Today, I did something about the car’s clock. It was a bone-of-contention because although it worked well enough to show the time the back-light proved to be very poor. The story of what I did to improve it follows. Oh, the soldering isn’t my best, but the quality of solder I have is not very good. I’ll need to get some more before I try soldering again. Ebay as per usual.
I checked out the bulb, which was working perfectly, but its wattage was questionable. The bulb was moulded into a plastic holder and not one of the types where a replacement could be fitted into. I was met with a quandary. I could refit it and put up with an almost none-existent back-light… or rip into it to modify. I ripped into it! I love a challenge.
To cut a long story short, I initially tried a 5mm & 10mm RED Led - separately, but with a GREEN lens between the LED light & display they were singularly no good.
I then fitted a 10mm WHITE LED, and it proved to be very good. However, an LED light doesn't
spread as well as a conventional filament-bulb, so the illumination tended to be centralised.
That’s when I fitted two 5mm WHITE LED’s as well, one on each side of the 10mm.
I should have taken more photos, but here's a clock on Ebay, showing just how dim they can be.
That did the trick.
So my recipe for getting a brighter CLOCKFACE is, one 10mm LED & two 5mm LED’s - all white. Each LED required a 520 Ω, ¼ watt resistor. I guess a single ½ watt would suffice, with all LED’s fitted in parallel.
I used my soldering iron to cut/melt the holes as required, with some existing internal burr creating some shade. I’ll break into the clock another day to finish that off. However, I’m pleased with the result and the back-light still dims when the headlights are switched on too.
I checked out the bulb, which was working perfectly, but its wattage was questionable. The bulb was moulded into a plastic holder and not one of the types where a replacement could be fitted into. I was met with a quandary. I could refit it and put up with an almost none-existent back-light… or rip into it to modify. I ripped into it! I love a challenge.
To cut a long story short, I initially tried a 5mm & 10mm RED Led - separately, but with a GREEN lens between the LED light & display they were singularly no good.
I then fitted a 10mm WHITE LED, and it proved to be very good. However, an LED light doesn't
spread as well as a conventional filament-bulb, so the illumination tended to be centralised.That’s when I fitted two 5mm WHITE LED’s as well, one on each side of the 10mm.
I should have taken more photos, but here's a clock on Ebay, showing just how dim they can be.
That did the trick.
So my recipe for getting a brighter CLOCKFACE is, one 10mm LED & two 5mm LED’s - all white. Each LED required a 520 Ω, ¼ watt resistor. I guess a single ½ watt would suffice, with all LED’s fitted in parallel.
I used my soldering iron to cut/melt the holes as required, with some existing internal burr creating some shade. I’ll break into the clock another day to finish that off. However, I’m pleased with the result and the back-light still dims when the headlights are switched on too.
Last edited:
