LED light bulb replacements

[Robert Caffyn]

Have been thinking of this for a while. I know I'll need an LED flasher module to make them work right. But here is a simple question: For the tailights, should I use a clear or red LED bulb(s)? I want to get the maximum amount of light that I can. I have read that when using a red lens, a red bulb should be used to avoid that "pink" look a clear bulb can give. Any help here, I know Andy C. has done this, maybe he'll answer this. Bob

 

[OFF TRAC]

In my case, the red LED bulbs with red lens looked brighter then when I put in white ones. Regardless, I ended up switching the taillights back to standard bulbs. The LED bulbs didn't illuminate the taillights fully. They just seemed to light up the area directly in front of the LED. You could make out the LED pattern when they were on and that's pretty much the only "stop" or "blinker" light that would show.



The LED bulbs were from the PepBoys, so that may be why they didn't light up the complete tailight.

 

[EddieS'04]

Red leds'. Choose led's that have an aray of lamps to the side also. so it will light up the the mirror reflectors.

 

[Richard L]

Personally I like the Red LED's for taillights. They have a more intense red color when lit behind a red lens. As for brightness, it is not based on the color.



LEDs are made in numerous levels of brightness (micro farrads) regardless of their color. The higher the micro farrads the brighter the LED. Also, the projection angle has a lot to do with how bright an LED appears. The narrower the angle, the brighter the light and the wider the angle, the less intense the light appears. Although the brightest LED's are often white/clear, you can find some RED LEDs that are brighter than many white/clear LEDs You want the brightest Red LED's you can find.



...Rich

 

[Jim Sacco]

These are the ones that I used, and I love them.. I used colored ones.

 

[Art Garcia]

clear LED will work better with your tailights. somewhat personal experince.

 

[EddieS'04]

Arturo, you have blacked out lens, right? That may be why clear works for you. White behind red looks pink.

 

[Mark K 2]

You have to make sure you get LEDs that bounce light off the reflector of the tail light housing. I have tried various LEDs and found only one that truly lights up the entire tail/brake light reflector surface area. Spider LED's only create five little lines of light and don't use the whole reflector area.



Here's what I use:



[Broken External Image]:



And here's the current equivalent:

 

[Robert Caffyn]

Thanks guys, I was kinda sure I would go with the clear bulbs. Mark, Yeah, thats the bulb I was looking at for the front turn and rear lights. It was a bulb with 48 leds though, built the same way. I think it was "superbrightleds.com" that I saw them on. Will check ebay to see if I can save a couple bucks. thanks again all, Bob :supercool:

 

[Mark K 2]

Bob...



They aren't the best in the front turn signal. I tried tham. It's like the LEDs don't reflect the right way in the reflector. But they're great as tail/brake lights. The whole reflector is filled with light as bright as the original bulbs.