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audidood
Samba Member
Joined: April 27, 2006
Posts: 231
Location: nor*cal
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 Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2012 1:39 pm Post subject: |
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My 56 is converted 12v and i am running these LED tailllights. they're much brighter than stock in daylight, that's for sure.
As for your question about the relay, you can't use the stock one. I almost returned the lights for that very reason, but then after a little research it turns out that you can just pop into an autozone and grab a Tridon EP35 flasher, and everything will work perfectly.
For safety, this is definitely a no brainer. but if you're the purist type and this is sacrilege, just take apart your tail lights and pull out the diffuser, like everyone else suggested.
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[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/audidood/IMG_4070.jpg?t=1365009618[/img]
2004.5 Audi A4
1956 VW Bug
a (not so) wise man once said, "chrome don't get you home." |
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johnshenry 
Samba Member
Joined: September 21, 2001
Posts: 9364
Location: Northwood, NH USA
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| Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2012 12:33 pm Post subject: |
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Well Chip hooked me up with one of the electronic flashers, and much to my surprise it worked in the stock (incandescent) bulb setup, and flashed the speedo pod light as well. This light is connected to the same terminal as the "output" and it flashes out of on-off sequence with the exterior bulbs.
So I decided to try to fit the flasher into an gutted SWF flasher housing. It was not easy, LOTS of Dremel work. But I got it epoxied in there and will use this flasher in my '57. I will probably try out the LED assemblies in there too.
I went over the wiring in my '57 and found no real issues with grounding or anything else. With the running lights off it is pretty easy to see the turn/brake bulbs. But with the running lights on, it is VERY hard to see the turn/brake lights. This is where the LEDs might work much better.
I have at least 6 non restorable SWF bakelight flashers that I will eventually convert to electronic guts. These will be great as they will work on any type bulb, and at 6 or 12 volts. I have ordered some non-potted electronic flashers and they should be easier to install in the SWF box.
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John Henry
'57 Deluxe
'56 Single Cab |
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L378
Samba Member
Joined: December 29, 2004
Posts: 992
Location: MD
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| Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2012 1:38 pm Post subject: |
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| johnshenry wrote: |
Well Chip hooked me up with one of the electronic flashers, and much to my surprise it worked in the stock (incandescent) bulb setup, and flashed the speedo pod light as well. This light is connected to the same terminal as the "output" and it flashes out of on-off sequence with the exterior bulbs.
So I decided to try to fit the flasher into an gutted SWF flasher housing. It was not easy, LOTS of Dremel work. But I got it epoxied in there and will use this flasher in my '57. I will probably try out the LED assemblies in there too.
I went over the wiring in my '57 and found no real issues with grounding or anything else. With the running lights off it is pretty easy to see the turn/brake bulbs. But with the running lights on, it is VERY hard to see the turn/brake lights. This is where the LEDs might work much better.
I have at least 6 non restorable SWF bakelight flashers that I will eventually convert to electronic guts. These will be great as they will work on any type bulb, and at 6 or 12 volts. I have ordered some non-potted electronic flashers and they should be easier to install in the SWF box. |
I hope (when you have the time) you'll post a write up (w/ a few pics) when you have worked out the kinks for installing the non-potted flashers in the SWF box. I for one would be very interested in that. The SWF flasher is just a nice little detail with a late oval, but the LEDs are practically becoming a must with all of the distracted drivers seemingly on the road. |
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johnshenry
Samba Member
Joined: September 21, 2001
Posts: 9364
Location: Northwood, NH USA
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| Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2012 5:21 pm Post subject: |
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Yeah, I'll post the details, and where to get the flashers (if they work). Will likely be in my "Zarwerks Spy Cam" thread over in the split forum, but I will post a link to it here in this thread.
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John Henry
'57 Deluxe
'56 Single Cab |
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Suboval
Samba Member
Joined: September 15, 2003
Posts: 794
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| Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 9:41 am Post subject: |
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| 6Speed wrote: |
I wondered why my pass side blinker blinked slower and way dimmer, than my drivers side! I tried cleaning the connections but saw no difference. How would I go about finding the bad ground?
Coincidentally I ordered up a set of Chips LED tail lamps yesterday.  |
Have you tried cleaning the contacts in the turn signal switch? They do corrode which will cause a high resistance connection. Don't forget to grease the contacts prior to assembly.
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It all works on paper.
There's two things we learn from history:
1.) History repeats itself.
2.) We don't learn from history. |
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johnshenry
Samba Member
Joined: September 21, 2001
Posts: 9364
Location: Northwood, NH USA
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| Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 9:54 am Post subject: |
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| Suboval wrote: |
| 6Speed wrote: |
I wondered why my pass side blinker blinked slower and way dimmer, than my drivers side! I tried cleaning the connections but saw no difference. How would I go about finding the bad ground?
Coincidentally I ordered up a set of Chips LED tail lamps yesterday. |
Have you tried cleaning the contacts in the turn signal switch? They do corrode which will cause a high resistance connection. Don't forget to grease the contacts prior to assembly. |
Here's how I chase out grounding and power problems:
To chase out ground problems, I take the taillight housing off, and the bulbholder out and then turn on the signal. I use a very long clip lead and clip one end to the neg term on the battery under the seat, the other to the bulbholder base. Now does the problem still occur? If it does not, you have an issue with your ground path back to the battery as you have just replaced the entire path to the battery with a wire.
If the problem has gone away, unclip the lead from the bulb holder base term and start moving it back toward the battery. Go to bracket that bolts to the fender, then to fender metal, then to a fender bolt on that side (may have to scrape it), then to the body shell metal somewhere, then to the batter neg term. What you are doing is gradually jumping out all of the ground path connections between the bulbholder and the battery.
Once you hit the thing where the problem goes away, you have found the ground problem. It is the ground between the ground point you hit to make the problem go away, and the thing you tried just before that. Make sense?
You can do the same thing on positive side though, jumpering the power terminal on the bulb holder all the way to the pos term on the batter (it won't blink then). Then step back through the power path to the bulbholder. Any terminal blocks, the flasher, the turn signal switch, the fuse box, etc.
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John Henry
'57 Deluxe
'56 Single Cab |
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6Speed
Samba Member
Joined: December 10, 2002
Posts: 340
Location: East Coast
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| Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 11:35 am Post subject: |
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| Suboval wrote: |
| 6Speed wrote: |
I wondered why my pass side blinker blinked slower and way dimmer, than my drivers side! I tried cleaning the connections but saw no difference. How would I go about finding the bad ground?
Coincidentally I ordered up a set of Chips LED tail lamps yesterday. |
Have you tried cleaning the contacts in the turn signal switch? They do corrode which will cause a high resistance connection. Don't forget to grease the contacts prior to assembly. |
No, not yet. That's the last place I was going to try. Is it difficult to disassemble and clean?
| johnshenry wrote: |
| Suboval wrote: |
| 6Speed wrote: |
I wondered why my pass side blinker blinked slower and way dimmer, than my drivers side! I tried cleaning the connections but saw no difference. How would I go about finding the bad ground?
Coincidentally I ordered up a set of Chips LED tail lamps yesterday. |
Have you tried cleaning the contacts in the turn signal switch? They do corrode which will cause a high resistance connection. Don't forget to grease the contacts prior to assembly. |
Here's how I chase out grounding and power problems:
To chase out ground problems, I take the taillight housing off, and the bulbholder out and then turn on the signal. I use a very long clip lead and clip one end to the neg term on the battery under the seat, the other to the bulbholder base. Now does the problem still occur? If it does not, you have an issue with your ground path back to the battery as you have just replaced the entire path to the battery with a wire.
If the problem has gone away, unclip the lead from the bulb holder base term and start moving it back toward the battery. Go to bracket that bolts to the fender, then to fender metal, then to a fender bolt on that side (may have to scrape it), then to the body shell metal somewhere, then to the batter neg term. What you are doing is gradually jumping out all of the ground path connections between the bulbholder and the battery.
Once you hit the thing where the problem goes away, you have found the ground problem. It is the ground between the ground point you hit to make the problem go away, and the thing you tried just before that. Make sense?
You can do the same thing on positive side though, jumpering the power terminal on the bulb holder all the way to the pos term on the batter (it won't blink then). Then step back through the power path to the bulbholder. Any terminal blocks, the flasher, the turn signal switch, the fuse box, etc. |
Awesome info! Thank you for taking time out to write it in such detail! This will help a lot. When you say to unclip the lead from the bulbholder base term, did you mean the battery neg terminal?
I unclip at the bulbholder base and reattach it to, say, the threaded post that goes through the fender, while the other end is connected to the neg terminal....just thinking this through out loud.
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'57 Beetle |
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johnshenry
Samba Member
Joined: September 21, 2001
Posts: 9364
Location: Northwood, NH USA
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| Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 12:00 pm Post subject: |
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| 6Speed wrote: |
.......
Awesome info! Thank you for taking time out to write it in such detail! This will help a lot. When you say to unclip the lead from the bulbholder base term, did you mean the battery neg terminal?
I unclip at the bulbholder base and reattach it to, say, the threaded post that goes through the fender, while the other end is connected to the neg terminal....just thinking this through out loud. |
No, I meant unclip the lead from the bulbholder base, then start working you way back to the battery. So when you start (battery to bulbholder clipped) you have eliminated all of the ground path. Then you take it off the bulbholder and move it to the the post taht goes through the fender, you have just "added in" that connection. As you go farther toward the battery in steps, you are adding in more and more of the original ground path.
Oh, but as the bulbholder is just hanging out free, you will need to touch it against that copper contact on the fender bracket for each test. You can just connect a smaller clip lead between the bulbholder base and teh copper contact for the rest of the tests.
It is common for the bracket to fender and fender to body connections to be an issue.
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John Henry
'57 Deluxe
'56 Single Cab |
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johnshenry
Samba Member
Joined: September 21, 2001
Posts: 9364
Location: Northwood, NH USA
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| Posted: Wed Aug 15, 2012 8:07 pm Post subject: |
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I'll run this one in my '57 for a while. Still have not got my Asian low cost flashers. Thanks again to Chip for putting me on to this.
I "faked" the duty cycle set screw by just JB Welding part of the bracket inside to hold the screw behind the housing hole.
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John Henry
'57 Deluxe
'56 Single Cab |
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6Speed
Samba Member
Joined: December 10, 2002
Posts: 340
Location: East Coast
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| Posted: Mon Aug 20, 2012 6:08 pm Post subject: |
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Just wanted to thank Chip for teh speedy delivery and awesome lights! Check these things out! Last picture is a video.
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'57 Beetle |
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Chip
Samba Member
Joined: July 19, 2008
Posts: 969
Location: Utah
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| Posted: Mon Aug 20, 2012 6:57 pm Post subject: |
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| Mighty 6V! Good example of the LED 6v flasher right there. Thanks for the photos! |
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Saggs
Samba Member
Joined: December 23, 2003
Posts: 662
Location: Lincolnton, NC
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| Posted: Sun Nov 25, 2012 6:42 pm Post subject: |
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I put a set of Chips LED's on my 12v converted 56 and they work awesome! I'm running standard bulbs up front and the snowflakes in the rear. I went to the electronic flasher he includes w/ the kit but I'm having trouble w/ the small indicator bulb in the speedo. After I hooked it up I tried jumping it off the switched lead on the flasher unit but it made the signals flash all the time. Must have somthing to do w/ the incandescent amp draw of the speedo indicator bulb? Is there a way to properly wire in the small light or does that need to be an LED also??
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"One man can make a difference...Jesus did." |
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Chip
Samba Member
Joined: July 19, 2008
Posts: 969
Location: Utah
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| Posted: Sun Nov 25, 2012 10:05 pm Post subject: |
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| The included flasher should wire in slightly different than your stock one. One pin goes to ground(-), one to 12v(fuse box)(+), and the other(L) other connects to both the wire to the switch, and the wire to the dash light. There is a small diagram posted on the relay itself, with the symbols - + and L. Hook them up as I just described and things should work. If not, shoot me an email or PM and we can sort out the issue. |
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veeduboval
Samba Member
Joined: March 07, 2002
Posts: 14
Location: Las Vegas
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| Posted: Sat Dec 29, 2012 9:23 pm Post subject: |
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Thanks again on the lights! They are amazing. I feel much safer driving the oval with lights that can be seen. I highly recommend these lights. DYI kit was easy to assemble as well.
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PASHN8
Samba Member
Joined: January 30, 2011
Posts: 152
Location: Melbourne, Australia
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| Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 3:47 am Post subject: |
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They look great!
Anyone supplier a similar kit for 'heart' tail lights?
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www.dinography.com.au - Dino!
1957 11-Window Split Bus
1954 3-fold Sunroof Oval Beetle
*** Looking for '56 Porsche T1 356A 1300 engine no. 22373 *** |
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NikC
Samba Member
Joined: June 30, 2005
Posts: 63
Location: Zillertal Valley
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| Posted: Tue Jul 29, 2014 8:16 am Post subject: |
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These are awesome ...
How do i go about getting a set over to the UK ?
Nik |
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ssx
Samba Member
Joined: May 19, 2004
Posts: 641
Location: Big Isle Hawaii
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| Posted: Mon Jan 23, 2017 11:04 am Post subject: Re: LED tail lights for 56-61 |
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My 56 came with a set of LED tail lights installed. I'm having a problem with the passenger side brake light. Car is 12V. Running lights and turn signals all work perfect. When I step on my brakes the driver side works but the passenger doesn't come on. Any ideas on what could be wrong?
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1956 Oval/Ragtop |
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Chip
Samba Member
Joined: July 19, 2008
Posts: 969
Location: Utah
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| Posted: Mon Jan 23, 2017 11:15 am Post subject: Re: LED tail lights for 56-61 |
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| Are they a set of my lights? If you have turn signals on both sides but only one brake light, the problem is probably your turn signal switch. The wiring is good from front to rear. |
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vwnut1
Samba Member
Joined: May 16, 2012
Posts: 495
Location: So Cal
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| Posted: Mon Jan 23, 2017 12:04 pm Post subject: Re: LED tail lights for 56-61 |
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I just finished installing Chip's LED snowflakes on my '56. Still running a 6 volt system and front turn signals are old fashioned bulbs. I purchased Chips LED flasher as well and everthing works perfect. I soldered and shrink wrapped all of the electrical connections for longevity and dependability. Two thumbs up from me!!!
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1957 VW Oval Resto Mod |
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ssx
Samba Member
Joined: May 19, 2004
Posts: 641
Location: Big Isle Hawaii
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| Posted: Mon Jan 23, 2017 10:30 pm Post subject: Re: LED tail lights for 56-61 |
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| Chip B. wrote: |
| Are they a set of my lights? If you have turn signals on both sides but only one brake light, the problem is probably your turn signal switch. The wiring is good from front to rear. |
I'm not sure how to tell? But I took the tail light off to check and put it all back together and now the brake lights both work. I did move around the turn signal switch because it's finicky... Maybe that fixed it?
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1956 Oval/Ragtop |
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