cob led rings

after going to spa and begbie taking a nice photo of my car with a 430 , I wasn't happy with the way the led lights looked and had to do something about it .



pondman had done the brake lights using cob led rings so I purchased 2 sets and started on a spare set of rear lights .

before -



after -



left - old 24 led strips , right - cob 105 led rings



finished -



I have left the rings as side lights and the bulbs to do the brakes , reverse , indicators and fog lights . very happy with the final look now as they are a lot brighter than the old rings and also look factory fit . now to replace the cfcc rings in my headlights with white or blue cob rings .

thanks Ross for the heads up about these rings

Wow look at all that wine!

Oh and the lights look really good too Iain!

Looks great!

Wish I had the confidence to do this, keep seeing people's pics and drooling lol.

its not hard to do and there is my old how too to help you do them .

http://www.fiatcoupeclub.org/forum/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=1214112#Post1214112

these are the rings I used =

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1Pair-90mm-Red...=item27f2ff4a4d

Looked at your guide and yeah looks doable, slightly put off as I've never done anything electrical before.

Are all your rear light lenses red? And if so how does the reverse, brake and indicators show through the red lenses?

I have left the lenses as they are so looks standard when the lights are off , the bulbs do the brakes , reverse , indicators and fog lights and they show up fine with the rings on . will do a video to show what I mean and post tomorrow .

Ahh ok, that makes sense now lol.

Yeah video would be great, thanks.

Saved in my watch list until I have some spare cash

these are worth it T

Really like the look these give and will make this a job for over Easter. I liked what Ross had done when we met up last year so with your how too it should be easy ! Thanks Fellas

if anyone needs any help with anything then just PM me and i'll send you my mobile number for those that don't have it .

I'll second that!

I've a different combo... All red lenses with orange cob rings for the indicators and cree led's for brakes.

And reverse?

Err, OK!

.sekarb rof s'del eerc dna srotacidni eht rof sgnir boc egnaro htiw sesnel der llA ...obmoc tnereffid a ev'I

...Sorry, long day! I forfeited the eye-level brake light. Now nice bright white LED's

Yes, they are the same COB ring suppliers I used. As said, nice job Iain.
Better than fairy lights ehh?!

you still need to do the bottom two Ross .

I like the double set-up Iain, but I also want to keep the car looking as OE as possible. So I went for the minor mod. look. I added the pic for people to "compare and contrast" a single and double look.
I hope you don't mind?

Not at all Ross , for me I have double rings on the front so had to have double rings on the back to match up .

Just watch out if you do. He had sent some interesting pictures to me

Looks good, shame I won't be able to do the same photo again

you never know mate

These look great Iain. I now have a spare set of red lights. Think I may have a go.

noooo ive just spent week tinkering with mine and now i must do this too

I've ordered a pair of led rings so will be giving it ago when they turn up.

photos when done .

Sure....... Pm when stuck lol.

Have got a spare set of lights from EBay which are in good nick so just waiting for LED rings to arrive

red lights crack open easy , but the indicator ones you may have to use a hack saw or dremel to cut them open as the last set i did i had to use a dremel as they wouldn't budge with a screwdriver .

Fitted my cobs today, only replaced the side lights and left the rest standard.

Just sidelights



With brakes



Thanks for the idea and advice!

Nice!

Still waiting for my rings to turn up.

Brake light on the inner, side light on the outer.

Great thread and great find on the cob led rings Nismo

dlongstaff, have you custom made those inserts to fit the cobs onto? Looks great!

Thanks, John

Yes I did make them.
I have the white on the front.
Pondman gave us the heads up on this.
Click

Thanks for the recognition

Thanks dlongstaff, do you have any other WIP pics of the build?

Ah yes, just re-read the first post in this thread, thanks as well to Pondman for the COB LED find

John

Hi doing mine when the cob led`s arrive just to get this right the black wire to the negative on the cobs and the white wire is the main lights positive feed to the cobs as i am soldering them to those wires (not the brake lights)
Thanks

Black and orange are the wires you need to use and they can go either way to the rings as they work both ways . You need to cut the orange wire going to the bulb or the bulb will stay on with the rings as side lights .

Thanks Nismo.

For those who are hard of understanding
This is the way I wired mine up. I hope it corresponds with what Iain said?


This will give you side light on = LED ring, when lights are on and a bulb feed to the existing brake light bulb, but will eliminate the side light part of the bulb when fitted. I did not want the LED off when braking. The brake light is bright enough to out shine the LED ring when on.

Just find and follow MY "how too" on wiring the led rings .

I simply covered the sidelight terminal of the bulb with insulating tape. No wire cutting and easy to revert to standard if need be.

Good idea

Things just got real.......my rings turned up today.

Just reading through this post again, making me more confused lol. Think it'll make more sense when I get my lights off, hopefully at the weekend.

I noticed with the old led how to you had to cut some off the strip but given these are pre made rings you can simply use as supplied and mount inside the light unit. If you have a photo I would appreciate it. thanks

i did mine yesterday, easy job.

I cut the orange wire in the back of the bulb holder to stop the bulb lighting up at the same time as the COB ring.

I soldered the two wires from the COB into the orange and black in the middle of the wires and insulated with shrink wrap.

I kept the bulb for the stop light, I dont like the dual ring look for side and stop lights.

The size of the 90mm rings are perfect, they sit about 1mm inside the outer rim of the unit. A couple of dabs of resin and job is done.

With regards the wire, i opened up the drain hole ever so slightly with a microfile to let the COB connector pass through. Neat job.

I'm going to do the indicators with 90mm orange but that leaves me to think about how to deal with the reverse light. I don't want to use the high level rear light as a reverse light.

Use the bulb as your reverse light as you did with the brake light

But it will be red... Needs to be white.?

the reverse lens is white so will show over the red rings as white light unless your changing the lens to red .

Was intending to go with the two red lenses and dump the std two tone lenses...

Ah I see , white led strips either side of the number plate for reverse lights .

Had a bit of a mare splitting the lenses and then getting them glued back on. Seems super glue doesn't work so used clear silicone. Just hope they don't fall off in the morning lol.

How rude of me, cheers to the guys who put the guides and photos up showing how to do it.

looking good Ste .

Thanks mate and thanks for the inspiration

I was thinking about mounting one in the middle of the reflector on the bumper. Routing the shape of the cob light / strip out of the centre of the lens...

sounds like it will work well Rudi .

I really wouldn't use superglue for jobs like this, mix up some epoxy resin.

Yeah lol found out the hard way. Used clear silicone for bonding glass, done the job nicely.

worked fine for me and has done for the last 4 years but I do understand there is better stuff to use than superglue

its just you get 10 tubes for a £1 from the pound shop

Why not just use slovent cement?
It's what they were bonded them together with in the factory
You get a few moments of adjustment, before it sets and melts/bonds it all together as a sealed unit again. No risk of moisture ingress.

because its a nightmare to crack them open a second time when the LEDs inevitably go wrong after time and you need to replace them

Have faith Mario, there are 100 of these little critters in a ring, if the odd one goes it won't show, if the resister goes, splice in a new one
Fit and forget!
And if it all goes horribly wrong get a new light from Ebay for a tenner.

4 years with superglue and no problems at all so no need to use solvent cement .

Confirmed that the reverse light isn't tested at mot, so going to leave it out for now...

i cant remember who, but someone did the red lense with 90mm cob indicator.

Ive just bought a set of yellow 90mm COBs, but was curious as to what the colour is like behind the red lens and whether the mot queried anything?

workshy did the 90mm cob indicator mod so have a chat with him .

90mm yellow cobs under red lenses as in my sig pic below.

Nothing mentioned at MOT time.

Thats the one, they look awesome. Cheers fellas

I fitted the cob rings (for side lights) and they look great - thanks for the tips,links and the howto :-)

However, I do now have a problem as I can't listen to the radio when I have my lights on. As I now get lots of interference on the radio when I switch my lights on :-(

Did anyone else have this issue, and if so, has anyone found a solution?

Thanks

I had this problem too whilst in my shed trying out said leds cutting out the DAB radio signal, they were within a metre of each other. Not noticed any problems so far using the in car DAB, although the Aerial is front screen mounted well away from rear lights. Maybe something to do with the drivers!

Great idea about the front screen mounted solution – what make do you have, and is it hidden from view?

The head unit is a Jvc, the front windscreen aerial is a stick on affair mounted near the top of the passenger side, you can hide the coax down the A pillar trim, quite unobtrusive (especially now the tax disc and holder are not required) this is used solely for the DAB radio and the existing aerial is used for Am/Fm. I'm pretty sure that most DAB car radios come with this type or you can get this type of aerial.

I haven't had any problems with interference on the radio .

Perhaps it's something to do with my car, as my radio is not a DAB one, but just standard Sony FM/AM unit. Nismo: Are you on the standard rear windscreen aerial? Perhaps I've got an earth problem....which is why I wanted to check if anyone else had this issue - or it's just on my car...

I have a standard alpine FM/AM unit running off the rear aerial , will check it tonight but I haven't noticed any interference .

I've not had this issue

Had a go at these today and am just doing the stop/ tail light for the time being. The hardest bit was breaking the bond of the glue between the lens and the light body. Managed without breaking anything after a while and now just waiting for glue to set. Will try and swap over tomorrow and post some photos.

Quite a simple job in the end and really pleased with the look. Thanks for the How too guys.

look great dont they!
now get rid of the crappy indicator ones and go all red with the yellow cob. they look so much better imo.