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MAGNUM S/T
Dodge Dakota
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2/13/2003
09:38:55
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 Subject: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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I found a site which carries the 3157s in a WHITE LED...among other colors (including a 'rotating' red led).
Thought I'd pass this along as the White LEDs seem to be hard to find (here's the link):
http://www.stylinconcepts.com/parts.cfm/partfamilyid/267/categoryid/25/subcategoryid/160
My guess is that they would look very cool with the Altezza Tails. I just bought a pair of the Altezza Tails...so it will be a bit before I spend the dough on these bulbs.
For those who get them...please respond with the results as many of us would like to know how they look!
Lata
Kevin
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Stepdogg
Dodge Dakota
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2/13/2003
10:55:51
| RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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My guess...They are illegal to have. Trust me, i know. I have had white, blue, amber, and red led bulbs before. When i get pulled over by the cops, and they give me an inspection check, they tell me they are all illegal. They even give me a hard time about having my red led bulbs.
Just a warning. Some areas, the cops are cool. And others, they aren't.
My 2 cents, don't put any color other than red in your tail lights, to avoid trouble. Later.
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MAGNUM S/T
Dodge Dakota
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2/13/2003
11:37:51
| RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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Stock 3157 bulbs are white...at least on the 99 and are completely legal.
The housings are either amber (in front for parking lights) or red (in back for stop and parking lights). The bulbs however are white...hence the white LEDs are a good catch...particularly for the back (not sure how the LEDs would look thru the stock amber front housings?)
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Dan Minnocci
Dodge Dakota
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2/13/2003
14:42:55
| RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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It depends on the location of, and color of the light. The LED lights themselves are not illegal. Hell, one of the new Caddy's have all LED tails.
But, if you have white light emitting from the rear, (except when in reverse) then the white bulbs would be illegal. That, and you can't have white turn signals, the bulbs have to be amber, that's DOT regs anyway.
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Stepdogg
Dodge Dakota
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2/13/2003
15:24:42
| RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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Dan said it better than i did. I was tring to say that white can't be seen other than when in reverse. I also thought you had clear tails. Sorry, didn't catch the altezza part. Later.:)
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MAGNUM S/T
Dodge Dakota
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2/13/2003
15:28:33
| RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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..Your right Dan, that's why the rear tail light assembly is Red...except for where the back-up bulb shines thru.
WHITE bulb, thru RED housing = Red light (rear brake/parking light :-)
WHITE bulb, thru white housing = White light (rear back up lights...the 2 white slots) :-)
can't splain it no easier dan dat
as far as amber turn signals...I suppose that is for the front, since our rear turn signals are already red ( I mean white bulbs shining thru a red housing :-)....see now I'm just being a samrt a&*
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MAGNUM S/T
Dodge Dakota
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2/13/2003
15:52:26
|  RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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I just ordered a pair of the Super White 3157 LEDs to go with my Altezza Carbon Fiber Tail Lights. Should be about a week 1/2, then I'll take some digi pics.
note to self: if your gonna be a SAMRT a&^, learn how to spell "SMART". :-)
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Dan Minnocci
Dodge Dakota
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2/13/2003
20:13:19
| RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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Cool, tell me how they work. I think they are really cool looking.
I was just making note that they'd be illegal if you had them in the back blinkers.
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HSKR
Dodge Dakota
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2/13/2003
20:48:16
| RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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For anyone wanting to try these in the Altezza tails, save your money. I had them in mine to try out. They don't put out enough light to the sides to make the reflectors work so all you see is the small ring of LED lights from the rear. During the daylight you coudl not see them even when braking which is VERY dangerous for anyone following you, and at night, they weren't very bright from the rear. Just trying to save people some money. And they are NOT legal on te street. to be legal for street use they have to have a DOT approval and the LED bulbs do not have any DOT approval on them and are labeled for offroad use only.
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MAGNUM S/T
Dodge Dakota
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2/14/2003
11:59:25
|  RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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HSKR,
What color LEDs did you use? I already ordered my whites so I'm SOL there....but I was told that the red LEDs don't work so well behind an already red housing.
Supposedly the Super White LEDs are actually brighter than the stock bulbs.
Either way I guess I'll find out for myself in about a week or so :-(
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MACDak
Dodge Dakota
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8/14/2003
01:26:39
|  RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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I just replaced all the front 3157 bulbs on my '03 Dak with amber LEDs. I am running clear corners, and the amber LED's look great and work great. The only exception is the "faulty bulb" sensor built into the flasher system. Because the sensor "thinks" the LED is a burned out incandescent bulb, it flashed the turn signals at a rapid rate. Trico does not have a replacement electronic relay available for this Dakota, which (if you've looked) is a large module under the dash, basically a 2-flasher relay combination. On eBay there are people selling a 6ohm resistor that is claimed to "fool" the sensor. Has anyone tried to use a 6-ohm load to simulate the regular bulb? I certainly would love to bypass the fault sensor circuits in the turn signal system. Also, white 3157 bulbs are available on eBay and they are inexpensive. I plan to replace my tail/brake 3157 bulbs with the white 3157LED once my NextGen APC tail light housings arrive.
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Paul
Dodge Dakota
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8/14/2003
09:39:09
|  RE: White LED Tail light bulbs 3157s
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putting a 6 ohm in parallel with the bulb should allow the circuit to pull enough current for the flasher to work, if not put a smaller resistor in (just make sure it is of high enough wattage to handle the current without burning up.)
As far as LED's go, there are several major problems with white leds.
1) Color consistency, the fast majority of white LEDs are blue LED's with a yellow phosphor in them. The two colors combine to give a white color to it, but most manufacturers still haven't gotten the process right and the colors vary a lot, with some of the bulbs looking almost pure blue. Because of this, when you put a red lense in front of it, a lot of the light is absorbed by the lense
2) LED's by nature are very directional. Most LED's have a beam pattern of 15-60 degrees. outside this beam there is very little light shown which is why your reflectors become useless without some serious thought put into bulb design or having the lense designed for the leds. This is also why LED's can seem brighter than a regular lamp. Light output with led's is measured from the middle of the beam, so the more focused the LED, the brighter it seems, even though the total light output is the same as or even less.
3) LEDs don't burn out, but rather get dimmer with time, how long it takes depends on how hard the LED's are driven. A disreputable manufacturer may decide to drive a bulb very hard as this will make them brighter in the short term, but will cause the bulbs to die a premature death, In my own testing for some designs I did, A bulb that was driven @ 70% greater than it's max rating (something very easily done as they still work) lost the majority of it's light output after 72hrs. They also don't handle heat very well. While they may not put much out to begin with, if you have a well packed bulb, they could get hot enough to seriously impair their function, losing about half the light output at around 150-170 degrees.
4) if you decide to use a colored LED (such as red or amber) you need to make sure that the center frequencies of the the LED and the Lense match, otherwise you'll again lose a lot of your light output. This isn't a problem with incandansents because they output light somewhat equally (give or take a bit) across the visible spectrum.
Hope this helps.
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