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Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those cases?

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Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

Brosky said:
I have the LED light bulbs, the stock 2.3 watt and the 6 Watt replacement bulbs so I'll be experimenting after the gauges are all done and in place. I really don't think that the LED's will work well. From what I've read (since I bought the LEDs) these gauges are better suited to a standard incandescent bulb.
Click to expand...

<span style="color: #990000">I'll save ya a few minutes time Paul.
Once the guts were cleaned up and painted, I could
see no greater brightness from the 6w bulbs. I installed
all new TRF Lucas 2.3w in the gauges. But I did remove
the blue plastic difusers.

IMO- The LEDs will not be any brighter.

d</span>
 
Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

Thanks Dale. I think that you did tell me this information a long time ago. This project is now about two years old.

Cleaning and painting the interior will help and I'll probably put the stock bulbs back in.

I do have my nicely rebuilt rheostat waiting to find it's new home, so that will help as well.
 
Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

Too many of them 6 watters will cremate that newly rebuilt rheostat anyway, so my vote is to paint the inside, leave the colored filters there (for originality) and use the 2.3 watters.

Oh, sorry, I see you weren't asking for a vote!!
 
Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

One thing I would like to try one day is to use a foil (like gold leaf but chrome) instead on new white paint. I know they sell it at hobbie shops and there was an article about using it to refurbish the turn signal stocks on TR4s some place. And that was what gave me the idea for the gauge.
 
Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

Justin Wagner (aka silicone gasket maker dude) authored an article on using it to re"chrome" his turn signal stalk.
For gauges though, you can get a great silver reflective paint for turn signal housings from Eastwood.
 
Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

Adrio,

Why would you want chrome reflective tape inside the gauges? Wouldn't that be awful glaring?

Anyone ever try bulb paint instead of the filters?

Graham,

That rheostat is pretty solid. Do you really think that the 6 watt bulbs will damage it?
 

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Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

You should also be able to by chrome - mylar vinyl adhesive based film and transparent colour film with adhesive base from any sign supply shop in your home town (Avery Graphics or 3M graphics products)
 
Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

I tried LED, they make the gauges dimmer than original bulbs, I painted the interior of my gauges white, got rid if the plastic things and they are better now, the LED s worked better for the dip beam indicator but using LED for turn indicator, it would flash on left turn but nothing on a right turn, there must be a polarity issue cause LED only work when current flows in one direction
 
Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

Leds only work 1 way. If they have a pigtail as in my boot lights and the cubby light you cannot reverse the wires.
 
Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

hondo402000 said:
there must be a polarity issue cause LED only work when current flows in one direction
Click to expand...

Yes that is right, there is a polority issue. The "D" in LED stands for DIODE which is a device that will only allow current to flow one way (with some exceptions that are outside this scope). You can "make" a bi-polar (no jokes please) LED by putting two of them back to back and depending on the polarity one or the other will turn on. That also gives you all sorts of fun options as in they could be different colours to tell you red for left and green for right if you are feeling nautical (this part you may joke about)
 
Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

And just to round this out, the turn signal indicator lamp does get different polarity applied, depending on left or right turn.

However, some LEDs will not withstand 15v applied in the reverse direction. So if you try Adrio's suggestion of two LEDs back to back, you may need to either use a common resistor (so the forward biased LED limits the voltage applied to the reverse biased one) or be careful to use LEDs with a reverse voltage rating higher than 15v.

Another approach might be to connect each LED from it's respective turn signal circuit to ground, instead of the other turn signal circuit.
 
Re: Gauge guts, ever wonder what's inside those ca

Dale,

Can you post a picture or a link to your cleaned up gauges? I figure you have a how to somewhere in your archives. Thanks amigo.
 
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