Thread: 97-03 Cluster Gauge LED Install

Originally Posted by Bronco Boy

I got some of the DD HP3 bulbs months ago, and finally got around to installing them.....




Very happy with the outcome, except now my "dimly lit" signal indicators are brighter.....




And a picture with the signal on showing how "dim" the indicators are.....

Did you ever get this figured out? I run Diode Dynamics LEDs on the front and rear exterior lights and the LED flasher. Mine were lit up on the actual HUD. The LED flasher did not fix the issue. I actually had to install a load resistor on each corner light which fixed that as well as my cruise control as I have diode dynamics LED's in the third brake light location.

The only thing that I have right now that is funky is that the LED below the PRND321 location blinks when I have the turn signal activated during the day. Once I turn the lights on at night that issue goes away. So there is feedback coming from somewhere.

Originally Posted by The Guz

Did you ever get this figured out?

I never did figure this one out.

I run Diode Dynamics LEDs on the front and rear exterior lights and the LED flasher. Mine were lit up on the actual HUD. The LED flasher did not fix the issue. I actually had to install a load resistor on each corner light which fixed that as well as my cruise control as I have diode dynamics LED's in the third brake light location.

Yikes. So you did get the cruise control issue.

The only thing that I have right now that is funky is that the LED below the PRND321 location blinks when I have the turn signal activated during the day. Once I turn the lights on at night that issue goes away. So there is feedback coming from somewhere.

I feel lucky not to have had this issue. LOL

Originally Posted by Bronco Boy

Yikes. So you did get the cruise control issue.

Yeah I did have the cruise control issue. Put the load resistors on even though I already had the LED flasher and everything worked like normal.

I wonder if load resistors would solve the issue you have.

Originally Posted by The Guz

I wonder if load resistors would solve the issue you have.

Maybe, but I don't do load resistors; defeats the main purpose of LED's. I suspect that if I put a resistor on each light to drain the extra power I might be ok, like this... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbP-pt4aczs

Load resistors don't defeat the main purpose at all. The main purpose is to produce more light output and have a modern blink rate.

Nick C.

Originally Posted by Paul J McCain

Load resistors don't defeat the main purpose at all. The main purpose is to produce more light output and have a modern blink rate.

I use LED's to reduce load, so using load resistors defeats this purpose.

Made updates to the first post. Since photobucket screwed things up, I re-hosted the images.

Thought I would post a little feedback.

I have had Diode Dynamic LED's installed on the entire exterior along with the LED tails. The flasher module worked to remove the hyper flashing but the turn signal arrows would appear on the HUD as well as the cruise control feature not working with the Diode Dynamic LED's in the 3rd brake light. The solution was adding load resistors to the 3157 front corners. This was working fine for the past year and all of the sudden the left turn signal appeared back on the HUD and would light up a couple of the LED's on the driver side Muth mirrors.

Took a closer look on the driver side corner thinking the load resistor lost it's connection. Connection was intact. Swapped a incandescent bulb and that fixed the issue. I recalled I had placed LED's into the turn signal indicators behind the cluster. I pulled the dash apart and replaced the turn signal LED's with incandescent bulbs and put the LED back into the driver side corner. This fixed the issue. I had the same issue on my 2002 Camaro with everything not functioning properly with LED's in the cluster gauge turn signals. Essentially not enough loading on the circuit.

Something to keep in mind for those wanting to run LED's everywhere.

Originally Posted by The Guz

I recalled I had placed LED's into the turn signal indicators behind the cluster. I pulled the dash apart and replaced the turn signal LED's with incandescent bulbs and put the LED back into the driver side corner. This fixed the issue.

Yup. I did this about a year ago. I found the HP3 led's in the dash cluster signals were a tad bright too. So, when they starting flickering after less than a year of use, I put the old incandescents back in.

Originally Posted by wstefan20

Wouldn't load resistors equivalent to the resistance value of each bulb in series with the led fix this issue? Maybe I'm not understanding the fault... new to leds lol

You would think so. In this case, they did work, but then stopped working. Maybe some other factor in play? This is what I hate about LED's. LOL

Originally Posted by wstefan20

Wouldn't load resistors equivalent to the resistance value of each bulb in series with the led fix this issue? Maybe I'm not understanding the fault... new to leds lol

Originally Posted by Bronco Boy

You would think so. In this case, they did work, but then stopped working. Maybe some other factor in play? This is what I hate about LED's. LOL

Well yes and no lol. The load resistors were what I thought a permanent fix. Now it did fix the 3rd brake light and cruise control feature which probably works fine now with the incandescent bulbs back in the turn signal locations on the cluster lol. There were times when I thought the connection was loose and the driver side turn signal indicator would display as being "ON" in the HUD display as if the bulb was out. It would also light up the bottom two LED's on the driver side Muth mirror. I never thought much about it because a little wiggle of the wires with the load resistor and the issue went away. This last time it did not go away with a wiggle of the wires and thus I took it apart this weekend to inspect if something was loose.

Recently I replaced the cluster LED's on my 2002 Camaro. I did not order enough so I was short two for the turn signal indicators. This car has no load resistors but rather the appropriate LED flashers. So when I received the two LED's I was short I swapped them them into the turn signal indicators. When I tested them out with the turn signal lever and flasher, only one side would blink. The other side would not make a noise through the flasher or blink internally and externally. As soon as I put the incandescent bulbs back into the cluster the issue was gone and everything worked together.

This is what caused me to swap put the bulbs in the cluster of the Grand Prix. It seems to be working fine.

GM wiring at it's finest and the quirky LED behavior.

Originally Posted by 97gtp01gt99gt

How did u get the 04 needles to work properly

I'm not sure what you mean by "work properly", but it's a really easy swap. You'll need to trim the stems to the same length as the stock needle stems and make sure you don't push them down too far so they don't catch, but other than that, there's not much to it. Just mark where the stock needles are at idle, carefully pop them off (I used a fork and gently rocked it back and forth to pop them off), and put the new needles on pointing to where you marked them.

Semi related to the cluster. The digital DIC can be swapped to LEDs as well.

I tried a couple options.

The diode dynamic 74SMD1 has good color but not good output in the 360 degree range. It leaves hot spots. In the other areas it works ok due to the light being separated.



The better option is the super bright led 74x-HP3-CAR. It provides even light dispersal in the main part of the DIC.




One thing to keep in mind is that by going the LED route, it the other areas of the DIC will be more noticeable(ie: metric areas, indicators for the doors, etc).

To complete the job, it requires 5 bulbs. Three in the DIC and two for the low trac and trac off.

Red is color that is needed. A size 74 bulb does fit.

74 LED Bulb - 3 SMD LED - Miniature Wedge Base | Super Bright LEDs

After a few years one of the LEDs went out on the dash cluster.

Purchased a brand new set of HP3’s from diode dynamics.

Here is cool white






Warm White. This is close to the incandescent bulbs.