I've been asking around about changing the color of my Cruise light...I was also looking around for a spare gauge cluster so I could snipe the appropriate LEDs. Well I met up with the DFW NB club (www.dfwnbclub.org) here recently and Marvins_Dad gave me a spare cluster he had. I appreciated it very much and as a favor in return I vented his TDI tank in the parking lot which he hadn't done yet.
Anyway...I have soldered quite a bit on xbox motherboards so I felt I could tackle this project. Let me tell you that I am freaking pumped that I pursued it and I completed it because it looks pretty dang cool and it cost $0.
The reason I did it is because at night I couldn't stand having this great colors for most of the dash (the purple and the red) and then having this ugly green or yellow or whatever it was for the Cruise. I mean I just couldn't stand it. So much so that sometimes I wouldn't use the Cruise. Anyway...so I decided to swap out that color. But, I figured why not swap the ugly turn signal color too.
There's plenty of threads on how to take apart the gauge cluster...so I won't go too much into detail with pictures and stuff. But here was the general process.
1 - take off the black surround
2 - remove 2 torx screws
3 - move steering column as far out and down as possible
4 - pull cluster out as far as it can go
5 - unhook blue (left side) plug - this requires depressing the hook that keeps the purple clamp locked down and then prying up the purple locking clamp
6 - unhook the green (right side) plug - same procedure as for the blue one
7 - remove cluster and take to work space
These can be done in a couple different orders:
8 - remove 2 silver clips for clear face cover
9 - unhook 4 black plastic hooks and remove and set aside clear face cover
10 - pop needle cap up from back and slide off needles (3)
11 - pull needles straight off with pliers (be careful)
12 - unscrew 6 (?) screws from back of cluster
13 - remove white back cover
14 - depress 2 silver locking tabs in middle to release gauge board (green)
15 - pull 6 black rubber nubs off the white plastic tips coming through board
16 - pull green board away from plastic housing
OK...that gets everything apart for you and now you are ready to swap some LEDs. Before I went down the path I checked out what gauges were what colors so I knew where to snipe LEDs from. I think with some careful planning you wouldn't even need a spare. I wanted to spare so I could play around with soldering on the spare before I did it for real.
What I noticed was the BRAKE light, the SEAT BELT light, the BATTERY light, and a couple others were RED. This is what I needed for the blinkers. The PURPLE LEDs are everywhere and you can get those from any place on the board pretty much.
This is what the LEDs look like on the board. You can see the BLUE square shows you one installed. When you remove one you will see the open spot like the RED square.
The best way to remove the LEDs (and install them) is have a small pair of pliers. Hold the LED with the pliers while you heat up one of the sides. As you heat it up start prying up so that it seperates. Once it's clear make sure and remove any hanging solder and flip it around and do the other side to remove the LED. Just do this in reverse to install the LED. It's very tricky getting something that small to stay still. Just take your time.
One little tip is make sure there's some fresh solder on the 2 spots on the board you are about the use...and don't worry about using a liberal amount of it either. The more the better cause the easier it will be to get the LED to connect.
The hardest time I had was when I put everything back together I had some trouble with the needles and where they lined up. What I ended up doing was plugging the cluster back in without the needles installed (this means without the white back cover or the clear face cover installed) and then I let the computer level out the needles. Then I turned the care off to zero the needles and then I pressed the needles into position. Then I turned the car on and took note of where the needles were and turned it back off and checked to see if they zeroed. It took a few times of this playing around to get it just right (it might be nice to note where your fuel gauge was hitting before you turn the car off).
Anyway...here's the fruits of my labor. It looks better in person cause the red isn't showing up very well...but you can see the BRAKE and CRUISE lights clearly and how they match up. It's a HUGE improvement at night driving...and it's really funny to me how little details like this make such a big difference.
Anyway...I have soldered quite a bit on xbox motherboards so I felt I could tackle this project. Let me tell you that I am freaking pumped that I pursued it and I completed it because it looks pretty dang cool and it cost $0.
The reason I did it is because at night I couldn't stand having this great colors for most of the dash (the purple and the red) and then having this ugly green or yellow or whatever it was for the Cruise. I mean I just couldn't stand it. So much so that sometimes I wouldn't use the Cruise. Anyway...so I decided to swap out that color. But, I figured why not swap the ugly turn signal color too.
There's plenty of threads on how to take apart the gauge cluster...so I won't go too much into detail with pictures and stuff. But here was the general process.
1 - take off the black surround
2 - remove 2 torx screws
3 - move steering column as far out and down as possible
4 - pull cluster out as far as it can go
5 - unhook blue (left side) plug - this requires depressing the hook that keeps the purple clamp locked down and then prying up the purple locking clamp
6 - unhook the green (right side) plug - same procedure as for the blue one
7 - remove cluster and take to work space
These can be done in a couple different orders:
8 - remove 2 silver clips for clear face cover
9 - unhook 4 black plastic hooks and remove and set aside clear face cover
10 - pop needle cap up from back and slide off needles (3)
11 - pull needles straight off with pliers (be careful)
12 - unscrew 6 (?) screws from back of cluster
13 - remove white back cover
14 - depress 2 silver locking tabs in middle to release gauge board (green)
15 - pull 6 black rubber nubs off the white plastic tips coming through board
16 - pull green board away from plastic housing
OK...that gets everything apart for you and now you are ready to swap some LEDs. Before I went down the path I checked out what gauges were what colors so I knew where to snipe LEDs from. I think with some careful planning you wouldn't even need a spare. I wanted to spare so I could play around with soldering on the spare before I did it for real.
What I noticed was the BRAKE light, the SEAT BELT light, the BATTERY light, and a couple others were RED. This is what I needed for the blinkers. The PURPLE LEDs are everywhere and you can get those from any place on the board pretty much.
This is what the LEDs look like on the board. You can see the BLUE square shows you one installed. When you remove one you will see the open spot like the RED square.
The best way to remove the LEDs (and install them) is have a small pair of pliers. Hold the LED with the pliers while you heat up one of the sides. As you heat it up start prying up so that it seperates. Once it's clear make sure and remove any hanging solder and flip it around and do the other side to remove the LED. Just do this in reverse to install the LED. It's very tricky getting something that small to stay still. Just take your time.
One little tip is make sure there's some fresh solder on the 2 spots on the board you are about the use...and don't worry about using a liberal amount of it either. The more the better cause the easier it will be to get the LED to connect.
The hardest time I had was when I put everything back together I had some trouble with the needles and where they lined up. What I ended up doing was plugging the cluster back in without the needles installed (this means without the white back cover or the clear face cover installed) and then I let the computer level out the needles. Then I turned the care off to zero the needles and then I pressed the needles into position. Then I turned the car on and took note of where the needles were and turned it back off and checked to see if they zeroed. It took a few times of this playing around to get it just right (it might be nice to note where your fuel gauge was hitting before you turn the car off).
Anyway...here's the fruits of my labor. It looks better in person cause the red isn't showing up very well...but you can see the BRAKE and CRUISE lights clearly and how they match up. It's a HUGE improvement at night driving...and it's really funny to me how little details like this make such a big difference.
