More LED's!

[ColonelPanic]

Not sure what got into me, but this evening, I hooked up my LED's again. I was originally planning to spend the day removing all mods in preparation for trading this clunker in, but I saw what wasn't in my bank account so I figured I would just make the best out of what I have for the time being. So anyway, I went by Pep Boys and they had some clearance goodies in the riceboy section. I wanted some of those LED's to mount above the door handles, and wouldn't ya know, I found a pack of three for $6 on clearance. Same ones I saw at the 'Zone for $9.99. Damn that's rather expensive considering that $1.00 worth of parts in that package is probably pushing it. But anyway... I picked up a set of purple ones and went on my way.I reinstalled the under-dash LED pods that I previously yanked out for some reason, I think it was done before I brought it to the dealer tried to figure out why the hell the dash is falling off... Those are purple too - think purple as in blacklight and you've got an idea of what it looks like. So I've got the floor lit up in purple on both sides, and where the LED's are mounted it also shines on the door panels. I grabbed a 9V and hooked up my newly purchased purple LED's and stuck 'em up around the door handle to see what it would look like but I didn't really care for them there... So I was wondering what the heck I could do with these things, then the Mrs. mentioned putting them in the radio bezel so they shine down on the HVAC controls and such. Splended idea!Got back home and yanked the bezel, took it inside to drill. I drilled three holes, left/center/right, and stuck the LED's in there. Got them out in the car and ugh, the LED was showing and it kinda got annoying really quick. So, (and another idea by the Mrs., I wouldn't have ever thought of this!) I pushed the LED's up into the bezel a bit more. Hot glued 'em in place from the inside. Perfect. Unfortunately though, I jacked up the left LED during the process and it only worked if you held the wires just so. So I just moved the center one to the left and have only the edges of the bezel illuminated. And a big gaping hole drilled out in the center. I don't really care though, my bezel looks like dump anyway from me scratching the heck out of it, so I don't really care about the big hole there (which you can't see anyway unless you're looking up from the floor.)The bezel LED's are connected to the same switch as my under dash LED's are. Here's the fruit of my labor tonight... Blurry pics, but hey - you get the idea. I'm not sure why the camera picks up the color as having more blue than it really does, so it doesn't look completely accurate but you get the idea... Like I said above, just think blacklight. Next on the agenda: some LED strips that will go in the map pockets on the doors.

[jeffgtx]

very nice.that LED under the radio bezzel is starting to get to me. you guys are pretty creative.

[redlava]

Nice job James. I didn't think the Purple would look very good with the red, but I was wrong. If Toyota and GM give you a lemon, make lemonade.

[ColonelPanic]

Thank ya! I'll get some pics of the rest sometime soon, I couldn't last night since I don't think it would be cool to let you guys see how the mountains of trash in the floor glow from the LED's under the dash.

[ColonelPanic]

Spent quite a bit of time in the ol' Vibe tonight with the purple led's... I've gotta say, that was well worth permanently damaging the Vibe's plastic components. Up until now, I've been a "double sided tape or it ain't going on!" type of person. lolI actually think it turned out better with just the two LED's instead of 3 on the radio bezel. But I would like to do something with that big gaping hole in the trim, but not sure what.... I'm thinking about a white LED connected to the dome light circuit, what do you guys think? Pretty much pointless but hey, it'll fill the hole. lol!

[jeffgtx]

which gaping hole are you referring too?

[Mr. Poopypants]

Lookin good! I may have to start doing some LEDs too.

[POLO]

Interresting Where you connect the led to power up and to you use a ressistor with the led?I have led project too,but i'm a real amateur on this things.

[Kari]

Quote, originally posted by jeffgtx »which gaping hole are you referring too?The hole where the center LED was...you can see it in picture #1, right above the fan speed knob.

[ColonelPanic]

No resistors necessary... These LED's that I have are 12V and don't seem to need resistors... At least they didn't come with any, nor did the instructions say anything about it. lol!I know the pods I have under the dash already have built-in resistors, so you just connect power and ground.Power I got from an Add-A-Circuit that is in the CIG fuse (I'm using this for both the LED's and the automatic dimming mirror) and ground was from a bolt under the driver's side kick panel...

[POLO]

Thanks for the info bro

[BlueCrush]

I like that LED mod! That looks really cool! I will get around to LED'ing my interior someday.

[ColonelPanic]

Thank ya. Doesn't take much at all to make quite a bit of a difference!I'm going to add a second set of LED's under the dash (blue this time) and wire those up separately so I can have the purple, blue, or both. I'll leave the ones in the radio bezel purple and I'll add a white one to that center hole, and I seem to have decided to connect it to the dome light. More pics to come!

[Mr. Poopypants]

CP, where do you get your LEDs? I am thinking this may be an Ohio meet project.

[jeffgtx]

Quote, originally posted by Mr. Poopypants »CP, where do you get your LEDs? I am thinking this may be an Ohio meet project.the ones i use are from street glow. you can buy them online or at circuit city. they run off 12, no extras needed.the have every color online and the come with a mount type connectro for the hole.

[ColonelPanic]

The ones in the bezel were from Pep Boys... Can't remember the brand name on them. But like Jeff said, those types are available from streetglow, looks close to what i bought.The others as I used under the dash, and I have bought many sets of these, and they're absolutely great: http://store.tireflysonline.co....htmlThey've been on sale for months now... Not many colors available anymore at the $6.99 price but if there is a color you want, they're quite cheap. Note if you look at the motorcycle section, they have a 2-pack of these electropods for ten bucks - I'm going to order one set of the two red ones and possibly install in the 3rd brake light assembly, getting rid of that one dim bulb. Maybe more pods in the housing if space permits. Not sure if there's a size difference between the "automotive" or "motorcycle" ones, but i'll be finding out soon. And I'll be getting a set of these as they appear to be excellent candidates for dressing up the front door panels. http://store.tireflysonline.co....htmlBuy a ton of crap and let's install it next month.

[Mr. Poopypants]

I think I may be buying some stuff to take to the meet. Possibly overlays as well

[jeffgtx]

i have seen that accent lights brand at fry's but they are round. they have a multicolor disc that was kind of neat.the ones at pep boys are called RedLine. very much the same thing.

[ColonelPanic]

I stuck another LED in that empty hole that I drilled. But sadly, from the driver's point of view, my mad drillin' skillz leave a lot to be desired since the hole isn't quite centered. Blah. Anyway, here 's some pics.. It's coo... And I replaced the dome light bulb with a blacklight-ish purple LED bulb, same color like these... Totally dim and makes the dome light completely useless but what the heck right?

[Lancer]

Here's what it looks like with red L.E.D.shttp://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id=17204

[ColonelPanic]

Ok, here's version 2.0 of this project. I had some issues with the LED's not staying in their place when they were recessed, so I had to go ahead and mount them properly, leaving the LED protruding from the bezel. There were some general issues with fit as well, with all three LED's in place it was tight quarters there for the bezel and that was putting stress on the LED's. Plus, the center LED was really, really getting on my nerves since it wasn't necessarily centered in appearance from the driver's seat. Honestly - for me, I think this particular setup is best left with two LED's...Another major change with version 2.0 is the power source for the LED's themselves to add flexibility *and* reduce clutter. I no longer have any wires running down the dash to the power for the other LED's. Instead, thanks to joatmon, I was able to find the pin on the rear defog switch for the illumination. I then simply piggybacked the positive lead for the LED's into the rear of the rear defog switch connector's green wire... This gives me the ability to have the LED's come on with the lights and to control the brightness along with the rest of the interior lights. The ground went simply to underneath the top left bolt for the HU.So hey, this gave me an excellent opportunity to use imovie on my mac for the first time. Enjoy the show! (Quicktime required.) Kinda pointless though really, isn't it?

Attached files led_movie.mov (45.8 KB) 

[ColonelPanic]

And now, I have even more crap installed. Now under the dash, I have two blue LED modules in addition to the two purple (blacklight-ish) LED modules, switched separately. Blue, purple, or both... lolToo bad the cameras don't pick up that great on the purple, instead it just looks blue. So I would get a pic, but... lolI still have some new and excitingly different LED goodies to install if I ever get a chance and a slight amount of creativity.

[jeffgtx]

hmm, quicktime says teh compressor needed is not available... guess i dont get to watch your directorial debut

[ColonelPanic]

Bummer! Silly Macintoshes! I know Kari was able to see it on her mac, but for some reason I guess it's not being very Windows friendly. I I'll try to convert it to something else tonight once I get home and resubmit. lol

[BlueCrush]

Ooooooh! Very nice. Love the colors.

[ColonelPanic]

Ok, here's a version of the cheesy video that will hopefully work for our PC friends. Not sure why the Mac liked it but nothing else did...This is an MPEG-4 video, hopefully this works. I've got it in AVI, but don't make me upload that over dial-up, as it is 2.2 megs. LOL!

Attached files led_movie.mp4 (300 KB) 

[ColonelPanic]

Well, I got all of the trash cleaned up out of the floor to take some pictures.... So, here you have it... Camera on night mode, to help make the reflective vents and vibe thingy on the dash look interesting too.

[ColonelPanic]

Dang it! *sobbing* The right LED in the bezel crapped out tonight. The left still works, but I removed it due to the fact that things were no longer in balance. I may have one more purple one but I'm not sure... If not, I've gotta go find some before the meet!

[Jaycie685]

Looks really good!! It fits very well with your theme.

[ColonelPanic]

Thank ya! I have the bezel here in the house and everything was going as planned until I ended up ripping the leads clean out of the one other purple LED I did have. So that kinda sucks!Blah, I'll just have to go buy more. lol!