LED tail light problems

[WZ JUNK]

I am helping a friend with his LED tail lights.  He has made a neat polished stainless spreader bar and he installed a pair of LED panels in the tube underneath some red lenses.  It looks great.  The LED's have 3 leads each, a yellow, a brown, and a black lead.  We hooked the black to ground, the brown to the tail light circuit, and the yellow to the brake/signal circuit (for each side).

When you hit the brakes everything works fine.   When you use the turn signals, even if you use the brakes, it works fine.  If you turn on the lights, the tail lights work.  But if you have the lights on, the brake lights and turn signals do not work.  I can see a little bit of flashing going on but it is hard to detect.  If I start the motor and test the system, it works better but not good enough.  I think it is a voltage problem with these LED's but I really do not know.  Has anyone had a similar problem?   Do any of you have any thoughts?  He is to leave Thursday morning for Knoxville and since he is a safety inspector, I think he should have working tail lights.

[kc ron]

I seem to remember the LED's so not draw enough currant to trigger the flashers. Kc Tom had the same problem, I thnk he has a number for the flashers. Hope this helps.

[WZ JUNK]

I have had problems with LED's and the flashers before but these LED's flash and I think the reason they do is because the front lights are regular bulbs.   I have been told that LED's do not draw enough electricity to make a flasher work.  I once installed a slave bulb in a circuit to make a flasher work on another car.  Some manufactures now supply a resistor to do the same.  I have placed a resistor in the brake circuit of this vehicle but I did not notice a difference.

[34ford]

Here's a site that has some information on the resistors in line. http://www.superbrightleds.com/led_info.htm

bob

[phat rat]

I am helping a friend with his LED tail lights.  He has made a neat polished stainless spreader bar and he installed a pair of LED panels in the tube underneath some red lenses.  It looks great.  The LED's have 3 leads each, a yellow, a brown, and a black lead.  We hooked the black to ground, the brown to the tail light circuit, and the yellow to the brake/signal circuit (for each side).

When you hit the brakes everything works fine.   When you use the turn signals, even if you use the brakes, it works fine.  If you turn on the lights, the tail lights work.  But if you have the lights on, the brake lights and turn signals do not work.  I can see a little bit of flashing going on but it is hard to detect.  If I start the motor and test the system, it works better but not good enough.  I think it is a voltage problem with these LED's but I really do not know.  Has anyone had a similar problem?   Do any of you have any thoughts?  He is to leave Thursday morning for Knoxville and since he is a safety inspector, I think he should have working tail lights.

I don't have any experience with LED's but don't they have seperate elements like a regular bulb? If so have you got the wires crossed? Example brakes using taillite element and taillites using the brake element.

[Bruce Dorsi]

We hooked the black to ground, the brown to the tail light circuit, and the yellow to the brake/signal circuit (for each side).

When you hit the brakes everything works fine.   When you use the turn signals, even if you use the brakes, it works fine.  If you turn on the lights, the tail lights work.  But if you have the lights on, the brake lights and turn signals do not work.

I may be WAY off target, but here's my thoughts.

Did you guess at which wires go where, or did the LED's come with instructions?

Is it possible that the black wire is not the ground, but instead, should be connected to the tail light circuit?

Did you try switching the black and brown wires?

I suspect that the stop/turn circuit is grounding through the tail light circuit, and vice-versa.

[Mac]

I'm probbly way off on the same target but I was remembering BROWN for Ground from my VW daize.

Jack

[34ford]

The LED's have 3 leads each, a yellow, a brown, and a black lead.  We hooked the black to ground, the brown to the tail light circuit, and the yellow to the brake/signal circuit (for each side).

I got out my wiring diagram for my Lambert LED tail light and this is the color and connection called out for them.


Black to ground
Yellow to tail lights (running)
Green to brake light wire

Your brown wire might be the green wire in this situation.

bob

[WZ JUNK]

Well according to the manufacture/supplier we have too low battery voltage.  My buddy is going to replace the battery tomorrow.  The alternator is putting out enough juice but the battery is not storing enough.

I question the usefullness of the lights if you have to maintain such high voltage.  I like the bright light these LED's emit but there may be a bad side to them as well.

[autocol]

i know you've solved this bit but i'll mention it just for interests sake:

if you had the incorrect wire hooked to ground none of them would have worked. LED's are light emitting diodes. diodes are a one way electricity valve, basically, so unlike a standard incandescent bulb, you can't pump the juice in the wrong way... and in fact if you do the likely result is a bunch of dead LED's.

what always gets me when wiring things is that, in most discussions of electical nature, we talk about the "flow" going from positive to negative, but i know that in actual fact the electrons are streaming from negative to positive. then i get the wires in my head crossed when i think too hard about it, connect everything up in a random assortment of +ve's and -ve's, and the thing doesn't work.

then i crack it, swear for a while, and come back into the house to read messageboards...