DIY LEDs gauge cluster

racerzedge

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Hi guys,

I know this project has been done to death by lots of members on this forum as well as other Honda forums, but there's still a lot of questions regarding bulbs specs. So here's my LED gauge cluster project.

First off, I want to thank talontsiawd for his great write-up on this issue (http://www.6thgenaccord.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2642). His thread gave me the inspiration to do mine.

First off, bulbs! Can't do LED conversion without LED bulbs, right? I got mine from Superbrightleds.com. Their website is easy to navigate and simple to use.

I ordered 3 #194 wedge base bulbs in cool white with 120 degree beam, non-polarized, 12v DC:
- WLED-x-x: 1 LED wedge base bulb-WLED-W120 ($1.39 each)

I ordered 3 #74 standard 5mm twist lock bulbs in cool white with 120 degree beam, 12v DC:
- T1.5-x: 5mm LED instrument twist lock lamp-T1.5-CW ($1.79 each)

Once they arrived, I removed the instrument cluster. The hardest part for me was the plastic trim piece.

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After you remove the 2 screws on top, use a flat head screw driver (if you want to be careful, make sure to wrap the screw driver head in tape) and GENTLY insert to unlatch the 2 clips. I was impatient and broke my right one :bash:

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Once the plastic trim piece is out, then everything else is cake. The following picture lets you know that you need to remove 4 screws that hold the instrument cluster in place. Once the screws are removed, unplug the 3 connectors located at the top.

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The back of the cluster should look like this. The image is from a 98 EX (mine is a 98 LX MT), so there are some variations, but the bulbs that you need to remove are pretty much the same (I'm not sure about AT, can anyone verify?)

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Remove the bulb holders circled red in the diagram above. Do this one at a time. Turn the bulb holder counter-clockwise to unlock and gently pull out to remove. Wear gloves or use a soft napkin to remove the bulbs as to not leave oily residues on these bulbs (just in case you want to reuse them later). Insert the LED #194 wedge bulbs into the holder. (They're non-polarized so no worries about how you put them in the holder.) Place the bulb holder back in and twist clockwise to lock.

Next, remove the bulb holder circled green on the left of the diagram. Same thing, twist counter-clockwise and gently pull out to remove. You won't be removing the bulbs from the holder for this one. Insert the LED #74 (which is the T1.5 twist lock lamp) into the receptacle and twist clockwise to lock. It's important to remember that these are polarized, so if they don't light up when you plug everything back in, you will need to unplug everything and take this lamp back out. This happened to me, so I learned from experience.

If you want to change out the LCD lamp, then remove the bulb holder circled green on the bottom of the diagram.

Put everything back together, turn on the lights, adjust your brightness and enjoy. Have fun, guys.

Ok, finally have time to take pictures of my finished product.

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There's a bit of a hotspot on the LCD screen. Nothing too noticeable.

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jwong512

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Nice DIY. I have also wondered if there would be hot spots if I got the high powered amber leds instead of the white/blue led's as that requires too much work IMO. I wouldn't mind keeping the stock color if it was just brighter. When I run the a/c, headlights, and radio on I can feel the alternator stress and the gauges would stay dim for awhile so I would just assume that converting that many bulbs to led's would remove some stress off the alternator.
 

racerzedge

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Hey guys...camera battery is charging so I'll take some pics of the end results when it's done.

As far as hot spots...there is a noticeable hot spot on the LCD (you'll see on the picture later), but for the gauges, I don't notice much of one. I have my brightness set pretty low, but I'm sure if you crank it up, you'll notice hot spots on there.

@jwong512: I haven't had any dimming issues of the gauges when I run my headlights and crank up the stereo. Haven't tried running the A/C yet, but I'll try that soon and see what happens.

Note: there will always be hot spots if you're using LEDs. If you want to remove the hot spots, you'll have to do more work (like talontsiawd - that dude's a monster; props to him for being so meticulous).
 

racerzedge

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@jwong512: my bad, bro....i read your statement carefully again, and yeah, I did have dimming issues when I was running stock bulbs, but nothing so far after I swapped in the LEDs
 

jwong512

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I might end up doing this with amber led's if that's the case to keep the stock style look but just brighter. With amber, even if there are hotspots it shouldn't be too bad as the color blends in with the filter. Did you use the high powered LED's or just the regular LED's?
 

racerzedge

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Amber LEDs would be pretty cool. I used the standard LEDs and it turned out quite nice. I didn't want to be blinded by my clusters at night.
 

Ofnir107

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I'm running amber LEDs in my cluster. There's no hotspots. I am running the different bulbs then the ones listed in the OP. I used these bulbs instead with the 360 degree beam pattern.

Edit: Here are some pictures. The lens is pretty scratched up so just ignore that. They are DEFINITELY more orange than that.

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