Converted to LED brake light bulbs, very happy

[Teej]

BTW, I feel like my tail lights appear orangish... possibly because of the bright white bulbs behind a frosty red lens. I noticed this more when looking at my car from a back angle where the rear side marker was nice and RED.

Has anyone used RED leds for tail/brake lights instead of the white? In theory since LEDs are more intense in any color, wondering if the red should still be bright enough to blast through a red lens. I guess in theory it should be just fine, just appear more rich like other modern cars.

Anyone?

 

[Hapa88]

BTW, I feel like my tail lights appear orangish... possibly because of the bright white bulbs behind a frosty red lens. I noticed this more when looking at my car from a back angle where the rear side marker was nice and RED.

Has anyone used RED leds for tail/brake lights instead of the white? In theory since LEDs are more intense in any color, wondering if the red should still be bright enough to blast through a red lens. I guess in theory it should be just fine, just appear more rich like other modern cars.

Anyone?

You should definitely use RED leds when replacing taillight bulbs. Keep in mind that "white" LEDs are typically illuminate heavily in the "blue" spectrum and actually have very little red light in them. Below is a graph showing the typical spectrograph of a "white" LED.


Secondly the taillight lens pretty much filters out all other colors except for red (that's the whole point of the red plastic), so your super bright white LEDs get reduced down to just the red spectrum (which is a very little amount anyway) plus a little bleeding from the yellow/orange. Basically everything from ~550nm and below will be filtered out..

By starting with a red LED you don't have that problem. The light will shine more red and it'll probably be brighter overall.

 

[Teej]

Hapa,

I'm picking up what you are putting down... however keep in mind that 99.9% of tail lights bulbs are in fact historically clear, not red, despite being housed behind a red lens. So the use of red LED's isn't as common sense as one might think.

But yeah, the one thing that has kept me at bay when looking at the complete GTC style LED tail lights is they look orange in photos instead of red.

Looks like I will be dropping more cashola on some red LEDs.

 

[Hapa88]

Hapa,

I'm picking up what you are putting down... however keep in mind that 99.9% of tail lights bulbs are in fact historically clear, not red, despite being housed behind a red lens. So the use of red LED's isn't as common sense as one might think.

Yes, I know both "appear" white, but you have to see the spectrograph of each bulb to understand what's being filtered.

Here's a spectro of a typical incandescent bulb like the OEM bulbs in the NSX (note how much red is in there):

By comparison, here's the LED "white" graph

Source:
http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2130527

 

[Teej]

Yeah, I doubt they whipped out the spectrograph when deciding to slap an incandescent bulb behind a semi opaque cover whether its clear, amber, or red.

Anyway, right now I am just shopping for the brightest yet deepest red LED available without throwing down $70 each like those crazy new v3 Tritans that they have on vLEds.com

 

[Hapa88]

Yeah, I doubt they whipped out the spectrograph when deciding to slap an incandescent bulb behind a semi opaque cover whether its clear, amber, or red.

Anyway, right now I am just shopping for the brightest yet deepest red LED available without throwing down $70 each like those crazy new v3 Tritans that they have on vLEds.com

You don't want the "deepest red" LED, you want the red that is closest in color to the taillight covers. This would reduce the amount of red light that is filtered out, allowing the most light to pass through.

 

[JS2k]

Not sure if this has been mentioned or not, but most, if not all OEM applications use Red-Orange LEDs because they are a good amount brighter than pure red LEDs.

I also want to note that stock NSX tail lights are on the dimmer side. Normally and typically, these types of LEDs in a plug and play configuration are dimmer than incandescents.

 

[Teej]

Not sure if this has been mentioned or not, but most, if not all OEM applications use Red-Orange LEDs because they are a good amount brighter than pure red LEDs.

I also want to note that stock NSX tail lights are on the dimmer side. Normally and typically, these types of LEDs in a plug and play configuration are dimmer than incandescents.

Good to know about the red/orange LEDs. Ill see if i can source those instead, but it looks so far like most people just have red.

The LEDs I dropped in are def brighter than the ones I pulled out, but to be fair, even in the incandescent world, not all bulb mfgs are made equal. Your $2.99 bulb most likely will not be as vibrant and bright as your $11.99 bulb. In dealing with LEDs going back to the late 90's, not all LEDs are created equal either.

The $20 I spent on two single bulb Sylvannia LEDs for my Infiniti license plate area are exponentially brighter than any of the blister pack 6-LED bulbs I purchased elsewhere.

 

[JS2k]

Good to know about the red/orange LEDs. Ill see if i can source those instead, but it looks so far like most people just have red.

The LEDs I dropped in are def brighter than the ones I pulled out, but to be fair, even in the incandescent world, not all bulb mfgs are made equal. Your $2.99 bulb most likely will not be as vibrant and bright as your $11.99 bulb. In dealing with LEDs going back to the late 90's, not all LEDs are created equal either.

The $20 I spent on two single bulb Sylvannia LEDs for my Infiniti license plate area are exponentially brighter than any of the blister pack 6-LED bulbs I purchased elsewhere.

Most of the LEDs that are mass produced in China are pure red, but you may be able to find a few red orange ones out there.

I agree. LED technology has come quite a long way in the past couple years. I'm a vendor on S2ki for LEDs, so I've had my fair share of terrible LED manufacturers and experimenting with LEDs.
Currently building a set of turn signal / DRL LEDs from scratch with around 100 LEDs.

Edit:
An interesting tidbit I found.
While personal preference can play somewhat of a role in determining that, red-orange is the unofficial industry standard for brake lamp illumination color. this is because the color appears brighter to the human eye without actually being any brighter then a typical red led. how can that be?

the easiest way to see that is to look at a human eye sensitivity chart:

stolen from here: http://www.maximintegrated.com/app-n...ex.mvp/id/1883

 

[Teej]

Just as an update, my red 25 (or so) SMD red LEDs arrived and were installed yesterday to replace my existing white LEDs in my tail lights.

As advertised on this very thread, they were much more rich and luminous than my previous LEDs. I was actually pretty blown away.. its like replacing your handheld flashlight batteries back in the day, it was that big of difference going from white to red.

Even with just the first bulb in, the glow on my garage door dominated the other remaining bulbs.

I really did NOT like the faint orange/red color the OEM incandescents and my first run of white LEDs were putting out.

I still have the white 168/194 LEDs but the reds are being shipped as we speak, as are the CREE reverse whites.

 

[Vi3tBoy]

what brand did you end up going with?

 

[Teej]

what brand did you end up going with?

I bought these from superbrightleds.com ended up costing about $80 shipped for just four of them.

1157-x26-CBT: 1157 CAN Bus LED Bulb - Dual Intensity 26 SMD LED Tower 1157-R26-CBT: Red


I have the red 194/168 coming from an eBay vendor as well as the reverse light white CREEs from the same vendor.

*I am not sure if there is a bulb difference between the 02+ tails and the rest. Make sure you check that before ordering any bulbs just in case.

 

[DreamPowered]

Any pics of your lights Teej ? I really want to upgrade my tail light bulbs on my 91

 

[Teej]

Any pics of your lights Teej ? I really want to upgrade my tail light bulbs on my 91

I'll take some pics tonight, not sure how they will turn out but I will also try to get next to my friends NSX for comparison, that would probably be the best test.

 

[DreamPowered]

Thank you. That would be great. Looking foward to see them.

 

[Teej]

These were taken with an iPhone5 last night. Unfortunately it doesnt capture "true vision" like a high end real camera would. Still, you can tell there is a luminescent difference between my friends on the left, and mine on the right. With the naked eye, mine appear more "stop light red" whereas his almost looks "fainty orange red". Looking at the surrounding glow should let you know how bright it is.

 

[DreamPowered]

Wow that's great. Such a big difference esp when you see the surrounding light. Just to clarify the pics were with you applying the brake and not just the parking/running light on.

 

[Teej]

Wow that's great. Such a big difference esp when you see the surrounding light. Just to clarify the pics were with you applying the brake and not just the parking/running light on.

Nope, no ones in either car, no brakes on

 

[Vi3tBoy]

Did you guys take one with both of the cars brakes on by chance?

 

[Teej]

Did you guys take one with both of the cars brakes on by chance?

No, just two of us there. He hit his brakes once and I watched, same other way around. He said mine didn't get much brighter but my 3rd brake light lit up

 

[TURBO2GO]

I am bumping this thread. Have any of you replaced the turn signals with LED? how did you fix the hyperflash?

 

[Teej]

I am bumping this thread. Have any of you replaced the turn signals with LED? how did you fix the hyperflash?

Dave, most decent LEDs now are CANBUS. That means no hyper flash. Look for "canbus" in the description. Superbrightleds.com or CARid.com

 

[TURBO2GO]

I already have LED clusters built by Bright Light tech (KIX). He used to modify the flasher to aleviate the hyperflash and the tail lamp out indicator and now I have both. He is no longer responding to any emails. I am just trying to find a solution.

 

[Teej]

I already have LED clusters built by Bright Light tech (KIX). He used to modify the flasher to aleviate the hyperflash and the tail lamp out indicator and now I have both. He is no longer responding to any emails. I am just trying to find a solution.

http://www.vleds.com/load-resistors...n-signal-blinker-fix-1-pair.html?options=cart

 

[TURBO2GO]

Yeah I bought these but not sure where to install it because my LED wires go to a controller that has knobs that control the brightness. And I am worried it will affect that but I guess I will try it. I want to fit the resistors between that box and the flasher not at the lamp end. But I don't know the flasher wiring. Kix had a mod that he did to the flasher that fixed that AND the tail lamp out indicator. It was inside the flasher and very clean.