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How To: Change backlight color (HVAC, switches, etc.)

11K views 32 replies 9 participants last post by  ZergTheBear 
#1 · (Edited)
#2 ·
Nice work Zerg! Great to see someone "handy" with a soldering iron making strides with new mods. I'm going to observe for a while before jumping in on this though - I have too many other mods in the pipeline to finish before I start another!

But again, thanks for your efforts, great to see and excellent write-up with photos and detail.
 
#4 · (Edited)
this is awsome

I just have to do this in blue as soon as i get school vacations!!!!

Zerg, what do you think about these leds,

http://www.superbrightleds.com/specs/b2545_specs.htm

they are 2500 mcd with a viewing angle of 45deg.

There are others with less intensity (1200 mcd) but a viewing angle of 120deg, do you think that the wider viewing angle will help with the issue of dispersion and hotspots?
 
#7 ·
this is awsome

I just have to do this in blue as soon as i get school vacations!!!!

Zerg, what do you think about these leds,

http://www.superbrightleds.com/specs/b2545_specs.htm

they are 2500 mcd with a viewing angle of 45deg.

There are others with less intensity (1200 mcd) but a viewing angle of 120deg, do you think that the wider viewing angle will help with the issue of dispersion and hotspots?
I would probably go with the 120° LEDs. My 1160 mcd LEDs seem to match the brightness of the rest of the car well (helpful if you don't change everything at once). The 2500s would probably stand out until you changed all of them, but still, they would make the dash brighter at night than it is now.

I personally think the viewing angle is the most important thing. I'm almost thinking about trying to get new LEDs with a better viewing angle to fix those problems. Not bothered by it that much... yet.
 
#6 ·
very impressive write up! WOW I would never dare to go takin my ride apart like that. Kudos for the nads man!
 
#11 ·
im havin trouble findin those exact resistors, whered you get em, what is an ok range for them to be in. thanks
 
#12 ·
I got both the LEDs and resistors from Digikey. Here is the link for the LEDs:
http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Detail?name=404-1097-ND

...and the resistors:
http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Detail?name=CMF634HFCT-ND

BUT... you need to calculate the resistor you need for your specific LED. Here is a site that will do that for you:
http://led.linear1.org/1led.wiz

**Use 14 V for Source voltage.** That's the typical voltage seen in the car. This site shows a common resistor value you should be albe to find at most places. The 680 1/2W they show for the LEDs I used will probably be better than what I ordered. I got my resistor value by doing the calculation myself. Unless you know the formulas off the top of your head to calculate these values, don't stray from this website's reccommendation.

I'll add the calculator link to the main post.
 
#13 ·
#14 ·
Well see how engineering school goes.
these are suggested. http://led.linear1.org/1led.wiz?VS=14;VF=2.0;ID=30
for these http://superbrightleds.com/specs/R12120_specs.htm
these are the 120 degree viewing angle.
Yep, everything looks good. Just make sure you get the 1W resistor. It will be bigger than a 1/2W, but if you just get a 1/2W, it will get pretty hot. Like the site says, you want to stay below 60% of the resistor's rated watage at the most. With the setup you're going for, you're over that number for a 1/2W, so they bumped you up to 1W.
 
#18 · (Edited)
Red, :). the light does show up well on the nobs, but thats, looks killer. ill finish up the other lights tomorow.



bleh pictures, looks great irl
 
#21 ·
Sorry for the lack of reply Enano, I know I was writing a reply this weekend, but it must not have been posted.

To check for polarity, you need to get down to the bare PCB. Take this back out to the car, plug it in, and turn on the lights. Then take a multimeter and measure the voltage across each light. If the voltage read by the meter is positive, then the positive side of the light is the red lead and the negative side of the light is the black lead. If the voltage you read is negative, the it's the exact opposite.

Then, when placing your LED's the annode is the positive side and the cathode is the negative side (cathode is usually the shorter lead, but not always).

Hopefully this helps.
 
#23 ·
I attempted the headlight switch this weekend, and ended up not going through with it. First off, if you want to take the switch apart, there is a torx screw (T10) under the label that needs to be taken out to get the rest of the housing off. I didn't know this until I broke mine.

Also, when you take out the circuit board, there are three lights you can see, and one that is covered up by plastic that is attached to the PCB. One of the three visible lights you can't really get to without removing the plastic. The plastic has a PCB of its own that is soldered to the main PCB.

Since I just did the free auto headlight mod and broke my switch in the process (it still works, just a little broken plastic in the back), I'm going to order an actual auto headlight switch and do the mod on that one, then put it into the car. I have been trying to see if moparsupercenter has any more because it isn't listed on their site. If not, I'll have to go through the dealer.

I know you didn't ask about this, but I did look into the steering wheel switches, but when it said you have to remove the airbag, I got a little nervous and decided to postpone that change.

My next task is probably the garage door opener and possibly even the U-Connect rear view mirror. Then I'll move onto the door switches (window/mirror/lock).
 
#29 ·
On an upside:
I modified the heated seat switches to darken them up a bit to blend in with the HVAC better. The update and picture are in the main post. Short version is that I added tissue paper to darken it.

On a downside:
So, I finally got around to starting the Nav radio today and ran into a very unpleasant surprise. When checking the polarity of all of the lights (there are 12 of them) I found out that they are all operating on 5V, not 12V. If I put in the LEDs with the current resistors that I have, they won't be very bright. From the resistor calculator, I am seeing that my LEDs will need a 150ohm 1/8W resistor to light up properly. One nice thing about this is that these resistors will be smaller because they are only 1/8W instead of 1/2W. There isn't as much room in the Nav radio as there was on the other parts, so this smaller resistor will help out some.

This will really throw a kink into the works for the people that bought the LEDs with the resistor already in them. What you will have to do is put another resistor in parallel to your current one like so (sorry for the drawing being so rough).


I'll try to get some of these resistors this week and let you know how it went.
 
#30 ·
nice, im thinking of dissassembling a few things with lights on them and bringing them to school along with the leds/resistors and do them there, can i put power through the pcb somehow to light up the leds without the car?, (a 9v?)
 
#31 ·
How are you getting the power? I think you're saying you'd use a 9V battery. This would work for everything I've done except the Nav Radio. If you were trying to do the same to that, you would need a 5V power supply. I wouldn't try this on anything else that I haven't done yet, as you won't know what voltage is used for the lights.

I wouldn't think you would damage anything, but I can't say for sure as I don't know the schematic or components connected to those circuits. If I were backfeeding power like this, I would apply power and ground straight to the PCB where the LEDs are connected. Make sure any wires you use to bring the power to the PCB don't touch anything else other than the LED pads.

Just to make sure everyone is aware - there is a very real chance you could break whatever you're working on. Sometimes you can put it back to original condition and take it in for warranty. Other times (like my ESP switch) you damage it and can't turn it in if you screw up. Just keep in mind that this is not guaranteed to be problem-free.
 
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