Super bright LEDs for tail lights

[supraman7mgte]

Just got a set of these cool looking bulbs,1157 replacements. Total of 24 leds each,
they looked great when I installed them,until...
Started the car and let her idle for a bit and noticed the tail lamp failure light was on.WTF? Got out and checked tails,turns,and reverse(my friend told me)and everything was working! So I figured,"ehhh,i'll just unplug the failure light later."
I take a cruise to a hardware store,get my stuff and come back to the car.I'm telling myself that the failure light was just a glitch.Start the car and it does not light. Cool! Step on the brake and BAM there they are again. DAM!
"Alright,i'll look into it later." Halfway to home my dash lights go out but my heads stay on AWWW CRAP!! Now i'm worried if I have tails at all! I finaly get home and yes,no tails!
I then checked the tail light fuse and it was blown and get the "new" bulbs out and replace the stock 1157's. HURRAY for my side,they al work like before.
What could have caused this?

Bueller?

Anyone?:aigo:

 

[ChadMKIII]

Maybe the LED's were drawing too much current? Iono...

Btw, any chance you have pics of the tails? And could you tell me where I could get them? That is, if they end up working right Thanks

 

[hottscennessey]

no good, check the screws and wires for a short first. Then, get pics.

 

[jtamulis]

Maybe one of the bulbs had an internal short, and it finally popped that
LED and now it works?

Just a thought.

Jeff

 

[supraman7mgte]

Well thats just it,the light NEVER came on before. In the years that I have owned the car not 1 problem with the failure light ,until now.
Side note,the side marker lights which take the smaller 94,I think ,are leds too.But I put those in a year ago with no problems.

 

[jetjock]

The problem is they don't draw enough current. You'll have to change a resistor in the lamp failure module.

 

[ChadMKIII]

JJ: Out of curiosity, why would it blow the fuse and cause the dash lights to go out if it wasn't drawing enough current? Or would that be related to something else? Just wondering how these work.

 

[jetjock]

I was referring to why the failure lamp lit. Obviously the short is a different issue. Probably from an installation glitch. But the way the LFM senses current it will need to be tweaked when using LEDs. At least mine did. As I recall there's a calibration resistor (a current shunt really) on posts near the rear of the PCB.

 

[supraman7mgte]

REALLY? I never thought that. I mean,the origional idea of the bulbs was to reduce the amount of juice used and to keep the bulb carrier from deteriorating.
As far as just the way they looked,they were awesome. it made the rear lens look light a big luminescent panel( brake light panel,that is). and they light up sooo much faster that stockers!

 

[jetjock]

Assuming the typical 20 ma for discrete LEDs 24 of them would run about half an amp. I forget what a 1157 pulls but I'm pretty sure it's more. The LFM senses current by measuring drop across a resistor. Standard electronic technique for that sort of thing. It's how the module knows a filament has failed. Since the LEDs are drawing less than the 1157s it thinks something's wrong. At least that's how I recall it, been a long time. I remember I had to recal mine when I put a strobe in the third brake light.

 

[supraman7mgte]

Okay,but why a blown too? That would be from getting too much current,right?

 

[supraman7mgte]

FUSE,durrrr

 

[jetjock]

Yep, that's true. It's the only reason fuses open . Maybe you have a funky socket or something wasn't quite seated. Or maybe one of those LED clusters took a dump.

 

[ChadMKIII]

K, thought that seemed odd that the fuse would blow from too little current

Supraman, I'd love to see pictures! I've been thinking I'd like to put LED tails in mine, just don't know for sure. And I wanna see how hard this is gonna be to get wired up right. lol.

 

[supraman7mgte]

lol thanks

 

[plaaya69]

Why don’t you try and use all of the stock bulbs and one of the led bulbs at a time to see if one of the led bulbs has a problem or to see if the light out light on the dash will light up or not. Also on a web site that sells led bulbs I saw a article that when using led tail light bulbs on a car that had a light failure sensor/or something that will let you know that a bulb is burnt out, that it can cause a problem with the sensor or the taillights.

 

[Jeff Lange]

As far as your tail light sensor is concerned, your tail lights were burnt out.

As for blowing the fuse, that's probably another issue.

If you are going with LEDs, I'd suggest bypassing and removing the tail light sensor altogether.

 

[bowsercake]

My friend did the same thing to his GS300. You have to use a resistance module thingy and a flasher so that the lights flash like stock. I think both of those are sold on the same site.

 

[supraman7mgte]

Well,tried it again today. I thought maybe one of the bulbs was not secure in the retainer. I put the leds back in,blink there goes the failure box. I then unplugged the LFM and now had NO tail lights. Shee-it! Screw it,just gonna put the stockers back in and save for the clearcorners version!

 

[RazoE]

same here, i got red LEDs for my rear signals..

looked great during the night, but you couldnt see it in the daytime at all..

i just swapped them out back for my stockers, but my tails still dont work, unless i brake..

this sucks..