2000-2000.5 LED Lights

[AndyC]

OK!.

so all lights work fine in std trim

replace front sidelights with std LED, no problem

replace stop/tail with led and you get error on dash.

replace with can error free led and sides dont work, brake does, you still get error.

tried 2 different can error free led , same problem

turn the bulb round to reverse stop/tail and sides work, brake doesnt..





confused .com

 

[aragorn]

Front Sides dont have any "monitoring" so you can do what you like there.

Rear tail and brake both have current monitoring, so any replacement lamp needs to use the same amount of current as the standard filament bulb.

Sounds like faulty/****e stop/tail lamps, but since theres no advantage over the filament bulbs you might as well just fit the standard ones and be done with it. They're cheaper, work properly and wont fail inside 6 months when the resistors burn out.

 

[AndyC]

Resistors do get f ing hot
std resistance is 66ohm

the can ones were way above that

 

[AndyC]

Out of interest can you switch off the monitoring in VAG Com?

 

[aragorn]

No, its not controlled by a microcontroller, and its not programmable. Its just a electrical circuit that detects the current flowing and provides a "good" or "bad" signal to the cluster as it sees fit.

You can probably rewire bits of the car to get round it, but it really is totally pointless unless you've fitted LED rear light clusters or something. The retrofit bulbs make no sense other than when they're white, and the LED's give a nicer color, like sidelights and numberplate lamps.

I fitted some to the number plate lamps on both my cars last year, and they failed within 6 months, all four of them with the same symptoms; fried resistors. Realised it was pointless and binned them off for standard bulbs again.

 

[AndyC]

its more of me playing at the moment.

i like the response time of the LED as well... very fast flash etc...

however I still cant understand why the circuit wont drive the sidelights with the CAN resistors in them.

on the bench both light no problem, in the car only brake works......!!!!!

gotta be a load issue... but how!

 

[aragorn]

It must be a wiring issue with the dual filament bulbs.

 

[AndyC]

std bulbs work fine.

 

[aragorn]

yeh, i mean internally in the LED ones, they must be doing something funky inside.

 

[AlexA4Avant]

I have had the same problem my ones the Leds just about on swapped the fuse from 5 to 10 amp no difference. They only work with the ignition on aswel

 

[Oranoco]

I can't echo the sentiments strongly enough. Bung some LED sidelights in if you like (I keep a bag of spares in the glovebox) but elsewhere I really wouldn't bother as there is just no benefit to them over a standard filament bulb.