How To I Bring My Dash Lighting Back To Life?

Well, I know the answer is to change the bulbs behind the dash bevels, but does anyone have specifics or any tricks? I need to change out bulbs in the dash above the steering wheel and also where the heater controls are. Some seems very dull.
 
  • Sponsors (?)


I just changed out the "Illumination" bulbs in the dash of my '92. I used LEDs referenced above in the link, from EBay. It didn't take too long, but I have had my dash apart before and knew exactly what to do. It did make the dash brighter. It's close to stock, but changed the way the needles look a little, for the better IMO.

One thing to keep in mind are that LEDs have polarity, if they don't work one way, you have to flip them around. I put them in, put the cluster back up and plugged it in, noted which ones didn't work, then took it down and flipped those around.

As far as the heater controls, I really haven't looked at those. Mine there are bright enough.
 
2 hours tops if you have to take your cluster out and have never done it. LED is a very worth while swap. just leave the dummy light bulbs alone. The lack of resistance from an LED can mess with the sensors/ECU and cause probs from what I hear.
 
I guess I am just not sure if I get all 1 SMDs, and replace every bulb with those, or like you said, replace some bulbs with a few 5 SMDs. I am just not exactly clear on as to why the needles are so much brighter than the rest of the dash.