme, same color car and I followed your door handle LED DIY. I hope mine turns out as well as yours, I won't have to go through the trouble of doing the nav or radio since I have aftermarket for both.

Great work btw.

02TLSfan

I'm curious, what mcd LEDs did you use or would recommend? I have some 7000 and 10000mcd lights, but was looking at some 27000mcd lights. Would this be too much of an overkill? I don't want to be blinded when I turn on my lights.

I replaced most of my guage cluster with blue lights, but it isn't bright enough and the needles hardly light up at all. Makes it kinda hard to see how fast I'm going at night.

How would I get a more uniform light? The lights are already shaved flat.

Any suggestions? From anyone?

vzuptnguyen

wat resistor did you use for each thing?

02TLSfan

I had this same question, so I asked OntarioTL since he seems to know "a little" about this. He said 1/8 watt 470 ohm surface mounted resistors would work, which is great because that's what I had. They don't draw that much power.

It's a bitch to mount them though, they're so fucking tiny, I kept dropping them .
I think they measure 1mm by 2mm, if that. The frustration factor is high, I hope this is not exclusive to me
I was angry enough to almost say the hell with it and smash them with a hammer.
In the end they turned out well.

With a little patience you should be fine.

fsttyms1

Just buy the kit from Ledautomotive it will come with the correct ones

02TLSfan

Or you could do that...
Their kit doesn't seem blue enough or bright enough to me. I'm lucky I have a Fry's next to me, so I can just go there, but I think any store bought LEDs are overpriced...WAY overpriced. Especially when you can get 100 of them on ebay for .10 cents a piece. Resistors are cheap enough though.

rbf351

i'm glad to see people are following what i did almost 4 years ago

Topher707

http://metku.net/index.html?sect=vie...alc/index_eng#

Topher707

The majority of the LEDs are 3mm. I used 13,000 mcd white and blue leds. I shaved of the heads of the leds to make the light more uniform.

For your needles, I recommended 50,000 mcd white 5mm LED.

gaping46and2

iTrader: (2)

I'd suggest running 560ohm resistors instead of 470ohm. When the vehicle is running, the supplied voltage would be closer to 14volts instead of the 12volt rating of the battery because the car's running off the alternator. Be prepared for the LEDs to burn out sometime in the future because of the higher voltage running though them w/o the 560ohm resistors. Although, you should use that resistor calculator CaliChris517 posted to figure out exactly what you're going to need based on your specific LED, since they don't all have the same specs.

ronie

Can someone please post a pic of what the stock cluster and button bulbs look like?
I'm curious why the bulbs from superbrightleds.com will not work. It seems that they have ready made led replacements for the clusters and buttons.

dreem1er

iTrader: (2)

that looking hot.......i waiting to get the leds for the cluster before i start on the rest of the dash......you even got the the memo and mirror control........you have to do a DIY for this.......i know that ledautomotive.com has write ups for the mirror and stuff for other cars but is it the same for the TL.......

OntarioTL

470 ohm is fine for blue....560 ohm is best if you dont want it as bright. You wont blow out the leds with 470 ohm with blue. White and blue leds dont require as high resistance as red or yellow. Plus since LEDs if installed properly can last for 100,000 hours, even using 470 might cut it down a few 1000's hours....woopee do. Think how many hours you leave your lights on (your HIDS only last 3 to 4 thousand hours) My previous install of LEDS with 470 ohm were over 2 years ago and not one blew on me. I only retrofitted again as I wanted a higher mcd.

02TLSfan

They are not bright enough for the application, click more info and check out the intensity, all are below 10,000 mcd. I am using a few of these in my cluster, they are a direct fit, they are bright enough for the odometer cluster but not even close for the guages. I don't know what ledautomotive uses as far as mcd, but I know how they make their cluster replacement lights, so I am going to buy some ridiculously bright lights and make them myself. I don't know if it will be cheaper or brighter, but i've been hella bored lately and need some sort of a challenge.

oulaw29

DAMN that is SWEET, too bad I dont know SHIT about wiring and electronics

vzuptnguyen

real talk.


lol at your little message. will sue for food. haha

seeemo

Does the dimmer still work after this install?

seanranger3

i beleive that it still does

ronie

http://www.ledautomotive.com/OrderIn...lusterInfo.asp
How about this guys? It seems that this is a direct replacement for the cluster.

I replaced all my bulbs in my Integra with all LEDs from superbrightleds.com.. it was all plug and play, however the dimmer does not work anymore.

Topher707

yes

02TLSfan

Hey, you live in Dallas, I'd be glad to help you out.

speedbawlinTL

see, I really want to do this, but screwing up the instument panel is what's keeping me from just manning up and ordering what I need... the radio and everything else, not so much...


also, are the photos just bad or is the blue kit on LEDautomotive a different blue than the bright blue that 3Gs have?

02TLSfan

LEDautomotive uses hyper-white for the guage cluster, they appear blue-ish, plus the back of the dash cluster only has a few lights in it for the guages. 1 for the tach, 2 for the speedo, and 1 for gas/temp, plus the factory bulbs for those sections are bigger than all the others, closer to 10mm. The 3rd gen TLs use a string of lights, I believe, or so I've been told by Acura, but I've never had the pleasure of taking apart a 3rd gen(dealers tend to frown when you take apart a loaner).

69tl

can you guy tell me where to get the LED and which kinda exactly like the part #, because i went to couple web site and they have whole bunch of different kinda of led and i just don't know which to get....thanx in advance for the help

gaping46and2

iTrader: (2)

Some might be interested in reading THIS thread, just as a precaution, if you have not already. This conversion is not exactly plug and play and there is no specific part number you can purchase somewhere.

02TLSfan

They typically advertise #74 bulbs as plug and play with the dash lights. They fit ok but can sometimes be a pain to set back in. The holes for the lights aren't very big, I haven't had any issues other than them not being bright enough.

ThreePointTwoTeeEl

iTrader: (1)

Im going to do Red...The A8 I was in had red buttons and it looked amazing. So I will do that with White LED footwell lighting.