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LED Light Bulb Upgrades

In a quest for better lighting on my 4Runner, I decided to start replacing some of the light bulbs with LEDs. This is partly to reduce the operating power for use when camping as well as to take advantage of the built in LED light patterns to put light where it is needed better than the stock reflectors (or lack thereof).

 
  To improve the light out of the stock dome light, I first tried painting the reflector w/ shiny silver paint. help a little but not enough to help. Adding a 1 watt Luxeon LED to the stock dome light involves removing the metal After installing the 30mm festoon type 1 watt LED (from http://www.taskled.com), the light output is awesome. One issue with the older Toyotas is the fading tail light lens, typically the red plastic fades to orange over time.  My lens is fairly new but starting to show a little fading.  Hard to see in this photo but in person you can see it. But once you turn on the lights, all is well.  How is that?  
 

 
  Simple, by using colored LED (or incandescent) bulbs.  After all, put a red bulb behind even the most faded lens and it is still red.  I used 24 LED 1157 style bulb for the brake/parking light plus a small wedge bulb for the side parking light.  Also above is a 30 LED narrow beam white backup light bulb.  LED lamps from http://www.superbrightleds.com.  I left the turn signal bulb stock due to some issues with the flasher relay. Here is the light output from the 30 LED narrow beam backup lights.  Very nice improvement over stock, especially with the built-in focusing of the LED bulb.  
 



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