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What are you using for a lamp to brighten your interior, a LED and which model and manufacture or a 10 watt stock color yellow lamp that leaves you back in the seventies?
I actually run the factory interior lights.
All 3 of them. They work great. They light up the interior when I open the door!
If that leaves me back in the 70's with a 70's car. That's OK with me. If I want a modern car I'll buy one of those.
Thanks will stop at a boating store or Camper world . My 75 had a rear light similar to overhead door attached under rear window. And those three glove box compartments had illumination also. When Delorean took over the bean cutters were hired to cut every item they could.
The key to more light quantity is lumens. The old incandescent bulbs in your car will deposit soot on the inside of the bulbs, and dim them over time. LEDs don't do that, of course.
As for quality, if you choose a warm color temperature (3,000 K or so), you will get the old-timey glow that you expect.
I'm assuming your thinking about doing this on a 1977?
If you have the Convenience Group package and a working curtsey delay timer it's unlikely using LED bulbs as replacements that the timer will generate enough resistance to work correctly.
These old timers have an internal heater, when "A" door opens the heater heats up allowing the N/O contacts to remain Closed.
Once both doors are closed the heater cools down and the timer reverts back to its N/O position and the lights turn off.
If the delay timer has been bypassed or a non optioned car LED bulbs should work just fine if that's what your looking for...
Thanks for the above comment. It seems over and over again these guys think LED's are an upgrade.
I am a mechanic. I replace over priced LED's all the time. Very, very costly Not-A-Upgrades.
Thanks for the above comment. It seems over and over again these guys think LED's are an upgrade.
I am a mechanic. I replace over priced LED's all the time. Very, very costly Not-A-Upgrades.
Originally Posted by bmotojoe
I'm assuming your thinking about doing this on a 1977?
If you have the Convenience Group package and a working curtsey delay timer it's unlikely using LED bulbs as replacements that the timer will generate enough resistance to work correctly.
These old timers have an internal heater, when "A" door opens the heater heats up allowing the N/O contacts to remain Closed.
Once both doors are closed the heater cools down and the timer reverts back to its N/O position and the lights turn off.
If the delay timer has been bypassed or a non optioned car LED bulbs should work just fine if that's what your looking for...
I get it. You hate LEDs for some reason. That's fine.
What @bmotojoe wrote is that the courtesy timer works in a similar manner to the stock flashers. It has not been my experience that the (78-82) courtesy light causes any issues. Perhaps 77 is different and needs to be bypassed. Perhaps the lights turn off too quickly when I close the door. I haven't noticed. You can switch to a digital courtesy timer if that is the case (as you need to with the two flashers to get the turn signals to work, for example).
Since you get paid to install LEDs on customer bikes, perhaps you can share some of the tricks that do work. Lots of folks switch to LEDs because (to them) the benefits outweigh the costs. I can get the old-timey feel in my car with warm LEDs, and still have enough lumens to be useful.
One thing you are going to notice with a brighter light in the rear compartment is you are going to need sunglasses to see anything. What I did to mine is go to the wreckers and find a pair of rectangular curtisy lights and pit them inside the the lower rear window trim.
If I had to do it again I would us a led strip with side emitting diods inside the trim, a much easier installation. I used the for my 3rd brake light. A 20" strip inside the plastic trim around the rear window.
Dale
