Custom Luxeon LEDs in 3rd brakelight and smoked taillights
 

First you start off with Luxeon LEDs ~$12 each (OUCH! but there's no better LED out there than Luxeon)
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/RIMG1889.jpg">

Heatsink them (very critical for Luxeon LEDs)
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/RIMG1893.jpg">

calculate and design a current limiting circuit (also very critical)
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/RIMG1909.jpg">

Test (Very important LEDs are current limited)
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/RIMG1912.jpg">

Very bright on test bench. Once installed on car with 20% rear window tint,
its slightly brighter than stock w/ no window tint (that was the whole goal of this project)
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/RIMG1918.jpg">

The taillights are much trickier. Make hole big enough for circuit board and LEDs
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/RIMG2011.jpg">

Mounted using a jig (not shown) for accurate placement and beam alignment. Connectors and custom circuit
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/IMG_5852.jpg">

Test (symmetric beam pattern)
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/IMG_5808.jpg">

Mount on car
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/IMG_5923.jpg">

Very nice. Slightly brighter than stock EVEN with my smoked taillights
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/IMG_5920.jpg">

Daytime
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/IMG_5878.jpg">

Not totally smoked, its just right imho.
<img src="http://www.audimods.com/brakelights/IMG_5879.jpg">

now i definitely feel safer driving with partially smoked taillights.
The Luxeon LEDs' output is amazing even with a %20 tinted rear window,
and smoked taillights. The biggest gain is the lightning fast on-off response
of the LEDs. Very nice in person. ya ya. its not a S4. so sue me. ;-p

looks pretty good. i have been thinking about doing the LED's for some time now
 

ive just never gotten around to it.i would want to put more in the tails however.maybe instead of 3 id put 6 or 8 of smaller ones.

i like the partial smoke too, my girls gli came stock with that and it gives it a touch of flavor. full smoke looks like crap IMO.

good job

wow, i love the tails! where did you get them done, and what level tint is on them?

Good info. Any sources for parts/things you built? I did this last year - converting...
 

my brake/tails/parks to Ledtronics "array" style bayonets. They were bright enough for sunny light use but in the end I didn't want to load the car with resistors to fix the Audi bulb-out crap.

What resistior(s) are you using for the l/r brake lights? I see the ones in the 3rd light and they look 10x better than the mega resistors with heat-sink enclosures. Nice job - would like more info on what you've done...

thread jack. what exhaust do you have?
 

it seems tucked up really high. my asp isnt like that. you car looks damn good.

Thx man. Its a BorlaG2. Tips are about as close as you can get to the valence w/o touching =-)

wow. thats awesome. was there a problem with visibility of the stockers
 

after you got the tail lights tinted?

and you made it that high, or it came like that?
 

my buddy is going to buy a silver 01.5 today or tommorow. he loves your car too.

Thx. Appreciated. I mounted it that way, but it is positioned w/o changing anything physically...
 

You could lower it slightly based on twisting the mid-pipe/resonator right off the Y merge pipe but I wanted it tucked in. Also you can pull the length out about an inch more, but the Borlas expand a good bit when hot - if I am runninng it hard the exaust will grow/lengthen out the back enough to see the "Borla" marks on the tips(about a 1" growth worst case/highest temp). Also note that it will hang a little lower in the middle of the car... mine has some speed-bump action on it. Nothing bad but good to know to be careful.

Key thing is watch the valence for heat. Mine seems fine, even in worst heat conditions. The tips are 2-3mm off the rear/inner part of the valence and have had no issues to date(maybe 2+ years now on the G2).

is that going to be your next available custom mod? :)