I was looking for some small smt stuff, and foundthis. It's a replacement for an incandescent bulb? Maybe it could go in your gauges?

http://www.chml.com/pdf/temp/1511A25W3.pdf

thx

Looks interesting and maybe worth looking into. The problem I've run into with the LED's is the angle of the illumination. I didn't see an angle listed in the specs for these LED's.

I've tried green LED's that were clustered with four bulbs and were rated at 15 degrees. These bulbs give off quite a bit of light but bouncing the light around the insides of the gage is presenting a problem.

I've since ordered and received the same LED's in white but this time I also ordered whats called a wide angle LED that's rated at 100 degrees. I haven't experimented with them yet, possibly tomorrow.

I have extra gages and I've painted the insides of one of them gloss white. On another gage I painted the insides white but I also removed the green plastic light diffuser. When using green LED's or clear incandescent bulbs without the green diffuser, the gage seems to light up much better.

I'm expecting the the white LED's without the green diffuser will be the best scenario, lighting up the gage the best. My goal is to clearly see my gages at night, I'll gladly sacrifice the green-glow these gages were designed with.

All of these bulbs have a bayonet base and plug directly into the factory socket.

Bruce

You might look around their web site: http://www.cml-it.com/cgi-bin/start.cgi/home.html

That have lots of bulb alternatives with different bases & colours

The only thing I can think of to light up the guages correctly or evenly is to run a string of the SMT leds chips around the perimeter of the case on the inside. You could have up to 12 of them in a string, and they usually come in colors like red & green, but I'm not sure about how to connect it to the bulb socket.

Looks interesting and maybe worth looking into. The problem I've run into with the LED's is the angle of the illumination. I didn't see an angle listed in the specs for these LED's.

The angle of illumination isn't as important as the lamp's radiation pattern. If it doesn't even have the correct radiation (illumination) pattern, then there's no use looking into it any deeper.

thx

We're probably talking about the same thing, just different terminology. On this website, they define it as "Viewing Angle" measured in degrees which is possibly your "Radiation Pattern".

http://www.superbrightleds.com/specs/ba9s.htm

Bruce

The radiation pattern describes where the light radiates from the top, sides & botom, so hopefully, you get light in 360 degrees in both directions. Like an incandescent bulb ( the best radiation patern inside your gauges) does. Too bad LEDs only radiate mostly from the top.

The radiation pattern describes where the light radiates from the top, sides & botom, so hopefully, you get light from 360 degrees in both directions; Like an incandescent bulb (the best radiation pattern for inside your gauges) does. Too bad LEDs radiate mostly from the top.

I saw a product on an older episode of two guys garage called SPIDERLITE which addresses the multiple led in a socket issue. They use it in a tail light application. Couldn't find it in the site on a search so here it is.

OK OK you've peaked my interest in the whole dash light thing again.........

Here's what I found on the site that BD240Z posted. The BA9S W WV look to be the best for out dashlights. It has a 100 deg. viewing angle and is 11,200 mcd brite. Just like the LED's I use in my LED taillights.

Low draw and wide angle with the correct bulb style..........sounds like a winner so far

Too much light can be a bad thing too. My Replay Sirius receiver is

ok in the day but way distracting at night.

Jay

AKA zdisease

Too much light can be a bad thing too. My Replay Sirius receiver is

ok in the day but way distracting at night.

Jay

AKA zdisease

Then I guess it's a good thing that Z cars come with a dimmer under the dash.