ToreB

The airbag warning light needs to be a incandescent lamp. It is supervised by the air bag control unit, and a missing or blown bulb will generate a fault code and warning light. A LED in this position will not present the correct resistance (load), and this will be detected as a blown bulb.
Cheers,
Tore

wilson.c

Tore,

Thanks for the info! I was thinking it was something like that

Regards,

Wilson
1997 993 Turbo

wilson.c

Tore,

Would LED lights work for warnings from the ABS Module (ABD & ABS) and Central Warning module (!)? I have not made my way out to that side of the instrument cluster yet for tests.

Thanks in advance!

Cheers,

Wilson
1997 993 Turbo

ToreB

I guess the airbag light is the only supervised light, and that LED's will work OK for the others. However, I have no expereince in this area.
Cheers,
Tore

Spyder_Man

I installed LEDs for all the bulbs in my instruments. The airbag LED has been stuck on, and thanks to Tore now I know why. No issues with any of the other indicators. I ended up using colored light less with each one matching the color of the specific indicator (as described in a prior post here). It all works and looks great. The tachometer is still a bit dim, but that is likely because there are very few back light bulbs situated in that gauge for some reason.

bjornebo

This also happened when I changed the incandescent bulbs for LEDs. I thought that perhaps one of the LEDs in my tachometer was not working and I was not looking forward to having to take the tachometer out again to fix it. Good to know that my LEDs are likely OK.

Spyder_Man

Note this article by Robin Sun where he installs additional bulbs in his tach to brighten it up further:

Installing new gauge faces

He also recommends scraping away some of the gauge face color behind the needles to allow them to light up better. I have a Pcar Dials tach face and I ended up cutting out the portion of the gauge face behind the needle to improve the illumination. It works...

bjornebo

Thanks Spyder_Man. The before photo of the tachometer under the "Aluminum gauge brightness modification Part 2" is what mine looks like. Interestingly, the needles for my other gauges aren't too bad. Perhaps some time when I am feeling inspired I will do Robin's modification to brighten up my tachometer needle.

Spyder_Man

Yeah, I too am not feeling bold enough yet to solder in some extra lights within my tachometer. The needle on my tach is especially dim too. Again I think it is because there are only two bulbs lighting the whole tach and neither is near the center where the needle connects.

wilson.c

Spyder_man,

I noticed that my Check Engine warning light was on very dimly lit when driving today, then it started flashing on the way home. I hooked it up to my computer and noticed the P1691 fault which was "MIL (Malfunction Indication Light), Check Engine - Interruption". A faulty bulb could cause this, so I changed back the bulb to incandescent and reset this fault, hope it goes away. Chalk up another warning bulb that will not migrate to LED's along with the AirBag warning.

Have you noticed this on yours?

Regards,

Wilson
1997 993 Turbo

Spyder_Man

I haven't had an issue with the CEL being swapped to an LED. Perhaps the contacts for the LED were a bit loose? As I said above, other than the airbag light being on all the time now, I've had no further issues. Perhaps this weekend I'll swap that one bulb back and see if my warning ! Finally goes away.

bjornebo

FWIW the original incandescent warning lights are plenty bright enough for me, so when I did LEDs the only bulbs that I replaced were those that illuminate the the gauges.

quacktoduck

Here is a recent update of mine.

Added a bunch of LEDs










Thinking of opening it up and adding an additional led under the 7k mark.

akrca4

^ are those amber color LEDs?

quacktoduck

yes some ebay special i had just sitting around at my office. i followed robins instructions for adding more LEDS i think if i were to do it again i might get a ccfl or some LED strips to put in there and wire them up.

If anyone wants i can do it for them for a minimal fee.. i have white and ambers