52 replies to this topic

[MrElliott]

Edit- do not use LEDs in place of your standard voltage warning light in your clocks, unless you make sure it has the same resistance across it.

so I thought I would experiment with LED bulbs on my
 mini. Im always looking for ways to be more visible on the roads as other drivers can be numpties at times!
 
so the first one i did was about a year ago
I changed the clock lights to LEDs and this was the result

compared to the normal filament bulbs the brightness was the same but the colour was whiter and made the dials much more clear so over all a positive improvement
 
then rear brake/tail lights
bearing in mind that these were advertised as super bright this is the result with LEDs on the right and standard filament ones on the left

so a bit of a disappointment there! These LEDs are clearly not as bright as the standard ones although are recommended for use in tail lights.
 
The numberplate lights were the last ones I checked today
here again LEDs on the rights and standard ones on the left

The LEDs seem to be slightly brighter but over a smaller area so without the light from my house the N becomes slightly hard to see. The Standard ones in comparison seem to illuminate the entire left hand side which from my point of view is far superior and I personally prefer the more orange glow compared to what ends up being blue from the LEDs.
 
From these three I have tested so far i shall only be using the clock lights as they are the only ones with any improvement.
I have rear indicators, fog light and interior light coming this week so I will post my findings when I test them. I am hoping for better results with these.
 
hope this will help someone
 

Edited by MrElliott, 16 December 2014 - 06:33 PM.

[leadly]

Good write up. How many white bulbs did you need for your clocks. Not had time to pull mine out to check.

With regards to the indicators, I've read that you need to install an electronic flasher unit in place of the standard one to get them to work. Don't know if you know this but thought it worth mentioning.

I've only got round to changing the interior courtesy light to led so far. It was a big improvement though.

[Ethel]

Might not be a fair comparison to have one of each, different resistances will split the voltage differently,it's a bit like someone flushing the bog when you're in the shower.

[firstforward]

I will be following this thread, keep up the good work.

[bikewiz]

Here's the list of LED's I used in my '92

I got most of the stuff from Superbright LEDS over here in the US.
(1) for the rear blinkers and reverse lights single intensity 1156-WHP28 cool white, these are 550 lumens you need 4 of them

(2) for the brake lights dual intensity 1157-RHP28-T (red) 550 lumen you need 2

(3)Side markers WLED-XHP9-T in amber these just fit the housing, 2 of them

(4)Front blinkers 1156-A45-T in amber also 2 of them, the bigger ones listed above don't fit the housing.

(5) 3 pole European flasher CF13GL-02 this was a direct fit in the plug under the dash replacing the mechanical one, it's pretty cool because it clicks like the original. You need this or you need resistors in the blinkers because the LED resistance is so low. I tried the one from Moss Motors but I couldn't get it to work.

I also replaced all of my weak dash lights with LED's WLED-WHP9-T and WLED-WHP5 I can't remember which I used in the 3 clock dash and the 3 auxillary guages but you can actually read the gauges at night now. I used green LED's 921-G12 in the interior indicators. I had to put them in from the front as the casing won't allow it to fit through the bulb socket hole. These are really bright so you can see them on a sunny day. I also did the interior light for the same reason. I used a standard bulb in the alt/gen position.

 

I experimented a lot (and wasted a bunch of money) until I found the brightest LED that would fit and had the proper light angle to reflect off of the inside of the light housing. My lights are considerably brighter than the stock bulbs. The only rating I could find on the standard incandesant 1156 single filament and 1157 dual filament was they're around 400 lumens new, however I've been told they lose brightness pretty quickly. You can also find info on the color range LED's fall into, so even if the lumen rating is only 150 higher they appear even brighter because of the color, the stock bulbs look pretty yellow compared the the cool white LED. I've also found trying to get a good picture to show how much brighter they are is really difficult, but by eye they really pop.

 

Hope this is of help to someone.

[Dan]

In the clocks the warning lamps look brighter too, have you fitted LEDs there? Do you know that using an LED in the charge warning lamp will stop the alternator working at all unless you make other changes to the wiring?

[MrElliott]

Yes the warning lights are leds too. his has been mentioned a couple of times to me.
Since i fitted the led for the voltage warning light i have managed to break two alternators within a month but for ten months it has been fine. Im not 100% convinced that this can cause an alternator not to charge. How does it effect the circuit? And how does this not stop the alternator all the time?

[Ben_O]

I heard recently that for brake lights and stop lights to be more efficient from the use of LED bulbs, it is recommended that you use red LED bulbs

 

Ben 

[Carlos W]

A high level 3rd brake light is a good idea in terms of safety.

[Dan]

Yes the warning lights are leds too. his has been mentioned a couple of times to me.
Since i fitted the led for the voltage warning light i have managed to break two alternators within a month but for ten months it has been fine. Im not 100% convinced that this can cause an alternator not to charge. How does it effect the circuit? And how does this not stop the alternator all the time?

The alternator windings need to get 12v through a 2.2w bulb on the warning circuit in order to make the right magnetic field to start the alternator charging. A diode stops them getting any current at all. Maybe if you are using bi-directional LEDs there is some current getting through, enough to make the alternator charge, but because of the incorrect resistance on the circuit also causing damage to the diode pack. It shouldn't charge at all though really and I'm surprised you haven't been getting flat batteries in the past few months. Certainly there have been plenty of people on here complaining they aren't getting any charge and finding it was due to an LED warning lamp. There is a way to make it work though, you just need to put the right amount of resistance in parallel with your LED. Search for threads about this with posts from DK Lawson, he's given the answer enough times.

[miniboy1993]

Can someone send me a link to these 501 led bulbs I have looked for them but there so many? And I don't want to get the wrong one :)

[grck1]

i found with led tail / stop light bulbs that whilst the leds gave a brighter taillight, the light output when braking was not much more than the taillight output and much more directional, ie thin focused beam as opposed to a large glow. as a mini is quite low i thought that the chances of other drivers not seeing the small change in output when braking would be quite high and possibly could end in a bad way.

[1984mini25]

I did by a pair of these about a year ago... 24 red duel brightness stop and tail light bulbs.

 

 

BUT, although the side/tail lights were brighter than a standard bulb, the stop/brake lights were next to non-existent and worse than the standard bulb. And imo fitting then in would have been unsafe compared to standard bulbs.

 

Thears a YouTube vid that also backs up using led for the combined brake and tail lights at least are unsafe.

[1984mini25]

Although the brake light bulbs were useless I am still using led bulbs in the fogs (still pretty useless), sidelights, clocks, both interior lights, rear number plate, 3rd brake light and some stick on strips under the dash rail and heater.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by 1984mini25, 10 December 2014 - 04:50 PM.

[Richie83]

Although the brake light bulbs were useless I am still using led bulbs in the fogs (still pretty useless), sidelights, clocks, both interior lights, rear number plate, 3rd brake light and some stick on strips under the dash rail and heater.  
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

how did you secure the light in your dash?