calling LED guru's!!
 

I hate to even start a thread about this, I know there's one somewhere but I can't for the life of me seem to find it. I'm wanting to change out all the bulb's in my 02 sierra to LED's, I know the cluster bulbs are the 194's , and I know I'll need the twist locks for them. What I need to know is what to do with the other's, the HVAC and window switch and fog switch and ect ect. I know I'll need 5mm bulbs, and resistors, but what kind and ect? Also how do I know which is the positive on the switches and everything? I'm willing to pay someone IF I have to for the exact info, or course I'd need to know you know what youre talking about and proof (pics/videos) I want to do it myself, not ship it out to someone. Any help is greatly greatly appreciated!

Helpful info would be:

Bulb sizes and type

What type resistors, sizes, how many

What end to solider the resistor to

Which bulbs for best/brightest outout

How to avoid hotspots

Best solidering iron/wire to use

Any tips/tricks to get the best results

If you get this done let me know, i'll drive my heap up there so you can do mine lol.

guess Im going to do the trial and error method lol Im too impatient

I have done all mine in my 01 Suburban.
Here are a few links to some pretty detailed write ups I did on another forum.
AC Panel: Change the color of your 99-02 GMT-800 AC control backlights - Truck Mod Central
Door switches: LED power window switch mod 99-02 GM fullsize - Truck Mod Central
Cluster:How-to: Change the color of your 99-02 GMT-800 gauges - Truck Mod Central


And here is how to do the 03-06 clusters:2003-2006 GMT800 LED cluster conversion HOW-TO: - Truck Mod Central

I have even done LED conversions for dozens of people on other forums, and one person on this forum. I'll answer any questions you might have as well.

Bulbs should be here tomorrow for the gauges , the easiest of all the swap haha. The rest should be in by next weekend. I ordered a ton of leds and resistors so hopefully it'll turn out good. Will post pics as I go and details of how I go about it. I'll be following most of Tootall's directions in his 03-07 thread and some of the directions from ScottyBoy's threads. I already have the lights in the floor, doors,glove box,map lights, dome light, cargo lights, and tag light swapped to 6000k led's so I think the blue will go good.

One more tip:
On the AC control panel, do NOT hold the soldering iron against the circuit for more than a few seconds. If you get the board too hot, the copper tracers will separate from the board. I learned this the hard way.
Use an iron at least 35-40 watts and it should melt the solder very quickly, and you won't get the board as hot since you won't hold the iron on it so long.

It's not hard to do, I did all mine on my '02, the hardest part is getting the leds pointed the right direction for no hotspots and even coverage. And as Scotty said the tracers on the ac controls are very delicate, one of mine peeled off and I had to re-glue it and solder in a connector since it wasnt making contact after a few months.

the lower the MCD , the deeper or more "royal blue" like the color will be
heat is the #1 killer
get the lowesr watt iron
if you screw up on soldering a resister on... toss both of them and start over

the surface mounts work the best

Thanks for the info guys. I ordered a ton of Blue leds , both flat top and round top, some are 5000 mcd, some 6000 mcd and some 13000 mcd. Didnt know what the mcd meant which is why I ordered different ones. I'm too impatient to order a set this week then wait a week for them to come and decide they arent what I want and go through it again lol. All the resistors have came already still waiting on the leds though.

The dash lights and twist sockets came in yesterday and I installed them, but the sockets they sent would not line up with the plastic back cover and would not light up the bulbs, which kind of irritated me since thats money wasted. I ordered both the bulbs and sockets from superbrightled.com so I assumed they'd work. I did get the in though, managed to take the factory bulbs out of the factory sockets and put the leds in them.

Did anyone else run into this problem or is it just my bad luck?

Scotty will also do them also,he did my whole interior
Great guy

Yeah, the twist locks from superbright led are crap. If you look carefully, the alignment of the twist lock in the board is not the same as the OEM Wagner twist locks. And there's really no feasible way to reuse the stock twist locks.

Here's what I did. I dremeled out the slots in the back of the black back cover so there was no contact with the twist lock bases. Then you have to turn the twist locks just enough so they're tight, but not all the way or the metal connectors will not contact the circuit board properly. Just takes some frustrating trial and error.


End result:
https://oi50.tinypic.com/a14lqr.jpg

re-using the factory sockets really isnt that hard, or wasnt to me, probably less time than the way you did, not saying it was bad since it obviously worked. All I did to re-use them was use a knife to work the bulbs out without braking them and pulled the metal connectors out then straighten the wires on the leds and fish through then put the metal connectors in and wrap the wire back around so it contacts the metal like factory, took about an hour to do it this way

I'm surprised you were able to get it done like that. I tried it, but mine were in there like hell. I eventually got the bulb out but I was so fed up I went back to using the aftermarket sockets.

I ended up having to break all the glass out of my factory sockets to reuse them, there was no way those bulbs were coming unsoldered on my sockets

GMCtrk,
You can't miss the boost gauge in the bottom left corner of the IP. Were you able to bore a hole in the circuit board there and install a 2 1/16" gauge? Sorta what I'd like to do with my trans temp gauge.
Thanks..

Yes, if you search my profile I have a thread on it with a few detailed pictures. 2 1/16" gauge fits perfect, like it belongs there

has anyone ever did the LED's in the traction control switch? I tried but for some reason the TRACTIO OFF stays on now and wont cut off. its 1am so can't check fuses to see if maybe I blew one or something. its just p*ssing me off, when I started this whole thing all my lights worked flawlessly, and now its one thing after another :bang: dang LED's in the gauges have the annoying hot spots, the cargo/fog light switch works great, I managed to burn up the passenger air bag switch and haven't tried doing the new one yet. now this with the traction control, very annoying :bang: I want to get it done so I can spend money on a glove box to finish my console swap instead of on new switches

Ok its 9:35 am now, just checked the switch again, with the lights off, the Traction Off is still lit up, so I dont think it would have anything to do with the LED since it isn't geting power to burn. I have auto headlights so didnt think to mash the interior overide button lastnight to cut all the lights off.

I checked the fuse boxes but I dont see any fuse labeled for the traction control??? which fuse would it be to check? Ive tried doing a search online but I'm not coming up with anything other than people saying pull the fuse pull the fuse to cut it off perm.

well Ive got most of the led's in, still have to do the headlight switch which Im nervous about because I tore it apart and now the dome override isnt working right but I bought another and am going to retry it. heres a few pics so far, still working out the hot spots , its not as hard as I thought, just very time consuming with trying to get the light even and all the bulbs angled just right

the pics suck because they are from my phone and I have no flash or anything on it.


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Don't want to start up another thread for just this, but I was wondering what is needed for wiring in SMD's?

Do they need resistors like the conventional LED's?

The reason I ask is that I want to buy a couple hundred different kinds of LED's and do some work for myself and around town. I've already purchased a couple hundred of the conventional type and resistors. Now I want SMD's for tight spots and more important places.

Anyone know what type and how many stock bulbs are in the AC controls unit? I have a few burnt out but don't want LED's.

I believe there's 4 bulbs across the top, and one for each little button on the bottom, they are really small, I've always seen them called grain of wheat bulbs, but not sure where to get them from for replacements.