one bright tail light

Check the bulb first - they are stamped with power ratings - like 5 or 8 Watts. Could be wired wrong too - where running light is wired to brake light filament. 

Paul, once you get the wiring sorted, you might consider LED.  Hot bulb issues go away.

That is a great idea. Any links to doing a conversion?

Heard good things about this guy from Jim Kelly on SOC.

 

"Jim Franzen is based in Batavia, IL.  His e-mail address is: Franzen@CuLayer.com.  It was a real pleasure to deal with him.  He takes great pride in his invention."

 

Here's another source unknown to me.

http://www.superbrightleds.com...e-replacement-bulbs/

Check the ground on the dim side. Bad or loose ground will cause a dim light.

 

Is it possibly a 6-volt bulb?

 

That might explain why it's running hot and too bright while the other is dim.

 

 

what is the deal with what appears to be drop in LED bulbs on ebay. see a bunch that show as replacements for the standard 1157 bulb. any one try these?

Bad filiment, bad ground, 6v bulb

Hi guys. I know designs have appeared with new teardrop LED systems and they are great. But you don't need to do any modifications for LED bulbs. You can buy LED replacements for all the bulbs (I haven't done the headlights) The only modification as such is you need an electronic relay for the indicators as the ordinary ones need the power consumption to be high to heat the bimetalic strip making the break/unbreak for the off and on. And the advantage is, if you do get an LED blow, you can replace with a standard bulb, if you need to. I use a red LED for side and break (I used a white bulb first but it was a bit wishywashy.

any tips on how to wire in the relay you mentioned when adding these LED Bulbs for the turn signals?

I added LED bulbs to my Beck and did not need to add relays to get the indicators to work properly.  I don't have the info on what I used handy but they were round LED arrays with a pigtail that plugged into the bulb socket.  the most complex part of the installation was cutting up a Coke can to make proper supports for the LED arrays in the teardrop light fixtures.

The newer electronic flashers don't care if the "light" is LED or incandescent....

Hi Lane, those pig tails are probably resisters (get hot) to make the system think it's using incandescent bulbs. That way you don't need to change (not add) a new indicator relay. I didn't want anything in the system that gets hot, just sucking power to radiate away. If you just change the existing indicator relay (mine was an old 5 pin VW beetle relay - I checked the functions and bought a 3 pin electronic design and just replaced it, no wiring change) Then you can just replace the bulbs with LED's. An advantage is that should an LED blow, you can replace with a standard bulb and it'll work. I suppose you could too with the resistors system but you may have to remove the resistor (pig tail bit) ?? Another factor of this system is that on a normal incandescent system, if an indicator bulb blows, the other bulb indicator rate speeds up. With this system, the rate is time based not power consumption based, i.e. same blink rate.

Just in case it's not clear. I have the teardrop tail lights and I just changed these bulbs too with LED type, no new assemblies. I used red LED, stop and tail bulbs (little bit different from USA arrangements) and white LED for the indicator bulbs at the back and because I have clear front indicators, I used amber LED bulbs. I either got the bulbs here in the UK or some sourced from Hong Kong (on ebay)

I bought 4 led's from Jim Franzin for my bee hive tails on my 56, they work beautifully but just so you know They're $100 a piece or 4 for $400...

Ouch !! The LED's I get from the UK are a bit more expensive than standard bulbs (they fit in the same receptacles) but the ones I get from Hong Kong (ebay) are real cheap, about £1.99 for 2 bulbs to £4.50 ish, depending on whether they are single or dual function - side light or stop and side etc. The shipping is generally free too.

Here's a stop & tail light LED for direct replacement into a european tear drop tail lens. £3.39 on ebay.

I just bought a pair of 1156 replacement bulbs in LED...look just like the picture you posted. got them at Pepboys for $20 for the pair.  they had the 1157 replacement which is for the turnsignal and driving light too but I didn't buy it because I was concerned about relays and resistors.  The 1156 stop light dropped right in and works great. I bought it in red as suggested here.

did that 3 pin electronic flasher just plug into the harness or did you have to modify the harness to make it work?  you wouldn't happen to have a part number or brand?

 

regards,
Paul

Paul,the only LED's that wont work "as is" are the flasher unit ones, side lights and stop lights are just bulbs that draw less power. I changed those before my flasher unit arrived. The flasher unit on mine is located in a "block" I just unplugged the old unit and plugged in the new one. I will go and get the unit details later today.

Here's a pic of the unit. I think that any "LED flasher unit" will work though.

excellent. thank you for the info. going to head over to the auto parts store again and see if I can pick up one of those and the 1157 LED indicator bulbs. 

I think the pigtails are just wires to allow the larger array to use the existing socket.  Here is the link to what I bought: http://www.customdynamics.com/...enesis_LED_Clusters_

 

The are also available without the pigtails for those applications where a straight on plug in would work.  They wouldn't fit in the tail light housings for our cars that way.

Hi Lane. I see what you bought. The things I bought are just replacements for normal bulbs fitting in the same socket as the standard bulbs. I still have the exact same bulb / socket arrangement for all bulbs, just LED replacements. The only thing I had to change was the "flasher unit" as the normal flasher unit, with this type of replacement wont work. It'll be different with yours. I have the option, if a LED fails to just replace with a standard bulb on the side of the road if need be.

So do I as it did not require changing the sockets.  The pigtails have regular bulb plug on the end.  I may have some pictures at home, but I think I lost them when our hard-drive controller crashed and corrupted the primary and backup hard-drives.

OK Lane. It seems pretty similar.

I looked at the clusters that were more conventionally shaped but was concerned about directionality.  How do yours compare to the incandescent bulbs for that?

I looked for bulbs with the greatest number of LED's, usually with all round LED's simulating a normal incandescent bulb. There are designs with 24 / 36 LED's etc. They also have different designs, i.e. the mini bulb type and the square LED's like a circuit board. I have also replaced the reversing light bulb, everything except the headlights, they are Halogen. (Just bought some new ones of these - Yellow. Apparently yellow sees through fog better than white and I'm told legal in the UK) Anyway, to answer your question, as long as I get the highest number of LED's possible, they're fine, the reverse for instance has a huge space available and I fitted a big bulb in there, it's better.