dripppps

I repaired about 15 dead diodes on my LED tail lights. The job was surprisingly simple. In fact, the hardest part was finding the ultra bright clear straw hat LED diodes with red light. Here are some pics of the job...maybe others can learn from this easy fix and save $$ instead of replacing (which would be about 1k for 4 new tails on my D3 A8).

Once you pull the tails out, the back side have access panels. Once the 4 tabs are carefully removed to expose the back of the lights, you just disconnect the mother board. From there, 6 T10 screws hold in about 6 small LED boards that are wired in a series.

I tested each board, marked the dead diodes, removed the dead ones, cleaned the old solder, mounted and tested the new bulbs. back to 100%!

hope this is useful for you guys! (i included a picture of the diodes i bought. I got 50 for 10 bucks on ebay)

MainelyA8

That's awesome. How long did it take you?

Greg5OH

nice work. It seems these boards are way more keen on DIY vs the merc boards for example. Nobody want to touch the S class!

ltooz_a6_a8_q7

Congrats... Nice work.

How do you make it display A8 when you brake?

Cheers,

Louis

dvs_dave

Nice work. Are the new led's a good color/brightness match? Also, how good at soldering do you need to be? You've obviously got an electronics background and do this sort of thing all day long, so how easy is it for someone without such skills?

Are these the LED's you used?

http://lighthouseleds.com/5mm-straw-...5-000-mcd.html

Turbo Tony

Is this possible on the facelift (2008+) tail lights?

Galco

Excellent DIY fix that most of us will have to do at one point!

Thanks for sharing.

haggisuk

The facelift lights are sealed units other than a little inspection cover to replace the lamps for reverse and fog light.

You got dead leds in a facelift unit?

Turbo Tony

Yes, I did have a dead LED in my old facelift cluster. I replaced the two inner light units but I still have the old ones and one LED has stopped working. I thought I'd keep it for tinkering with to see if a repair would be possible but I've not had time to even look at it since replacing it.

Hannibalacp82

This is an awesome DIY Guide. Book marked for future use!