No, that wasn't a typo. I want the dimmest bulb # options, not the typical, "what's the brightest LED conversion?" question. Now that I've managed to default traction control to off, I'd like to make the super bright TRAC OFF warning be less blinding for regular driving conditions, while still having the visual status indicator.

This thread has a good breakdown of OEM socket and bulb part numbers, but I haven't been able to correspond them to anything aftermarket, find their output levels, etc. Bulb 90981-11018 brings up an Amazon review saying they fit different than 73 and 74 bulbs, but that's about it. Tanin says size 24, but that's a tough one to search for because it mostly brings up 24V stuff. This thread says size 74 fits but might be loose, and also that 74 is dimmer than the correct bulb. (Promising!)

If 74's do indeed fit, then that likely makes it a T5 equivalent base, in which case the compatible bulbs would be: 17 18 27 37 57 58 70 73 74 79 85 86 206 207 286 306 2721. I haven't had any luck finding a comparison chart of their outputs, or much of anything individually, for that matter. 17's and 18's bring up lots of 17W and 18W LED bulb results... I do know that 74's are a mere 9 lumens and 1.4W, while 94's are 13W. I can't imagine many bulbs are less than 9 lumens. I would guess that the lower ones on the compatibility list would be dimmer?

I haven't pulled the gauge cluster yet to determine which socket size is used for that spot, so I may be dealing with a couple options to narrow down still.

 

LOL, I know what you mean, I have the dummy light for the TPMS on my truck and my whole dash is dim, except for that damn light. Anyway my MR2 had LEDs in the dash, but the PO sleeved all the bulbs that made them pretty dim, to the point I couldn't see ish at night, so I pulled half of them off. If not that, maybe look into Cellophane wrapping film and drop some layers on to them, Celica guys used this to modify the OEM clock color to a whole bunch of differenct colors.

 

Easy, put in an LED with resistor you can make it as dim as you want.

 

Tallyhoe, when you say sleeve the bulb, are you talking about the little colored condoms that go over them? I have a few of the green ones as spares that I managed to peel off old bulbs, but they usually cook themselves on and I wasn't sure what effect the green rubber would have behind a yellow lens. A yellow one might work, but would probably require experimentation with thicknesses to sufficiently dull the output.

A quick search indicates that cellophane wraps on light bulbs isn't a great idea, as it doesn't allow proper heat dissipation. I don't want to be pulling the cluster repeatedly because a bulb keeps burning out.

LeX2k, I'm not a fan of adding resistors to bulbs, as doing so is often considered the source of fires. (Think tail lights.) It just redirects the heat to somewhere not necessarily suited to handle it.

I appreciate the input, but what I'm looking for is info on the bulb itself, not ways to sidestep the issue.

 

Apples to oranges the wattage of the LED bulb in the cluster is extremely low. I've done this very thing on a couple of cars for the D indicator. Because the LED is running at such low wattage it will last 30 years or more.

This doesn't side step an issue it makes it better.

 

We can just make you a custom "dim bulb" and socket to put in there.

 

Well, that's an option I didn't even think to ask about!

 

I feel the pain of having a gauge cluster that is "too bright" after doing an LED conversion.
I put white LEDs in my IS300 and I immediate realized that I went too far.

So what I do now is I have all the LEDs in there but I have the brightness setting turned down almost as far as it will go, so the **** is right near the spot where it cuts power to all the dash lights. This works for everyday night driving in urban and suburban areas.
However, it is not enough to prevent eye fatigue driving long distance at night, like when I drive back from FinalBout. For this I have a set of Oakleys with yellow lenses in them. This helps out ALOT for night driving. Anytime I drive cross country at night I wear driving glasses (it cuts down on the glare from the new LED headlight cars and trucks also)

EDIT I just reread your post and just realized you're looking for a dimmer warning LED light! Sorry I jumped ahead of myself.
I have this same issue after the LEDs in the IS cluster I ended up putting a red LED light into the TRAC light so now its a deep orange-red instead of a bright-*** yellow

 

It was a quality tangent, but it did illustrate why I'm rather resistant to putting LED bulbs in the gauge cluster.

I take it the orange-red effect is less intensely bright? I wonder if a red incandescent would do the same and mellow down the LED impact.

I did experiment with the lowest lumen incandescent T5-base I could find specs for, the 9 lumen 37LL ... and it was a bit of a fail. 1) It's a thicker/longer bulb and required some trimming of the wedge base, and 2) it's no dimmer than stock. If anything, it's ever so slightly brighter than the CEL bulb next to it. It should have been like a quarter the brightness. With how hard it is to find specs across the series, I don't believe any of the info out there now...

 

Regarding the light, changing the color makes it still noticeable but it has less intensity so it doesn't bug you as much at night. Well, its still a bit more intense than an original incandescent, but its red now so it has less effect on the eyes.
In your situation yes a red painted bulb would work a lot better to shift the indicator to appear red instead of yellow but the thing you would have to worry about now is that the painted bulbs tend to run hotter than unpainted. I don't think this would damage the socket but depending on the size of the chamber the bulb sits in it could warp the plastic a bit. The other down side is the paint will flake off with age and the light will start to "pink" then finally be a normal incandescent again, if it doesn't die early (painted bulbs tend to die a bit faster than unpainted).
Those were all issues we had in the days before red led bulbs. I used to put red painted bulbs in my solid clear taillights in my Integra, and I had every issue I mentioned above.

I saw a few people discussing the cellophane on bulbs option above.
Well, on my IS300 all the cluster bulbs are normal incandescents but they all had orange "bulb condoms" (I have no idea what they really are called) on them. In your situation, I bet if you put an orange bulb cover on what you have now, you might cut light output by another 25%. The IS300 has these orange bulb covers on all their dash lighting, from the cluster to the clock HVAC to the gear shift indicator on the shifter. If you use one of these OEM covers, all the issues you read about regarding the cellophane covers don't apply since Toyota designed these to last 10+ years and not cause issues. I saved as many as I could when I took my bulbs out, and the majority of them were sorta easy to remove, meaning they didn't tear. My IS is an 03 and I took the bulbs out back in 2017 I think

 

Painting the bulb will increase temperature but won't increase power consumption in fact it will go down. Hotter the filament runs the higher resistance goes. Bulb life is shorter as you noted.
Or the paint flakes off and goes everywhere inside the lamp housing lol. I think to this day some Toyota's have painted incandescent bulbs.

That's what I call them. Eventually the condom gets cooked and turns brown.

 

Yeah, I've tried removing a few of the bulb condoms and they're usually cooked onto the glass. Apparently they're marketed as light bulb caps or light bulb covers... Tanin has the small sizes available, including the #37 that I would probably want:

https://taninautoelectronix.com/shop...aps/bulb-caps/

Nothing much else is turning up other than unspecified ones on Amazon that reviews indicate fit 194's.

 

The best option is to leave the bulb alone and cover the little colored plate on the face with some film from the back. Even a piece of paper works well to dim it and keep the correct color. The plastic color pieces just lay in the cluster’s midframe and can be lifted off once the faceplate is off.

 

https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sc-...al-thread.html

 

I certainly wouldn't want to use paper -- nothing flammable near bulbs that get hot enough to burn fingers -- but if I can find some tinted plastic and figure out how to wedge it in place (or put it under the OEM overlay?), that idea has potential.