[6pack] dashlight update

[Bob Danielson]

You might want to go through Paul Rego's site 
(http://www.74tr6.com/gauges.htm) where he did a complete refurbishing of 
his gauges which made a huge difference in brightness. A lot of work but 
worth the effort.

Bob


Bob Danielson
1975 TR6 running with
Throttle Body Injection
Toyota 5 Speed
Nissan Diff & CVJs
http://tr6.danielsonfamily.org

-----Original Message----- 
From: David Murray
Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 4:55 PM
To: 'Joe Honor' ; 6pack at autox.team.net
Subject: Re: [6pack] dashlight update

Joe,

Don't expect a huge difference in gauge brightness.  The gauge construction
severely limits the amount of light that makes it to the front of the gauge.
The light travels around the edge of the gauge face plate (metal) through a
perimeter slot of at most 1/8" and then gets reflected off the inside of the
glass onto the face of the gauge.  I have fabricated a test setup with an
array of outdoor sign LED's (equivalent light output of 60W bulb) arranged
around the periphery of the gauge housing and while I do see an improvement
it is still nowhere near a modern car; even one from the 80's :)

I think the only way to significantly improve the lighting of the gauges
would be to have new faceplates fabricated out of plastic that would allow
light to pass through those areas one would want lit, i.e. the numbers and
markings; or to fabricate a flexible circuit that would mount in front of
the faceplate but behind the bezel using surface mount LED's that would
illuminate the front of the faceplate.

Dave