Anyone know if it's possible to change the colour of the dash / instrument / radio lighting? Is this handled though the colour of the bulb or some other method?

Rob

I believe it is done by bulb colour, so in theory you could go to a VW dealer and buy spare bulbs. I saw on either this forum or possible Vortex that one of the Swedish guys had done just this mod (posted pictures of his car with the blue Golf lighting. Then you just need to get a radio that can display in that colour.

If you are familiar with german this would help:

http://www.amiarts.de/bilder/tachoumbau.pdf

http://www.skodafreunde.de/

Regards,

Vladimir

Just phoned local VW dealer who said the bulbs are not coloured but filtered via the dash somehow. Would also have quite liked to do this mod but not sure where to start now.

Cheers

Hugh

Trying to get the germanic bits into English, but there's still a lot of gobbledigook in there! No doubt someone in the UK know's how to do it - just gotta find 'em!!:1:

lol

Best of luck trying and if I can help to source how to do this let me know.If I manage to find a way to do this modification I'll also post on here ASAP.

Cheers

Hugh

Even if the colour is achieved by filtering clear bulbs, if you changed to coloured bulbs you could change the colour, though it would be something which comprised green...

If you wanted blue, you could probably get a set of VW dials which would fit into the intrument pod. This wouldn't sort out the other cabin lights - actually, on VWs, are all the interior lights blue?

Rob.

I think the other lights are red if my terrible memory serves me right,Rob.

Cheers

Hugh

The coloured lights I have dealings with have always only been a coloured sleeve over a clear bulb.

Andy

Is that on VAG cars, Andy?

Rob.

Must confess it was Jap (work) motors, mainly Toyota and Mitsi.

Did strike me as a very good way of doing it.

Andy

Does indeed sound like a good way.

I'm sure one of the console bulbs has got to be fairly easy to get to so as to determine how the colour's done...

Rob.

Originally posted by robmawer in this post

I'm sure one of the console bulbs has got to be fairly easy to get to so as to determine how the colour's done...

Rob.

Don't want bu@@er-up the nice screw caps just to yank it out and discover a whole new world behind it Rob!, hence I was rather hoping to find-out the way forward with info from someone else who's done it :p

Rob

IIRC getting behind the A/C controls, etc is relatively easy...can probably do it just by pulling the head unit and cubbyhole out...

Rob.

I'd be quite surprised if it is coloured bulbs - those kind of things are usually done with clear bulbs behind coloured plastic filters. The bulbs are then standard and easily changed. The exception of course is indicator bulbs which are coloured for those fashion conscious people who like clear lenses on the outside of the car - misplaced vanity IMHO as they are never as visible as the true orange lenses.

Originally posted by ncarring in this post

as they are never as visible as the true orange lenses.

That's because they never use the damn things...

Rob.

Lol - no I meant they are actually not as visible. To me, anyway. I guess there's no reason, really, but they always look feeble to me, just the bulb flashing away in space, whereas with a coloured lens, the whole thing seems to light up.

I know my Transporter (which has blue lighting) a/c and recirc switch has orange lighting. When the light failed, it was a complete switch replacement not a bulb.

Andy

My mates Golf IV GT TDI has Blue dash / HU and everything else is Orange IIRC.

I only really want the dash blue / red - unless the HU can be changed to a blue background too of course! :1:

You would probably find that the HU uses coloured LEDs for illumination.

Much easier to replace it.

My sony HU has a choice of 7 colours including 3 greens none of which quite match so I have stuck to purple.

A blue dash would have been nice as the blue & red illumination on the sony would have matched perfectly

According to the PDF file posted, it has a couple of LED's which can be replaced with any other colour LED of the same rating. If you just look at the pictures it should be very easy to remove the dashboard glass thingamajig and get to the electronics behind it.

IIRC the early model VW Passats had green back lighting on the instrument panel (well i know this for a fact as a mate has an R reg Passat with green dash lighting)

This changed over to the purple/blue back lighting when the Golf mk iv came out just like my dads 99 Passat.

... so it must be fairly straighforward - sorry not very helpful was I? :p

it has to be something other than the filters as my first Octy (1998) had red dash illum and even at that time it was not the standard. the Dealer said it was a bit odd but it was the only one he'd ever seen - tried asking for a discount as it was obviously flawed :-)