LED Third Brake Light (Homemade)

[Schnitzer318is]

Here are some teaser pics guys. I didn't get completed shots tonight because my camera batts died on me. I'll take some of those tomorrow. I could have gone with smaller LEDs, but I wanted it to be bright. Plus these are the LEDs I am going to use for the tail brake lights so I wanted them to match pretty well. Let me know what you guys think. BTW next up... LED side lights, front signal lights, and tails. Not using the same style LED for all of the lenses, but should look hotness when completed.

[Schnitzer318is]

Here are some completed pics... though I have since added one more LED on each side to fill out the housing shape. Looks pretty good, and is super bright at night.

[Shoomakan]

I like it! If I was keeping my Touring I woulda done that!

[Schnitzer318is]

Here are some night time pics. I had to tone down my exposure all the way on the camera to prevent lens flare. LOL if you want pics with full exposure to see true brightness let me know... but it's bright ;)

[golde30]

cool.

[aaron325ix]

whats with all the bars on the windows? you live in S. Dallas or something? Cool LED's

[StereoInstaller1]

Dude, that is fucking BALLER!

Nice job, man, excellent!

Now send me schematics because I am too fucking lazy to do it myself. I will build them, but I don't wanna do the math.

Oh yeah, check panel is OK with this?

Luke

[DaveSmed]

[DaveSmed]

Dude, that is fucking BALLER!

Nice job, man, excellent!

Now send me schematics because I am too fucking lazy to do it myself. I will build them, but I don't wanna do the math.

Oh yeah, check panel is OK with this?

Luke

He's got a 318is, which shouldn't have a check panel. (though I do spy the relay, that a 325 housing?)

No biggie, connect the green/black wires together and call it a day if it acts up.

[Garageaholic]

Awesome! yeah send the schematics. I would definitely be in for giving that a try!

[hendrixvodu]

id buy that shit if it was for the tail lights !!!!!!

[StereoInstaller1]

That pretty much is what I am doing with a set of Ebay tails I have for my early car.

All red, all LED...and I am trying to do sequential turnsignals.

Wewt!

[JasonC]

...and I am trying to do sequential turnsignals.

I've been waiting for someone to do this to e30 tail lights.

[Schnitzer318is]

^I'll be doing full LED conversion on my tails soon. Need to order more LEDs. Though I am going to keep amber signals. I just like em... personal preference you know.

There's not much of a schematic for these guys. You just buy the board, decide where you want your positive "rail" to be (down the middle works best usually). Then you solder the resistor to each LED to that rail (in the correct orientation of course), then solder the other end to the anode (+ leg, longer leg) of the LED. Once you have done that for all X number of LEDs... you just have to connect all of the grounds for the LEDs together using jumper wires/solder. Lastly solder a +12v wire to the positive rail, and a ground wire to one of the negative leads... really anywhere u have a ground, could be any of the LED ground legs, or ground jumper wires. After that it's just a matter of wiring those 2 wires you now have coming out of the back of the housing to the +12v of the factory third brake light and the ground on the housing. I can definitely help anyone who wants to try it, but you'll see it's pretty easy.

Oh as mentioned... no OBC for me so I don't have to defeat anything *yay*. The housing is the factory housing on the 318 afaik. Maybe they put the relay on all of them just in case? But as mentioned, easy enough to defeat the OBC with the above method.

[BDSax]

looks good. i bought a pc board to try on the tails but i never got around to it. i also counted how many leds thats needed from the picture in germany someone had. probably not to acurrate, as the reverse has 4 rows not 3. looks good though