what about a white background cluster, would it be tooin your face with all the white and then that being lit up by the blue t5 led's??? also where would i be able to find atemplete for a cluster to make into a white one???

Mate ive tried it (white cluster dials, lit up by blue LED's), lets just say it didnt work out as i planned

I made up the white dials, and already had the blue LED lights for the cluster fitted beforehand. Once the white dials were in, it didnt light up very well at all. Would only light up sections and you could see all the plastic brackets and everything light up behind the faces, looked very weird. The only thing you can do i suppose to fix that would be to redo the cluster lighting so that you have a larger wide spread light source directly behind the faces to light the dials up as a whole as opposed to the standard lighting where you have 6 bulbs spread around the cluster and just picking the light up around the edges of the faces. Hope that makes sense. You could try ebay though, you can buy the white dials for the cluster and they come with a light source to make it light up properly at night, lights up either green or blue i think and looks pretty decent.

Heres the dials i made up using Gimp. Didnt take any pics of them installed in the car with the lights on though, coz it looked that stupid lol. I was gutted when i did install them though, i reckon they looked mint inside the cluster, gave it a subtle modern sports look. Theres a tech doco on here written up by data_mine, has the scans of the cluster dials. From there i just altered them using gimp, changed colours, fonts, logo etc. You can also use photoshop if you have that, gimp's free though

ahhhk yeh i can understand how it might not be too great, might just stick with the current dials. was thinking i could paint the black plastic cover that you can see on the outside, has the cut outs for the different sections, haha hard to expalin, was thinkin some silver paint might look good to break up all the black.

I know what your talking about. That's been done also. It looks good imo. Yeah go ahead and paint it. I like the silver colored one too.

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/FORD-XR6-EF-EL-T ... 4|294%3A50

HOLY CRAP!!!!!

You'd be blinded by that fker!!!

yea i saw that ages ago we was asking $540 buy it now price i p****d myself laughin

wats a police cluster and wats the diff from a normal cluster

gallery.php?img=10308&mid=-1#

This is my cluster.
used white leds with a blue filter.
chz.
Jason

I'd like to change my orange Ghia displays to plain white to match the head unit. Should I just keep the standard globes and change the filters to white?

Mike

May not work as the 'yellowness' of the regular bulb will probably just pass through the white filter with no filtering effect and your left with yellow light.

Just go the LED's IMO.

Guys,
Basically I believe our current (pardon the pun) approach to cluster modding is flawed.
The main issue is, our current approach of individual LED "bulb" mods will usually kill the LEDs.
This post is to get some awareness happening so we can work on a better solution.
I don't have all the answers yet! Hopefully others can help out here..
The post is a bit all over the shop (not the best day today) but it's a start.

I've done a bit of work with LED mods in clusters and instruments. My electronics background has
helped a lot
I've compiled a pile of info and data on the topic, when I get time I'll get it organised and post it (hopefully revising the existing "howto" article).
My CRO died and since then I haven't been able to get a capture of the actual waveform used by the BEM to drive illumination.



Problems:
Current
The BEM drives the cluster illumination with a PWM signal. Basically, it's a pulse. This is NOT straight DC. While I'm not yet sure of the different strategies used by the Hi/Lo BEM's, I suspect they are the same (they just use the "dimmer" switch on Hi series headlamp switch differently to provide "stepped" levels rather than bright/dim). This PW signal may have a reverse voltage component, a reverse bias. This reverse bias, if it turns out to be high enough, will DAMAGE the LED's. More on this later.
The short story is, people are using DC calculations for the dropping resistors. This is not valid for the application. Due to this the actual peak voltage applied to the LED is higher than it can tolerate and will result in premature failure.
Most LEDs will start to flicker or blink (slightly temperature dependent) when they're on their way out.
Apart from this, making individual bulbs with resistors is fairly tricky and often results in wasted damaged parts.

The beam of most 5mm blue/white LEDs sucks a*** for use in clusters. Higher mCd LEDs often just concentrate the beam more into a tighter viewing angle, exacerbating the issue.


Solutions:
I don't have a solid solution yet Only suggestions.

Resistors!
Don't power LEDs in parallel with individual dropping resistors, power them via a single resistor.
Unfortunately though, running LEDs in parallel with a single resistor isn't ideal due to manufacturing
variations. This can result in the "weakest link" effect where an out-of-spec LED will die in service.
I think this is a better solution though.
The resistor would need to be beefy, and I haven't checked to see if the backlight LED power rails can be isolated from the other bulb rails.

Use a diode!
I suspect there's a reverse voltage component in the waveform driving the LEDs. This will increase the stress on the LED, or if high enough cause damage.
I recommend using a diode in the line to block any reverse bias. Probably a medium-current Schottky diode would suit due to high speed and low voltage drop.

Beam shape!
I've worked on using diffused silicone potting, reshaping the lens, and applying silver/white paint to the tops of the LEDs with varying success.

Parts!
My local Jaycar stockist (PCB Electronics) has been stocking the pre-made blue plastic-base bulbs with diffused LEDs (and a dropping resistor). These also fail eventually. But I think they're part of the solution.

Needle Illumination!
Can't member if anyone posted something for this, but I worked out a neat (if tricky) way of illuminating the needles a nice red. Looks awesome and is easily visible with peripheral vision - good for safety. No more "clock watching" to avoid 1-pointer camera fines.

if only they made the el cluster in the ef colour. that would be the best ever!

nonsense. An LED is a diode. Any back EMF will just reverse bias it further and nothing will happen. No current limiting will kill it also regardless of the supply method. PWM is just a square wave with a varying mark/space ratio. A back EMF large enough will damage a diode, but most diodes will spec very high volts for this. Highly doubtful that back EMF will exceed supply volts, if there is any back EMF at all. So its not a problem. I have used PWM for LED driving for years. Use series resistors to limit current during eack mark of the PWM. You will do damage to the LED without it... just at a slower rate than straight DC.

ny 1 no if theres a guide for putting leds etc in cluster im looking to do it

^^ documents.php?d=1

Link to the tech doc on the conversion.