Still work in progress, not entirely finished...
The ultimate in-your-face lights and LED FAQ
I wrote this to help people find answers to the most commonly questions regarding LED interior and exterior upgrades along with headlights and tail lights. It includes personal experience, internet and other sources. I am not responsible for any errors that might be posted in this thread and by your own screw ups. If in doubt get a professional to do it.
It is a work in progress and will be updated. Please leave comments, questions and contributions below and I shall try to update the thread accordingly, or maybe some forum moderator will.
What is a LED?
A light-emitting diode (LED) is a device that produces light from electricity. It last a long time and does not break easily compared to standard incandescent bulbs. LED's are very efficient and run on low power, most of the energy makes light, not heat. The most common LED bulb design in automotive applications is the SMD (Surface Mount Device) LED, they can be tightly packed on boards and provide a wide, bright beam of light.
I want to replace the interior lights with LED's, what now?
Easy. Decide on which interior pieces you want to replace, then locate the bulb number. A quick guide is posted at the bottom, otherwise visit THIS page or the Sylvania page which contains the necessary tools for locating your bulb type. Once you have that, you can proceed at buying a LED replacement bulb.
Dome light/interior comparison, picture courtesy of DiodeDynamics.
S – stock, W – white, R – red B – blue
Once you have the bulb type, you want to figure out how bright you want them to be. That usually mean deciding how many SMD LED's the bulb has. Most vendors post the specification of the bulb so you can compare it to the regular bulbs dimensions and base avoiding the hassle of ordering the wrong item.
Variety of 194 type SMD LED bulbs. The amount of SMD's correlates to the size and brightness of the bulb.
I personally bought all my LED bulbs off e-bay, including tail lights, since the prices are competitive and practically all of the bulbs on market are made in China anyways. Prices between the vendors, some newer designs (for example turn signal/parking light “switchbacks”) and overall quality vary. Like I said, I got most of mine from a variety of vendors so I can't comment on a particular source. I'm sure posters below will say more.
ALWAYS MAKE SURE YOU ARE ORDERING THE BULB WITH THE CORRECT BASE AND DIMENSIONS! EITHER MEASURE THEM YOURSELF OR ASK UNCLE GOOGLE FOR HELP.
For 97-2003 Grand Prix
Ash Tray Light Bulb – 194
Auto Trans Indicator Light – 73
Back Up Light Bulb – 3156
Brake Light Bulb/Tail Light Bulb/Rear Turn Signal – 3057
Center High Mount Stop Light Bulb – 1141
Courtesy Light Bulb – 194, 168
Dome Light Bulb – 562
Engine Compartment Light Bulb – 561
Fog Light Bulb – 562
Glove Box Light Bulb – 194
Dual Beam Headlight Bulb – 9007
High Beam Indicator Light – PC195
Instrument Panel Light Bulbs – PC74, 194, 37, PC195
License Plate Light Bulb – 194
Map Light Bulb – 212-2, 168
Parking Light Bulb/Front Turn Signal – 3457A
Rear/Front Side Marker – 194
Trunk/Cargo Area Light – 912
Vanity Mirror Light Bulb – 7065
For 04+ Grand Prix
Back Up Light Bulb – 3157
Brake Light Bulb/Tail Light Bulb/Rear Turn Signal – 3057
Daytime Running Light – 4157NA
Courtesy Light Bulb – 2825
Dome Light Bulb – 562
Fog Light Bulb – H11/898
Glove Box Light Bulb – 194
High Beam Headlight – 9005
Low Beam Headlight – 9006
High Beam Indicator Light – PC195
License Plate Light Bulb – 194
Map Light Bulb – 2825
Parking Light Bulb/Front Turn Signal – 3757A
Rear/Front Side Marker – 194
Trunk/Cargo Area Light – 912
Vanity Mirror Light Bulb – 7065
What is HID?
HID (High Intensity Discharge) is a type of a gas discharge bulb that provides superior luminosity and visible light compared to its incandescent and fluorescent counterparts. As such it is used in headlights of higher end vehicles.
Cool! They come in different colors right!?
Temperature is responsible for the color of the light, NOT luminosity and light output! It is measured in Kelvins. Aside from the natural color of the light at 4300K-6000K, which generates a bluish hue, the projector lenses, their curvature, the reflector etc. generate the color. They work together to produce light as optically designed.
Typical HID Color chart. Note that the actual color will vary depending on the manufacturer, housing, ballasts, bulbs etc.
3000K (Yellow) – commonly used in fog lights to provide contrast during adverse weather conditions like fog snow and rain. I'm not sure how much truth to that there is, although personally I felt yellow fog lights did make driving in the snow a bit better, but that may be subjective. France used selective yellow for many years in cars. Reasoning behind this was suppose to be less eye strain when driving during the night and better visibility when driving on snow.
4300K-5500K (Warm White to Pure White) – Standard temperature for most OEM HID solutions, provides the most useful combination of visible light and luminosity. The preferred choice for the sensible man.
6000K-7000K (White Blue to Blue) – Very common on aftermarket kits, provides less useful light than previous solutions.
8000K and up (Bright Blue, Deep Blue, Purple, other colors) – Not recommended, highly distracting and provides more glare than previous colors.
Great, I want super bright HID xenons!
There are three ways of doing this if your car comes standard with halogen housings, none are street legal! Vehicles equipped with HID's will have either projector housings to project the light properly or a housing with a reflector setup that uses the top half of the reflector to aim the light down. Some have a little washer jet to keep the headlight clean and minimize glare, some have additional wipers.
BMW Projector Headlight with a washer jet and a Lexus HID housing.
HID Kit with stock housings (not recommended)
The asshole way of doing things. You will blind others, even in the dark housing. Grabbing a HID kit off the web is easy enough, they range from 50 to 150 dollars for a set and usually consist of the bulbs, ballasts, mounting hardware, some kind of warranty and optional relay harnesses. Some vehicles (Grand Prix included) might need the relay harness in order to provide constant power to the bulbs and avoid damaging stock wiring. The most common sets of ballasts are regular (bigger) and slim ballast (smaller). Most people use slim ballasts as they work just as good but are easier to hide and mount in the engine bay.
A typical HID kit.
There are two popular choices are 35w and 55w. I personally never saw the need for 55w kits. While they provide more light (and more heat), 35w is plenty ESPECIALLY is a halogen housing. HID's in stock GP Fog lights are known to cause melting of the housing in some cases. There are plenty of vendors, from the more popular DDM and VVME to countless others, on shady e-bay sellers ending.
Aftermarket Projector Housing and HID's (aka Spyder Headlights)
A little better choice for most, housings cost anywhere from 150 to 250 dollars depending on the style and availability. Some come with the so called LED or CCFL Halo's (Angel Eyes). They all have projector housings, although these are not perfect and tend so be of shoddy quality, crossbeam. Housings themselves leave much to desire and the headlight brackets are a complete joke. Some models are prone to sealing problems and fogging up. 04+ headlights are particularly bad and should be avoided.
Various fixes have been made to remedy some problems, like weatherstripping around the bottom and the corner of the headlight housing to stop bouncing caused by the crappy brackets. Look to the bottom of this page for solutions.
Aftermarket projector housing on a 97-03 GP.
Retrofit or how to be the boss
You bake your headlights in the oven, crack them open and throw a proper projector inside. This is easier on the 04+ but can be done on 97-03's as well. There were several write ups on the internet and the forums on how to do it, there is also a guy making retrofits to order in case you're afraid of breaking stuff(Classy Pontiac, check the for sale section of the forums). This is the most expensive solution and the only one that provides the proper HID experience.
A Proper 04+ Retrofit, this one features angel eye effect.
http://www.theretrofitsource.com/ - this is the place to get projectors from.
http://www.grandprixforums.net/threa...ldn-t-buy-them - Dave's guide on 04+ retrofits.
http://www.grandprixforums.net/threa...-08-Headlights - Another panda guide to 04+ retros
Man I saw those sweet turn signals that switch between a white parking light and amber turn signal. What is that!?
Switchbacks are SMD LED bulbs that contain both white and amber diodes. Typically it shines white when used as a parking light and amber when used as a turn signal. There are a few ways switchbacks work during signaling a turn, like AO (amber-off), AW (amber-white), RA (red-amber) and RO (red-off) depending on the bulb.
Amber off Switchback at work.
But my Switchbacks/LED's turn signal bulbs are hyperflashing!
While some tail lights have resistors built in, throwing LED bulbs in turn signals (both rear and front) requires you to replace your flasher module to the one supporting LED bulbs or wiring in resistors yourself. Scroll to the bottom of this page for write ups.
Sweet. But I don't want to buy bulbs for my tail lights, I want the cool tail lights that have LED's already in them!
Sure, google it, browse through e-bay (which is where I got mine) or check out a parts vendor. They're highly popular nowadays. I believe the tail light most commonly bought are made by Spyder, and as such are of quality that many times leaves much to be desired. Fitment won't be perfect, 04+ guys complained that some of the LED's burned out quickly. I personally run the 97-03 version for over a year now with absolutely no issue, I know Dave (DrunkieTheBear) ran more than one set on his Panda Prix. On my Grand Prix the fitment isn't perfect, I had to make the hole for the tail screws wider, not sure about the 04+ version, I'm sure someone will chip in.
The 97-03 LED Tail lights.
POPULAR SOLUTIONS TO COMMON PROBLEMS (to be updated)
Hyperflash – Consists of acquiring the proper LED flasher and/or adding resistors. (EP28 flasher for 97-03 guys)
Boostjunki3's write up - http://www.grandprixforums.net/threa...r-flash-delete
Aftermarket Projector Bounce – Consists of using weatherstripping to surround the housing and making additional support for brackets to remedy the never ending wobble of the headlight.
Boostjunki3's write up (with type0holic's brackets of ClubGP) - http://www.grandprixforums.net/threa...oney-for-cheap
Why you should retrofit and ditch those aftermarket chinese projector housings – Like it says, yo.
DrunkieTheBear's write up and info thread - http://www.grandprixforums.net/threa...ldn-t-buy-them
Another thread - http://www.grandprixforums.net/threa...-08-Headlights
