LED there be light!

The instrument bulbs in the 280Z had become quite dim.  I'm guessing that many of the filament bulbs are the same that rolled off the showroom floor when the car was purchased.  The bulbs in the gauges are of a size and wattage combination that isn't too common nowadays and was hard to find.  I became interested in replacing these bulbs with LED counterparts to that I wouldn't have to worry about them dimming over time and replacing anytime soon.

I did some research and found some good candidates at SuperBrightLEDs.com.  I picked up 20 of the 12v, warm, 120 degree LED's in a bayonet base of the proper size.  Since they were only 88 cents per bulb, I picked up a few more than I needed figuring I would get a DOA or two (which proved to be true).

Since I already had the steering wheel off, the speedometer and tachometer would be easy to remove and replace the bubs (each gauge has 4 bulbs).

Since I had these gauges out, I cleaned them up as they had 40 years of dust inside of them.  

The lenses on both gauges also had some deep scratches on the front surface, so I used some Novus plastic lens cleaner, starting with the number 3 polish (deep scratches), then moving to the number 2 polish.  This polish never ceases to amaze me and both lenses came out like new.

After swapping the bulbs I returned the gauges to their homes, replacing hardware that was missing as necessary.  The bulbs are definitely brighter than the previous filament-based bulbs that were replaced, but not so bright that they are obnoxious.

The warm color and 120 degree reflection of these bulbs seems to have been a good choice as the gauges have retained the same color as that produced by the filament bulbs.  I plan on replacing the bulbs in the center gauges at a later date and will follow up with another post when complete.  I already know that I want to address a common issue with the voltage gauge where some type of adhesive or other gunk accumulates around the charge LED (I've seen this condition in several others).