Modified tyga tail lamps!!

So as I found out my throttle cables were oh so close to snapping the project has been set back a few weeks. Whilst waiting around for parts to arrive I decided to modify the Tyga tail/brake lamp assembly. Tyga manufacture marvelous aftermarket fairings for our little pocket rockets but unfortunately the lighting for the tail lamps are too dull and not bright enough which is a disappointment. But don't be put of as changing the LED globe on the printed circuit board is not too hard as it seems. Getting to the printed circuit board on the other hand is a fair tough task without the correct tools.

I suggest for this modification to have handy the following tools.

1. dremel/die grinder with cutting tip/disc
2. soldering iron
3. solder sucker
4. solder
5. small flat tip screw driver
6. sikaflex
7. new LED globes

First I started to remove the lens cover by using a saw toothed knife as i dint have a dremel and cutting disc at the time. This took time and patience as I slowly worked my way around the lens cover until I could get a little flat blade screwdriver between the backing plate and lens cover to pry apart the two components.

lens cover removed

once the lens cover is removed next there are 2 screws which hold the circuit board onto the back cover. remove these two screws then pull some of the wiring through to make it easier to work on the circuit board.

Next task is to de-solder the old LED lights from the solder board and remove all the old solder with a solder sucker. Now for my new LED lights I chose to go with 10mm .5watt with a forward voltage of 2.0v-2.3v I wasn't sure if this was going to work with these LEDs but i gave it a shot. The standard resistors on the board are about 112-120ohms each (two resistors) according to my calculations I need 33ohm resistors but before I went replacing resistors I trialed the new LEDs with the old resistors in place. 

New LEDs soldered onto board and old LEDs sitting on multimeter!

As you can see the new 10mm LEDs are mammoth compared to the old LEDs. The circuit board was designed for small LEDs but with a bit of tweaking and bending the 10mm monsters fit nice and snug. Using a nice hot soldering iron helps as I find it takes less time to melt the solder onto the pins of the LEDs. This helps protect the board by not putting the iron onto the board heating all the components and possibility of damaging more parts. But good practice is to keep the soldering tip clean, tint your soldering iron before soldering and clean after use.

cover refitted

trail run, they work with original resistors and are quite bright too. note these are park lights!

with brakes applied, these are noticeably brighter than original LEDs, unfortunately I don't have photos to compare.