Don Carter

I installed the Jager/Nicole kit today and it went pretty well. It's really nice to be able to see the guages at night now, but it's almost too bright. I bypassed the dimmer while I had the pod out, so now I think I'll reconnect it and see if it helps at all. The instructions say the dimmer won't do much with LEDs.

I decided not to mess with all the other bulbs, maybe later.

Ducman82

i have an 81 OB. i cant seam to tell what LED i need to replace the 19 little black based bulbs in my cluster... any one know? im guessing the bigger ones are the #74 base bulbs..

davek9

For the Main Pod lights you only need to replace three bulbs, the others are all for the indicators not instrument illumination.

Ducman82

id like to replace those if i can. might as well while i have the dash out.

syoo8

Just remember folks, LEDs need a properly-rated resistor in series, otherwise they will cook. The resistors that came with a kit that I bought (for the three triangular wedges in the instrument panel) were too small, meaning too much current was flowing through the LEDs, meaning my LEDs cooked in the instrument panel and burned out after only a month.

If you have questions check out: http://ledz.com/?p=zz.led.resistor.calculator

Tony

ok..im looking this mod also. If its a "kit" i would of thought they would have had that all sorted out? Going in the pod to replace bulbs is a job i only want to do once.
I also want ALL dimming features to work!

davek9

where did u get the ones that failed.. e-bay?
hooked-on cars, and jagered(?) engineering sell proven kits, although u could get a weak led.
i tested mine w/9 volt battery on bench b4 installing w/o any issues.
there is an eletronic dimmer u can buy (i got mine from robert budd).
also most don't replace all the small bulbs, not worth the trouble.

Ducman82

anyone have a picture of the "triangle" LED parts ?

syoo8

Here you go:

syoo8

I bought them from Nicole, which I believe she gets from Jager. She already knows about the issue and is investigating. (She was extremely helpful and nice to work with!)

The weak LED theory doesn't hold water because all three of the LEDs failed at around the same time. I also tested the LEDs with a 9 volt battery without any issues. They are fine on the bench in a test, but with prolonged use my LEDs cooked inside the instrument pod.

They are IIRC 5mm LEDs that the kit uses, rated at around 30mA-- which means they need around 500-600 ohms in series to keep them happy. The kit I received used 270 ohm resistors (you can tell by the bands on the resistors-- I double checked with an ohm-meter) which was too small for the 30mA rating of the LED.

Tony

intersting. Ill wait until its sorted. or...perhaps this an easy thing to fix your self? I have one of those HUGE multi pack of resistors from RadioShack...it has whats needed in there Im sure.

Ducman82

that seams like an expensive kit for 3 LED's. is there more to it ? do you just take out the reflectors and make a hole for them or...............

syoo8

I don't know if you can make a hole for the reflectors-- I don't think so. I don't remember what the original reflectors look like.

The kit comes with:
- Three translucent wedges

- Wiring, including three (I think lead) slugs that fit into where the light bulbs would have been.

- Three LEDs attached to the aforementioned wiring, with resistors soldered in series (hidden by white shrink wrap.)

As I mentioned earlier, the resistors that came with my kit were of the wrong size, thus three cooked LEDs. Nicole generously refunded the cost of the replacement LEDs, and was VERY responsive in terms of customer support. (Even though it was a pain in the ***, I came away from this experience wanting to work with Nicole more, and not less.)

syoo8

I am not particularly handy with a soldering iron and haven't had much electronics experience since my laboratory electronics class 20 years ago in college, and it was ok, took about an hour or so. Important to use shrink wrap to protect the resistors.

The_Remora

Hi guys, in the middle of this project and have some questions...

I have replaced all of the LED's in the pod of my '87 except for the 4 warning bulbs that light up for low fuel, low battery, low oil pressure and high temp which I didnt replace yet. now these are the only bulbs that light up. I know i've got the polarization right for either all or almost all of the bulbs. I put the cluster back in (without bolting it to the pod housing), re-connected the 3 plugs to the circuit connection, and reconnected the battery to double check the orientation of a few that were not obvious before i buttoned it all back up. I was hoping to see my new LED's all light up. If only it were that easy...

I also put in a new ignition switch while I have the dash apart. It only goes in one way so I know the orientation is correct.

Anyway, here's what happens when I connect the battery: without the key in the ignition the open door buzzer goes off and the exterior running lights go on. When i insert the key and twist it to 'on' (not all the way to ignition) the lights go off and buzzer stops. It seems backwards, but the ignition can't be put in backwards because the pins and housing wouldn't line up any other way.

I can see the needles twitch when I switch the ignition on so thats a good preliminary sign; I had them all apart, re-soldered the circuit board (neatly, there pretty much zero chance I shorted anything on the circuit the solders came out better than expected with no stray solder or burns), the speedo has never worked since I've had the car, part of the reason for the surgery.

I also did the 'Dwayne' fix for the fuel gauge, installed a new '5-speed' tach to replace the auto tach (car was a 5-speed conversion) and did the Jagar/Nicole LED dash light conversion.

I've checked all the LED's both before installing in the cluster and after in the cluster by tracing the circuits and giving power via 9V battery w/ wire clips and everything worked great until I plugged it back into the car. I don't think any of the plugs where attached backwards (can they be? they seem like they couldnt be put on backwards due to shape of the fittings) but I will double check these now.

Does the cluster need to be grounded to the pod when they're bolted back together in order for this all to work as expected or are the only grounds in the 3 connectors? I'm hesitant to put anything more back together until I find out whats going on and where I've gone wrong here.

I took meticulous photos of the project up to about the half way point when my blackberry died and i may have lost them all, won't know until i get a replacement phone. intend to post a write-up, not sure if it will have pics or not...

Thanks for any advice.
Chris