Bulb Talk - A General Illuminating Discussion

[Rally Pack 2000]

A few threads are popping up of late asking about bulbs and illumination options for both traditional filament and LED bulbs I thought I would start an open discussion thread to bring everything together in one spot. By all means post what has worked for you and what hasn't or add a question of your own for suggestions on what bulbs to use.

I thought I would start with adding what I currently use in the rear for my Mk2 Escort. Having tried many different LED types I ended up going back to traditional filament bulbs but with a bit of a twist.

Not what you expect to see when the tail light lens comes off I bet!

One of the problems I discovered with the wave of non original rear lenses was that the casting and colour tint wasn't as deep and consistent as the original Butlers and Attimisso. When you put a regular bulb behind the brake light section it would appear red in the thicker parts of the moulding but pink in the thinner parts. On the amber indicator section it would appear correct on the thicker parts but yellow on the thinner ones. Some of the crappier Chinese ones were only cheaply painted on one side. I even found this could be eaten away when the neighbours cat peed down the lens while sitting on the rear spoiler literally turning the lens white! So to compensate I use amber and red filament bulbs rather than the traditional clear. Regular bulbs are 21 watts so to also compensate for the light reduction of the bulb glass caused by their colour tint the bulbs are an unusual 27 watt. The blue brake bulb in fact illuminates red with the blue mirror coating just to make it look fancy if you use completely clear lenses. The result is a very rich red and amber that's unaffected by cheap lenses. Many white LEDs designed to fit the sockets have a colour temperature around the 6000 kelvin (blue white) and this ruins the colour transfer trough the lens and washes it out.

Sick of reverse lights that didnt illuminate anything I use a very rare Raybrig 27 watt halogen bulb. The blue tint of the glass in this bulb filters the traditional yellow filament wavelengths to give a natural white 4000 degree kelvin light that matches the best colour temp that you should aim for in your headlights as well.

Feel free to add your thoughts and experiments. Maybe you have found an LED to work at the rear where I have not. I will post some other interesting bulbs I have found for different areas on the car, boot interior, number plates etc.

[Danish]

 

I have LED lamps for my Mk3 Cortinas sidelights, but for the brakes I couldn't find any suitable LED so went back to filament.

For the Lucas reverse spot I found a Chinese guy selling Cree LED lamps to replace the 35W (?) old-style Lucas lamp.

My front indicators are much like your chrome ones, but amber - they do look good with clear lenses.