Blue dash now with write-up
 

EDIT: Added small write-up

Finally finished my winter project, turning all interior lights to blue. Gauge cluster is procarparts.com reverse indiglo. Everything else is lit up with high intensity frosted blue led's. Some switches (a/c and back window) have the green painted on the back of the label insert, so I printed out new inserts with inkjet transparencies (the kind you use for overhead projectors), printed them backwards so the ink is on the backside of the label, followed by a piece of frosted theater light gel so the letters will show white in the daylight, followed by frosted blue gel to help diffuse the led light. The rear defrost, driver side window "auto", and hazard light had color pieces that you could remove without destroying the stock label, I just removed all the small stock light bulbs and soldered in some leds with resistors. Frosted leds help diffuse the light better too so the lights are more a blue glow than a spotlight. For the heater control panel I removed the clear plastic piece behind the panel and installed a row of the frosted leds into the plastic. I spent way too many weekends (a few hours here, a few hours there) to do a ful write-up along the way, but if anyone has any questions or wants to see more pics I'll be glad to help out. Pics and write-up on my website.

Man that is one sweeeeeeeeeet looking interior, I can't wait to get a look at that writ up, post and let us know when it's up for reading, I really want to do that same set-up I just had no idea where to begin. Way to go I can't wait to follow in your footsteps, aprox. how much did it all cost f you don't mind my asking?

Oh man thats amazing! I hope you get the chance to upload the write up. Good job :bigok:

Heh I said I didn't have time to do a full write up :). But I guess if enough people are interested I'll jot some stuff down.
The only thing I spent money on was the led's (around $12 for a 25 pack) and the resistors ($.99 per 5 pack at radio shack), for the theater gel colors I got a free sample kit that contained more than enough gel material to do what I needed. The reverse indiglos were about $30.

That looks damn good!!!!!!!! One of these days I gotta do the same to my interior. Looks way better than the stock green. How hard was it to do it all and did you leave the needles on your gauges alone or did you change those as well?

Wow, that's great work. It looks fantastic! You're now the envy of alotta people on these forums!

Hey hey!
 

Now that's a BRIGHT idea (yeah corny I know). It sounds like it wasn't too tough either, just really tedious and time-consuming. I remember seeing Butnut's blue turn signals a long time ago but I didn't want to do it with only the turn signals. I have to say I'm jealous! Also, a few Q's. How many mA's were the LED's rated at? I think I have a few 20 mA superbright ones left over from when I put auxiliary blue LED accent lights in my corner lenses, but they're really high output: 5500 mcd's. Did you just use a few frosted ones from Radio shack? Also, I know LED's usually only can handle only like a 3V power source, as opposed to the 12V source powering the stock green ones. What was the Ohm rating on the resistors, and were they all the same? Also, what colors were the bands (been a while since I've worked with them)? Maybe I'll reconsider Butnut's and your idea now. It'd go nicely with the other blue lights I have!

Zach

AWESOME:eeek: Job well done and looks so sweet.
Now i need to get my butt in gear and finish my blue light mod. I have the reverse indiglos and did the turn signals blue when the cluster was removed.

Wild-Bill you really should do a wrte up even if it is just a bunch of jotted down lines and descriptions, I work well with pcitures, but if your really descriptive then I think you can pull together a good wite up that will help us all be the envy of all 4Runner owners out there. That is tooo sweeet for words. Let us know if you do get around to making a write up, I can see that I will need to learn some electrician jargin to pull his mod off too, hmm time to read up. Way to go.

wow!

ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh, pretty!!!!!!!!

Agreed. It looks phenominal!! Yes, please put together a small write-up for this!

Al

that looks bada$$

:bowdown:

yes very sweet lookin

Thats awesome!!!! :bigok:

The only reason why I havent ventured into changing the interior color was because I'm picky and having some lights still green(heater, window switch, etc) would drive me insane. With that said, you solved the problem, now I just have to get the balls, time, and patience to do it (and get back to the states).

Here's an idea, package all the pieces and instructions in a kit and sell it! I know I would buy. ;)

That looks incredible!!! Some tips would be great! I also wanna know what type of LEDs and resistors you used. I would definately buy a kit if you packaged and sold some :bigok: I didn't switch any of my lights for the same reason as Lifer, but I've always wanted to so that I could match my footwell lights and my headunit.

That looks really great! Nice work!

Excellent Work!!!

:eeek: that is too pretty, i have been wanting to do the same thing with mine since my panasonic deck is that identical blue. that is an awesome jobe dood. very very nice.

OK... now that is the S@&*!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Please grace us all with a writeup of some sort... c'mon don't go getting all quiet on us now. We need ya`!

Great Job,

Outkast`

Thanks for all the good comments. OK you guys have convinced me to do a write-up, I should have some time this weekend to put one together and answer all your questions.

that is the coolest...:eeek:

:eeek: Kick a$$!!! A write up is a must (would be great). I especially need to know, or try to understand, the process of the LEDs & resistors. How they work, how they get sodered, etc.

Great job dude! I look forward to your writeup!

What I really want to do is somehow graft the light-up needles from a Lexus car onto my dash. Those things are just fun to look at when it's dark out!

Wild Bill,

Absofrickinlutely phenomenal. I tried to get that blue look many moons ago, but didn't have the patience to do what you did. That looks great---I'm very impressed.

And yes, you should do a write up or else you will get a million PMs and emails from Vato Loco. :laugh:

Bob

Yeah! :laugh:

Ya, what Bob said !!!!! Outstanding job!!!!

Looks like I've gotta' get the "blues" myself...

Looks awesome, I can't wait to see your write up.:bigok:

What'd you do about the clock? If you care enough to spend more money to fix the clock, Dakota Digital probably makes something you would like, but they're pricey.

Here's one that looks like the stock clock but in blue. $70
http://www.dakotadigital.com/Detail....umber=ODY-16-1

This one would be kind of neat. Time, Day, Temp. But uhh, $150. ouch.
http://www.dakotadigital.com/Detail....mber=ODYR-16-1

OK guys added a write-up here. Let me know what you think and if you're questions aren't answered or if you have something to add let me know. Thanks

Read the write-up
 

I read the write-up. Was this supposed to be funny or am I just entertained by immature humor: "For the turn signals and background lights inside, I removed the stock bulbs with the green condoms and soldered in some LED's." Green condoms eh? :D :laugh: :lol: :con:


Zach

Looks really cool man. The only reason I wouldn't do it is, I think it'd blind me at night, lol. I even dim my green lights sometimes.
But anyway, it sure looks nice.

Great writeup. Another alternative to the frosted leds is to take a regular LED and sand the round part flat. Then use a higher grit sandpaper on the flat part for more even lighting. The result is a LED that produces a even glow. I don't remember where I saw that, but it was on a forum somewhere.

Thanks for the writeup! Now I gotta figure out if I really want to do this or not...

One thing I haven't mentioned is that the stock dimmer does work with the led's. And the reverse indiglo gauges come with their own dimmer. So I can dim the dash lights and indiglos independently of each other. Works out real nice.

Does anyone know if reverse indiglo gauges like Bill's are available with a black or white face? I like the "slightly-modified-stock" look :D I've been trying to think of ways to maybe modify the gauges Bill has to make it black and the only thing I can think of is having a vinyl sticker cut to cover all the silver (and maybe the gear indicator since I don't have that). Otherwise I'm thinking of rigging up blue LEDs behind the stock face :dunno:

*edit* I know speedhut has the custom thing that they do, but it doesn't seem like the red glows, and they change the font, where as the procarparts one is just a copy of the stock. It's also $120 :eeek: Sorry speedhut guys, I actually was going to order them and wait for you, but when I checked the website, they didn't meet my super-picky preferences :redface:

I guess Vato Loco is off the hook cause I'm the one with all the questions :ignore: :help: :pat: :dunno: :nerd:

How many?
 

I am of the same opinion. I like the blue lights but not the silver- or white-faced guages. Any idea on how many lights are behind the stock face? Or maybe we could use one of those blue "light wire" things. We'll see.

Zach

I don't see any reason why you wouldn't be able to just use the blue leds like I did behind the stock gauges and have it look just fine. There's only 3 bulbs back there with green condoms on them, I replaced them with blue leds even though I have the indiglos to help illuminate the odometer and needles.

I started converting the lights today :bigok: I'll keep posting here to give you guys some tips.

Well, I started with the ring of light on the ignition. There's a small bulb in there that I just popped out. The bulb is really tiny so there's not much room for the resistor. Well, here's what I did:
-First, the plastic ring comes out if you pop out a plastic rivet thingy. It's easy to take out. The bulb socket and wire harness unplug about 6" down from the ignition, too.
-I took a LED and cut the legs off really short (like 5 mm each).
-Then I took what I think is a 18 awg wire, stripped about a cm of it, folded it back on itself so it looked like a U, soldered it like that, and cut it off so I had a soldered piece of wire shaped like a U. I made two of those.
-I then soldered them to the legs of the LED. What I was trying to do was to imitate the base of the stock mini-bulb that was in there so that it would slide in just like the stock bulb.
-There's two wires going to the bulb socket. In my 97, the green one was the + and the white w/ the black striped wire was -. I cut the green wire and soldered in a resistor.
-Put it all back together and plugged it in! Looks nice! :D

Thanks Bill, for being the first to take the leap! I'll do my best to give you guys tips here if you'd like.

Ok, on to the "AUTO" driver's window switch...

Re: Read the write-up
 

yes, you see, the engineers at Toyota really have the customer in mind when designing the interior. They figure, "hey, the owner might get lucky at a bar one night or even at the office with the secretary and not have any protection..." So they thoughfully included those in the dash bling-blings. :laugh: