led number plate lights, help

[DaveDon]

May be a simple question but i am strungling to find an answer myself haha, led'd my octavia facelift all interior is done and went to do number plate bulbs. Fitted normal led's and it through up the fault on the dash sayin there is a bulb out even though all was working with these led's, anyway i then purchased 2 canbus led's and fitted them and made sure they were working started car and once again it through up the fault, has anyone else had the same problem or has anyone got a solution?

cheers,

dave

[Gizmo]

The only solution on MY09? onwards VAG cars is to use something like a resistor as well as the CANBUS bulbs.

[vectra1]

Had the same problem.. Solved it by soldering the old festoon bulbs piggy back to the led's and fitted them.. No more warning lights on dash

[DaveDon]

nice cheers for the advice ill give it a shot and see if i can get the light to go off then, cheers for the advice

[Gizmo]

Had the same problem.. Solved it by soldering the old festoon bulbs piggy back to the led's and fitted them.. No more warning lights on dash

Don't suppose you have any photo's of our handy work before you fitted them?

Do they not get a but hot with another bulb soldiered to them?

[vectra1]

Don't suppose you have any photo's of our handy work before you fitted them?

Do they not get a but hot with another bulb soldiered to them?

The LED's I fitted had the heatsink on the back so helps them stay cool. I checked them several times and feel no heat from the unitts.

I am not the worlds number 1 at soldering but you will get the idea

Festoon vS LED

[DaveDon]

looks good im gonna give that a bash this week and see how it turns out so fingers crossed looks good nice vrs

[vectra1]

It is not too difficult.

Or in other words.

If I could do it anyone could. You may have to solder short lenghts of wire from bulb to LED .

Other than that it is a piece of pie and well worth it.

[vRS Carl]

This is how I solved it

http://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/204652-led-number-plate-light-bulbs-with-no-errors/page__view__findpost__p__2635032

Edited 4 June, 2012 by vRS Carl

[07 vRS Taxi]

Anyone know the wattage of the bulbs? Ive got my thinking cap on ;-)

[Gizmo]

They are C5W, so 5W.

[DaveDon]

Right was doing this today, got the holders out and soldered the phestoons onto the back of the led anf fitted them all looked good and was pleased started car up and what happens light came back on i couldnt beleive it so i played about for a bit and still no luck so i got fed up put normal phestoons back in to see if they would cure the fault, then went to check strangely the light was still on . so i decided time to plug in the diagnostic machine i ran through guided fault finding and found the there was also a fault stored with the passenger side lamp so i checked all bulbs were working which they were erased faults and it came straight back. not very happy haha but in the next few days get a good look at it and see what is causing this fault hopefully get this fixed then back onto trying to do the led's

[07 vRS Taxi]

They are C5W, so 5W.

ah well pop goes that theory lol, it is sensing an open circuit due to the high resistance of the led maybe a piggy back voltage return is the only answer.

[DaveDon]

found out that it is a common fault on the skoda that it says a fault with left rear tail lamp even though all the bulbs are working to resolve this you replace both bottom sidelight bulbs and problem solvved so i have been told yet to try that, give this a go tomorrow ill let you know how i get on then back to piggybacking the led's on thursday

[Simon Cobb]

I read somewhere on this forum that piggy backing just one festoon onto the LED will do the trick, but this didn't work for me. With one original bulb soldered onto the back of the new LED (and illuminating, so the solder connection was good), I got a the error warning light on the dash and a message "check number plate lights". This morning, I soldered the second original festoon onto the back of the LED and bingo, problem solved. There seems to be no impact on the "whiteness" of the LEDs with the festoon bulbs in place.

That said, although I now have a working solution, I'm going to invest in a pair of these bulbs as they look like they may be a tidier solution. I'll report back once I've got them here (~2 weeks delivery to NZ).

[Gizmo]

Simon, I doubt they will work either, see my post #2 above, even correct CANBUS bulbs show an error.

A resistor or additional bulb is the only way forward.

[Simon Cobb]

The LED bulbs I linked to have resistors built on to them, which is why I'm hopeful they may actually work. Anyway, for the modest cost, I think they are worth a shot. I'll report back on success (or not, as the case may be) in a couple of weeks.

[Stoofa]

No, they won't. These are absolutely no different from the "Error Free" bulbs that have been around for years.

These will work in pre-FL Octy, but not in the FL. I can 99.99% say these will give the same error as the two sets of CANBUS Error-free sets I've already tried.

[Gizmo]

The only difference to those and the 'normal' CANBUS LED's is the addition of a heatsink, I'm not quite sure why people fit them though (looks? - if they look better then they must be better?) because LED's do not get hot anyway.

All post '09 VAG cars have this problem, it's not just the Octavia.

Personally for the TT, I am going down the route of soldering a W5W bulb holder to the actual No. plate light itself (not the bulb) - as in Carl's link, so they can be changed easily enough when they eventually blow.

The extra heat that is produced from the OE filament bulb when it is soldered to an LED bulb cannot be good for it's longetivitety of the LED surely?

[Simon Cobb]

All post '09 VAG cars have this problem, it's not just the Octavia.

My 2012 VW Polo 6r 1.2TSI throws up no errors with "bog standard" LEDs, with no need for any resistors/soldering of OE bulbs. Frustratingly inconsistent across the VAG range, eh?

I fear that you'll be right and the bulbs won't work, but I'll find a home for them somewhere else if they don't :-).

I like your idea of soldering a bulb holder into place. That's a much better long term solution, until someone comes up with an LED solution that works without the need to bugger about like this.

Edited 10 June, 2012 by Simon Cobb

[Gizmo]

The issue with the Polo (and I believe the Fabia?) is that they are still not true CANBUS, hence why you can get away without the errors.

[Simon Cobb]

Before ordering the bulbs I mentioned above, I asked the eBay seller if they would work with a FL Octy and got this reply:

"No these are for the earlier models Octavia.

Your car has the same running base as the VW Passat and A4 which has pulse width modulation and you cannot get leds to function on them without error, do not buy these."

Nice to get a clear and honest answer. Time to invest in the W5W bulb holder solution recommended by Gizmo68. My electrical skills are pretty basic, so please could you walk me through the steps to installing those bulb holders?

• Where and how would you connect them?
  
• Does it matter which colour wire goes to which side?
  
• Where and how are you going to secure the additional bulb holders?
  

[Stoofa]

I will be basically doing the same.

I shall solder the bulb holder so that it bridges the LED festoon that I install. So in effect solder onto the contacts at either side of the LED festoon.

It shouldn't matter which wire is soldered onto which side. I will then use cable ties to secure the W5W bulb to the wires that drop down into the lighting module. This should stop it from rattling around.

If you're worried about which side each wire should go to, you should be able to test first by just wrapping the bulb holder wires around the contacts to prove to yourself it is working before going for the more permanant solution and using solder.

[Gizmo]

If you look on Carl's photo:

This is basically what the W5W bulb holders will look like (Carl has the metal cases resistors - with ventilation holes in instead of W5W bulbs)

On the TT the RH contact is the earth (brown wire) so I will solder the black wire to this contact and the red wire to the other side which will be the positive power (colours may vary between models) then just as Carl has done, a cable tie fixing the W5W holder wires around the plug socket to keep it all from moving around.

It doesn't really matter which way round you connect the wires, but you may as well do it the 'correct' way.

Also by soldering to the actual light contacts the bulbs can be changed at any time quickly and without any further soldering. If you solder to the bulbs themselves then you would need to do that each time if you have to replace a SMD bulb in the future.

[jrw]

I notice BMW have LED numberplate lights - wouldn't these work? Or is it just VAG that have changed the way the canbus system works?