Honda Civic DIYs and Civic Tech ChatHonda Civic DIYs and Civic Tech Chat - for the true gearheads! Bring your wrench, it's time for some Honda Civic DIY projects! Questions about problems with your car do NOT go here.
Welcome to civicforums.com!
Welcome to civicforums.com.
You are currently viewing our forum as a guest, which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our community, at no cost, you will have access to start new topics, reply to conversations, privately message other members (PM), respond to polls, upload content and access many other special features. Registration is free, fast and simple, so please join civicforums.com today!
The goal of this DIY is to help the user change the lights in their car to color for the backlight, and any color they want for the icons (left/right turn etc...).
Also the ability to change the faces with photoshop etc... is an option, a large full color scanned is provided, don't download it unless you're really going to work with it in photoshop, as the bandwidth is expensive at with a 5 meg file. The other pictures provided should suffice for reference.
Obviously the user can change stuff around, this is just how I changed my gauges, color and number of bulbs can be swapped out for certain uses.
Items required:
12 5mm or (T1-3/4) LEDs for the backlighting (mine were blue) they will be filling in 4 holes (3 per hole).
5 "twist in style gauge LEDs" forleft/right turn signals, cruise control, "brights", and "key in" reminder icons. (mine were blue) Or you can substitute just 5mm(T1-3/4) LEDs with a resistor will work fine too.
11 LEDs for icons (mine were white)
1 short and 1 long (or just 1 short) phillips screw driver
1 flat head screw driver (for popping faces off)
Soldering Iron. for PCB work a 15watt is reccomended, for other soldering you can use a more powerful one, just be careful not to burn anything out. (I used a 100w one for soldering LEDs and resistors when not on the PCB)
Solder - rosin core is easiest to work with, the thinner the better
Resistors - to be determined by your LED color and how many you will use.
~1 cup acetone (if even that much)
lots of cotton swaps (Q-tips) for removing orange filter
* Non-US people may need more Icon LEDs and/or Bulbs, this was done on a US SI, and I noticed there were bulbs /LEDs missing, for example Daytime Running Lights. You can apply the same knowledge to your application pretty easily, I'll note where it may be different.
Background information:
Differences between LEDs and Bulbs:
Why Pick LEDs over Bulbs? Simply put, bulbs put out a low color temperature 3,000*K white light. When you put a bulb "condom" over that you are filtering out all the light except which that filter lets go through. LEDs do not filter, or at least the good ones are encased in a water clear epoxy casing and the light that is emitted is a "pure" color. You can select exactly the color you want, Bulbs you can't.
Look at the Spectrum Chart, Light is composed of different wave lengths measured in nanometers. Our visible spectrum goes from about 350nm on the UV end, to 800nm on the InfraRed end. White light is composed of a broad range, enough such that no one wavelength dominates. LEDs put out a very narrow spectrum, and have one over riding wavelength which dominates all others, and that is how you pick your LED. ELEDs has a great search tool where you can select the frequencies you're looking for. http://www.eled.com/ProductSearch.asp?Category_name=5mm(T1-3/4)
Note that some LEDs with a certain frequencies are very dim, so even though the frequency may be the one you want, if it doesn't put out enough light, it's pretty much out of the running. Check out the "430-470-blue" picture (the purple chart). Note that 470nm blue is more of a turquiose according to the spectrum chart, but that 430 blue is PURE blue. I really would have preferred the 430nm blue, but didn't search hard enough, or couldn't find them... The 430nm blue put out too little light for the ones I did find... In the future hopefully they'll put out better performing 430nm blue LEDs... If a company doesn't tell you the frequencies and/or specs of the LEDs, assume they're the cheapest kind you can find on a good site.
5mm are the normal size, and 3mm are the smaller version, both put out about the same amount of light. SMD (surface Mounted Devices) are basically the miniature version, Civics do not have these, RSXs, cell phones etc.. do have these instead of bulbs.
LED brightness are measured in Candelas or more specifically Milli-Candelas, since they're not putting out that much light. Leds also are measure in their viewing angle, like 15* 30* 45* etc... the wider the angle, the lower the Candelas, so a 2800mCd (milliCandella) 30* (degree) LED and a 5000mcd 15* LED are putting out the same amont of light, but just at different widths of their beam pattern. For our application, Backlit LEDs a wider beam is better, and for icons probably a narrower one would be better.
In order to run LEDs in a circuit you need a current limiting resistor soldered onto the Anode side to keep the car's current from blowing out the LED. I just use a calculator to find out the resistor I need, but you can do the math if you want... here's a calculator:
Look at the sample Blue LED chart [blueLED-Specs] The key fields you're looking for are "contituous forward voltage". That's what you'll plug into as "Diode forward voltage" on the calculator. basically at 20ma (milliamperes) which most LEDs are rated, they'll put out their given luminosity (this case is 2400mcd). Peak forward Current is 50ma for this case, meaning if you go over that you'll fry your LED, and it can't handle more than that. Power Dissipation is how many watts it's taking up. The other characteristics you might be interested in are peak wavelength (this case is 470nm). Viewing angle is 30*.
Now for the calculator
Supply voltage - Your car's voltage (13.5 is normal, but 14 just to be safe)
Diode forward voltage - whatever your forward voltage is, this example is 3.5
Diode rated current mA - 20 is the rated, you can go over or under a little, but no more than 10 either way or you can burn up your LED, or change the color.
then click find, and you should get the following values
Calculated resistance value 525 Ohms - the resistance in ohms of the resistor to be soldered onto the anode
Next standard 5% resistor * 560 Ohms - what it says, they don't make a 525 ohm resistor, so you'd have to go upto a 560 ohm, try plugging in different "diode rated current" (like 25 instead of 20) and then see what you come up with... Best bet is to push the LED with a little more current, rather than making it dimmer.
Resistor color markings green blue brown - the resistors have color markings to tell you what they mean, but just go by the package name.
Power dissipated in LED** 66 mW compare that to the 100mw that our Blue LEDs can dissipate before the blow... a good safe number, if you're over your LED's rated power dissipation, lower the current (20ma) a tad.
Power dissipated in resistor** 197 mw - means basically the resistor is a dummy load, sucking up the extra fluctuations. Actually just get at a 1/4 watt resistor.
Now the value you calculated in the exercise is just 1 LED, for the backlighting we're going to put at least 3 LEDs in place of 1 bulb. LEDs do not like Paralell, don't do it (unless you're an EE). So we're going to use Series, meaning + to - to + to - etc... With LEDs, you just need one big resistor in front of the trailing LEDs. Or you can divide up the total resistance among the LEDs, and put one in front of each anode. I chose the latter method simply beacuse I had small 120 ohm resistors lying around, it's probably easier for you to calculate one big one and put it in front of the first LED. To calculate that, just add all the forward voltages together and use that number. For example if a blue had a 3.5v forward current, and you wanted 3 of them, 3.5x3=10.5 So just plug in 10.5 for forward voltage, and that'll be your resistance you need.
If you want to calculate it by hand, the formula is Ohm's Law: V=IR, or in this case, R = V/I, where V is (Car's voltage - LED voltage drop), and I is the desired current in Amps. So in our example:
R= (13.5-3.5)/.02 = 500 (ohms)
Just a note about color selection. You can pick whatever color for the backlighting you want, But if the filter isn't close to that color, with LEDs, you won't get any light through there. For example the needles normally glow red, if you use a blue backlight you're going to get very dim needles.
Steps:
0) Preperation:
Get a full tank of gas (NOW) before you start, you'll need it to calibrate your gauges once you put them all back together.
1) Remove the Gauges from the Dash.
Lower the steering wheel all the way. Remove black plastic cover, there are snaps in the top and bottom, basically just put your hands touching the clear plastic, and push down (at the bottom) and up (at the top) and pull towards you, it will pop towards you pretty easily. Then there are 3 screws holding the gauges in place. For the top there is 1 screw you need the short phillips to remove (wood threaded). For the bottom left and right screws (machine thread) you can use the long or short phillips screwdriver.
2) Take the gauges apart.
The gauges are held together with wedge type clips all around, basically you're gonna take everything apart... Leave the back white plastic on until the gauge faces have been removed so you don't scratch the back PCB (electrical board). [pic 1]
The Helms manual gives shows which bulbs are which for when you want to install the twist in bulbs (later step).
You're going to have to remove the needles to be able to get the PCB off. You can use two small flat head screw drivers to pry them off, but I just used my fingers in a vise like manner. Be gentle and pull up, don't push the needle to either side, they should just pop off, see pic for details. [pic03+pic04]
Ok, now the needles are off but you won't be able to remove the face until the round washers around where the needles were, are removed. I just slipped a flat head screw driver right under the face and pryed upwards. Even though the washers are round, there are flat spots on the inside which hold the washer down to the clear plastic light diffuser underneath. When you goto put them back on, note those flat parts and put them on accordingly, youll notice on the clear plastic that there are notches for that. Pic 5+6 explain howto pop the washers off.
The face is tackied on with glue, try not to bend or put marks in it, I just used a flat head screwdriver to remove them.
Once you get the face off, you'll need to take the tach and spedometer pins off, pinch from the back and push them through, don't worry it won't tear the plastic.
Ok, now you can see in pic 7 the clear light spreaders, and how 4 little bulbs are supposed to distribute all the light... With the orange filter the light diffuses pretty well, but when we take that filter off we're going to be responsible for aiming light through those 4 holes accordingly to evenly distribute the light. [pic 7]
Now you can take the white backing off the gauges, and remove the PCB. Take out all the Bulbs and set them aside for now. [pic08]
oK, now here's a tricky part, the LCD odometer display has an orange filter behind it, and to remove it you have to be VERY careful not to break the LCD. Use a very small screwdriver or flat tweezers to lift the top left corner up and somehow grab the orange filter paper behind and remove. Yours will look a little different, I messed up and tried painting the front white part because some acetone spilled onto the front. [pic09+10]
3) Removing the Orange Filter with Acetone
Ok, the key here is use more acetone than force. You're basically just using q-tips on any part that is orange and maybe have black dots in it. Take a look at Pic 11 and 12. Pic 11 shows where NOT to acetone, and where it's ok to acetone. Basically, if it's backlit, you can acetone it, if it has a seperate LED or Bulb you CAN NOT acetone it, or you will erase the icon outline. I messed up and removed the "brights" icon trying, don't make my mistake. Before you start acetoning, understand which bulbs/LEDs light up which icon or backlight..
When you goto acetone the orange off the LCD filter, put tape over the white part or acetone will leak onto that and destroy the white paint, and then you'll get a blotchy backlight. I ended up completely removing mine because it looked gross. So TAPE the White Side!
Pic 12 Shows what the face looks like through a very nice light, so the color should be pretty true. You can't change the color of the 4 top icon lights (left/right turn signal, brights and cruise control), if you use an LED of the same color (like blue to the green signals) it will work fine, but you can't use say a red LED for a turn signal on a green filter, the LEDs just don't put out enough green/blue spectrum, and the red filter will only pass red light, so you can either print out your own gauge faces, or use white LEDs which will make the filters a more pure green/blue etc...
Look at Pic 13 and 14. In pic 13 RED text denotes a twist in bulb, and yellow denotes an LED. In pic 14 you see an overlay of the gauge faces and the PCB. What this allows you to do is decide what color you want for each icon. This should let you customize your color tastes. You'll refer back to this pic when you go to wire things up. The circled orange in pic 13 is a question mark, I think that's what it is, but if it's not you'll just have to flip the twist in bulb upside down, no biggie. You should always have a multimeter handy to test for polarity.
Note to people outside the US, you may have different icons and more LEDs here, don't acetone somethnig that's black on the front.
You can see in pic3 and pic 4 where I messed up and taped a "bright" icon to the back of the face... :-/
4) Replacing Icon LEDs
Ok, this is the easier part, and a warm up for the backlighting. [pic15] the Red and amber LEDs are the ones we'll be replacing.
LEDs have a positive (anode) and a negative (cathode) lead on them. see pic 16 for a diagram, and you might notice on your PCB that the same diagram denotes anode and cathode. It is very important to get them going the right way or they will not light up, and possibly burn out. [pic16]
Basically all you're going to be doing is desoldering the LEDs on the board and replacing them with your chosen color LEDs. The way to do this is heat up the back soldering pad (on the PCB) of one LED leads, and pull the led out a little, then heat up the other side and pull that out a little, teeter tottering it out until it completely comes out. Now these LEDs happen to have their leads bent on the back side so even if you do heat them up, they're not going anywhere. I just used some snips to cut as much of the LED Lead on the back side as possible without scatching the board, then proceed as normal. [pic 17]
Once you get one out, get your new LED out and cut the leads a little bit longer than the ones you took out. And slowly put your LED back by heating one side, push, heat other side, push, till it goes in. Make sure the LED is aiming straight up when you finally are done heating it up, or it won't fit into the white plastic "light guide" piece that sits ontop of the board. In pic 18 you can see I've replaced the top left LED, the others are stock. [pic18] Refer to pic 13 and 14 for the polarity.
5) Replacing the Bulb Backlighting
Ok, this part is probably the most challenging, Basically we're trying to light the entire gauges with just 4 bulb locations. We're going to tap off the 12volt power there and put some LEDs in their place. The idea is to cram as many LEDs in there as possible. I only had 12 blue LEDs on hand, (3 per location) you might be able to get 4 in there, but with 4 you might have to alter the white "light diffusing" piece that fits on top of the PCB. Try putting the white piece back on the PCB before we start to see what I mean, each bulb/LED fits into a hole on the white plastic, eventually you're gonna have to fit whatever you solder onto the PCB through those holes (or notch bigger holes).
Before you solder the LEDs together, you're probably going to want to sand down the 5mm LEDs so that the light pattern is diffuse, I used a steel file, but sand paper probably would work fine too. Be careful not to break off the LED Leads while sanding them.
Ok, now you've figured out how many LEDs and the resistors you need from the above background information. All you're going to do is solder them in series and solder them to the solder tabs on the PCB where the Bulb normally would twist onto. A single Resistor on the front anode is all you need, despite my picture (radio shack was closed, and that's all I had). [pic 19+20] Refer to pic 13 and 14 for the polarity.
6) The top 4 Icon Bulbs
Pic 21 is a completed PCB. You'll note that I just used twist in style LEDs for the top icons, but you could just as easily solder in single LEDs for the top icons (left/right turn, bright and cruise). [pic21]
You can get twist in style Bulbs that fit the SI, and presumably the EM/ES civics frow www.superbrightLEDs.com I actually ended up getting all my LEDs there, as they were the best price/performance at the time, but there are many others as well, just check the specs. See bottom of page for places to purchase LEDS. If you've gotten this far, you can easily do the Icons just as you did the backlighting LEDs, just use 1 LED per icon.
Pic 22 and 23 show you the stock and replacement twist in bulbs. You'll notice you can remove the bulb from the twist in holster. I chose not to use the LED holster because they didn't work as well as the stock ones, so I just removed the bulb and put the LED in the twist in stock holster. The twist in replacement LEDs from superbrightLEDS.com have a resistor built into the part that fits into the holster, for those of you smart people thinking why you don't just put an LED straight into the stock holster. Remember LEDs need a resistor.
7) LCD Backlight
I chose to take 3 of the twist on replacement gauge LEDs and solder them in series to poke through the hole. And I left the filter off, which gave it a floating in space kinda look. This will work the same way as the other single icons. Definetly sand the top of the LED off unless you want hot spots.
8) put everything back together and "manuever" the LEDs
Like above, put the white piece that deflects the Light ontop of the PCB. You'll have to fit each of the LEDs into the original hole, and then make sure before you put everything back together that none of the wires are crossing (if you have multiple LEDs wired together for the backlights). Pic 24 is the white plastic light diffuser piece with the LEDs pushed through the holes. spread the LEDs out as best you can without them shorting each other! Put the face back on and the washers too (remember the flat parts). Don't put the needles on or the clear plastic dome cover on yet, we have to calibrate them first.
9) Calibrating your needles
In order to calibrate your gauges you need a reference point for each item. If you haven't already tested out your gauges by plugging them in and turning your car to the knotch right before ignition. Turn the lights on, play with it etc... make sure it works before you calibrate your needles and go for a drive (or you'll have to get another full tank).
Ok, if you haven't already, plug in your gauges (blue and green) and just set them in their place in the dash. Turn the key to right before you start the car... If you had the needles on, they would jump up to like 2,000 rpm, 30mph etc... SO...
Your car is hopefully cool (it must be cool!) and not running, so just place the tach needle at 0RPM. The SPEDO needle at 0MPH, the Full Gas needle on FULL (because you HAVE a full tank). and the temp needle just below full cold.
Now turn your car on, and take a drive, make sure everything works, and pop the clear plastic dome on, screws etc... back together. Whala. Done.
I've attached a full sized scan of the gauge faces in JPG format 100% compression. Should be good enough for anyone to edit, or I have a 3 meg tif if anyone wants to work on a new gauge face in photoshop. You can get in touch with me through my profile.
Enjoy, and lemme know who's actually completed this! Ocelaris
LED suppliers *I have no affiliation with any of the below companies, I have purchased LEDs from the top two.
Yeah, sorry, I've had this for a while, I just got around to potsing it...
You can take the general advice for this and apply it to any light bulb in your car.
In the end I used strings of SMD LEDs wired to the bulb solder tabs. I used 3 SMD white with a 200ohm resistor (or thereabouts I forget the exact amount). I used 24 total behind my face, and replaced all the twist on bulbs with a 3 or 5mm LED with a resistor in series.
cool... the white looks hella clean..but i gotta ask you sumptin.. when you open up the gauge on the ex coupe, do you know if it'll look the same/similar as the SI's?
I did a DIY on the RSXs and the SIs. I have yet to get into an ex or lx. This thread will teach you enough to get started on any project, if you open it up and find it that different, lemme know, but I'm betting it's the same. The RSXs on the other hand are completely different. The point is not a exact howto, because you want to do your own thing with your gauges, but the general figuring out howto solder LEDs into 12v sources... once you figrue that out, any gauge looks the same to you.
ok to calibrate the needles:
Prerequisite: You've already got a full tank of gas, and let your car get "cold".
Put the gauges back in, but with the face and needles off.
Put the key in and turn to accessory, right before you crank the engine. put the temperature needle at the coldest setting. For gas put it at the highest setting.
For RPM and Spedometer, put the needle in so that it is about 1cm below the pin that normally holds the needle from dropping below a certain point. That is you're putting the needle so that it rests against the pin. manuever the needle over the pin and it should be pushing against the pin. You have to see for your car what a good setting is for the needle, but the key is to have the needle pushing against the pin slightly. Any Qs?
