S30 rear light cluster

MCBladeRun

MCBladeRun

Club Member
Hi guys

I saw on the forum somewhere, someone had put a bright enough amber bulb in the rear light cluster so that it would shine through the red lens?

I can't find it anywhere now and I may have to give up on trying that method. I may have to get some JDM rear clusters instead.

I can't remember exactly, but the bulbs may have been LED to gain that much brightness.

Thanks
Martin
 
Bazzateer

Bazzateer

Club Member
If you want a red lens to show amber/orange I believe you need to use a green bulb or bulb cover.
Maybe try using a green permanent marker on a spare bulb and see if it looks amber?
 
MCBladeRun

MCBladeRun

Club Member
Bazzateer said:
If you want a red lens to show amber/orange I believe you need to use a green bulb or bulb cover.
Maybe try using a green permanent marker on a spare bulb and see if it looks amber?
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Green + Red = Brown (I'm ashamed to say I google'd it to confirm) but Yellow would work
Paul_S said:
I'm sure I read about that too. Wasn't it a specific LED they were talking about?
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possibly a yellow (warm white) LED lamp then?
 
Bazzateer

Bazzateer

Club Member
MCBladeRun said:
Green + Red = Brown (I'm ashamed to say I google'd it to confirm) but Yellow would work

possibly a yellow (warm white) LED lamp then?
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Nope. Definitely green bulb shows amber through a red lens. Lots of mentions on the web to confirm. However, with led technology a strong high intensity amber led will work better. My initial post on this was based on knowledge from a couple of decades ago before leds started to take over.
 
MCBladeRun

MCBladeRun

Club Member
Bazzateer said:
Nope. Definitely green bulb shows amber through a red lens. Lots of mentions on the web to confirm. However, with led technology a strong high intensity amber led will work better. My initial post on this was based on knowledge from a couple of decades ago before leds started to take over.
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I have got a clear halogen bulb, I could attempt painting it green. My other problem would be the voltage being too low at the moment.
 
Mark N

Mark N

Club Member
atomman said:
I just used an orange LED bulb and it could be seen plainly through the red lenses , until I brought JDM clusters
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Did you have to fit a resistor or did the rest of the bulbs in the circuit draw enough current for the flasher unit?
 
atomman

atomman

Club Member
Mark N said:
Did you have to fit a resistor or did the rest of the bulbs in the circuit draw enough current for the flasher unit?
Click to expand...

I was going to use a LED 2 pin flasher unit but didn't need it in the end as the draw from the front bulb still made the relay flash
 
tyroguru

tyroguru

Club Member
Hey Martin - I used these::

https://www.classiccarleds.co.uk/co...t-amber-led-indicator-bulbs-ba15s-p21w-glb382

They gave off a very good amber light but I wasn't happy with the color through the red lens as to me at still looked more red than amber. I rewired the rear lights to get rid of the US style brake/turn system (where the brake light doubles as an indicator) so I put the indicator in the clear lens section of each light (bottom inner corner) and this worked very well. I speak in the past tense because the car is currently dismantled :) . When I put things back together I intend to get the JDM style rear lights.
 
MCBladeRun

MCBladeRun

Club Member
tyroguru said:
Hey Martin - I used these::

https://www.classiccarleds.co.uk/co...t-amber-led-indicator-bulbs-ba15s-p21w-glb382

They gave off a very good amber light but I wasn't happy with the color through the red lens as to me at still looked more red than amber. I rewired the rear lights to get rid of the US style brake/turn system (where the brake light doubles as an indicator) so I put the indicator in the clear lens section of each light (bottom inner corner) and this worked very well. I speak in the past tense because the car is currently dismantled :) . When I put things back together I intend to get the JDM style rear lights.
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Cheers for this Jon, it must have been your post I saw a while back.

I'm curious, if you decided to use the clear side for the amber bulbs, where did you intend to put the reverse bulb?
 
tyroguru

tyroguru

Club Member
Reverse...?? :D My priorities at the time were just making sure the car had clear turn and brake signals that would be very obvious to the average UK driver and as the reverse light is pretty much optional I just reused the clear lenses.
 
MCBladeRun

MCBladeRun

Club Member
tyroguru said:
Reverse...?? :D My priorities at the time were just making sure the car had clear turn and brake signals that would be very obvious to the average UK driver and as the reverse light is pretty much optional I just reused the clear lenses.
Click to expand...
Ah, I see. Shame you can't get a bulb that does both amber and clear?
 
MCBladeRun

MCBladeRun

Club Member
Nice one Bazz, I'll have a crack at it. Think it'll need a resistor, but it means I won't need to change the cluster now. Thanks.
 
Bazzateer

Bazzateer

Club Member
Make sure the ones you get have the right 'prong' layout on the bayonet fitting - if you know what I mean.
 
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