Hello everyone. I had to have my car inspected by DMV today and to my surprise, the inspector found the front passenger side marker bulb was burned out/not working!

I'm obviously going to see if it's a bad connection or just simply the OEM incandescent bulb burning out. After all, this bulb was installed sometime in 2005 and has I don't know how many thousands of hours of use.

Question 1------will changing out the front side marker bulb cause the car to 'hyperflash' (flash quickly)? I know if the actual turn signal bulb at the rear would cause 'hyperflash', but how about the side marker bulb? It's a #194 bulb I believe.
Question 2------anyone have any highly recommended sources of a #194 LED bulb, IF IT DOESN'T cause 'hyperflash'? (I'm NOT going to go through the time/trouble of placing a load resistor and all that nonsense for simple side marker bulbs if LED's cause 'hyperflash'.)

Thanks guys.

PS...$80 for 2 years registration renewal and they even let me pass inspection with a bum bulb!

 

there is a bulb in the head light assembly that i had to put resistors on when i swapped all my bulbs out. i assume it was the turn bulb (sorry i forget exactly). but i know i had to put them on the rear turn signal LED's (4 total in the car).. so i assume that it was the front bulbs that i installed the resistor on.

 

I don't know if the bulb layout of pre-facelift and facelift are different or not, but the 194 in the front of my 2003 isn't even used for flashing. In fact it's not connected to any system other than power. Which is probably why you didn't get a warning on the dash that it was out.

You'll be fine putting in an LED based 194 in there. I did, and didn't need resistors. Though I recommend incandescent style myself, the color of it would match better and it's barely used for anything.

 

Does anyone have detailed instructions on how to remove/replace the front side marker bulb on the 04-06 LS? I've been putting off the job thinking one has to remove the headlight assembly to gain access to the side marker bulb?

 

no need to remove the headlight. You do need to remove the wheel and peel back the wheel liner though. Pretty easy job

 

Thank you for that bad news. Might try to tackle it this weekend.

I always feel when prying those plastic pieces apart and possibly breaking any push-pin type connectors, or whatever types of connectors, it's never the same as compared to untouched, regardless how carefully you do it.

 

Hear that. For the flat head looking plastic fasteners, just turn them 90 degrees so they unlock and pull out. Everything else are just the regular 10 mm bolts. Not much to mess up trust me.

And while youre there take off the black plastic strip that’s screwed to the metal lip of the fender and clean the dirt out from between it and the fender to discourage any rust there.

 

You should be able to avoid hyper flash and load resistors simultaneously - just replace the flasher relay with a capacitive one suitable for LEDs! I believe your gen LS still had a replaceable relay, not the integrated type of the current generation.

 

Unfortunately only the LS400 uses an external flasher -- the 430s use a non serviceable one.

SuperbrightLEDs.com is a great research tool for LED bulb type and placement for most cars.