Intrument Lighting - Benzworld.org

jmansmann · 02-07-2005, 08:01 AM

Has anyone considered or installed different color lights for a W210 in the instrument cluster? I owned a few BMW's before my e320 and I really like the orange colored cluster. I know that some mercedes models(S,SLK,?)use orange lights for the cluster. Does anyone know if these OEM parts can be installed in the W210 and how many would it take? Or if not, anywhere that these can be purchased.

Lastly, opinions. Do you think this will look like sh*t?

Sandro N · 02-08-2005, 01:08 AM

Hey bro, You can change the color of the lights, the bulbs are #194 and #164. It may be a waist of time. I switched the dislay ones. good luck

jmansmann · 02-08-2005, 08:14 AM

Why a waste of time? Does it look bad or do you not notice a difference between the white and amber bulbs?

e320mule · 02-11-2005, 07:52 AM

If you do an ebay search "mercedes gauge", there's someone selling a plug-in for plasma instrument lights. White during the day and blue at night. Looks very cool.
Also, chrome instrument rings and no display color change looks great on the W210 IMHO. Instrument cluster comes out in less than 5 minutes. Rings have self stick, and the whole replacement takes less than 30 minutes.

Sandro N · 02-12-2005, 02:48 PM

It's not that you can't tell the difference between the colors, its just that there may not be a good contrast between the new colored bulbs you put in versus the factory gauge cluster. Don't be affraid to pull it out and play around a little, Let us know how it goes.

Carinc01 · 03-08-2005, 09:20 PM

Anyone have pictures of the inserts or the plasma plugin ?

jmansmann · 03-10-2005, 03:16 PM

I found this diagram showing the rear of the W210 instrument cluster. It looks like there are (5) 194 type bulbs marked E8. It looks like these 5 need to be changed to change the color.

I have ordered and received 5 blue LED 194 bulbs and I'm waiting for the cluster tool to do the install. I will try to send pictures when done.

Here is the pic;

Carinc01 · 03-10-2005, 05:32 PM

What Cluster tool do you need? Can someone also tell me where to get a different speedometer/fuel/rpm background. I think a white one might look pretty good.

jmansmann · 03-11-2005, 07:04 AM

Do a search on "Cluster tool" on this site. There are multiple posts that show a picture.

rob_fed · 03-11-2005, 11:22 AM

If the main illumination bulbs are 194 types, here is an interchange chart:

Trade No. Design Volts Watts Amps Avg. CP Life
161 14.0 2.66 0.19 1 4000
158 14.0 3.36 0.24 2 3000
194 14.0 3.78 0.27 2 2500
192 14.0 4.62 0.33 3 2000
168 14.0 4.90 0.35 3 1500

If you use 168 types instead, they are almost twice as bright. You may want to do this if you go with amber colored bulbs to compensate for the dimming effect of the color filter.

On a non-MBZ car, I played around with 168 bulbs and Krylon glass paint to change the dash color illumination. Orange by far gave the best contrast on black back ground. Blue only works if the light numbers/letter light up with back light through the characters. Blue is not so good when the dash light is a true back light shining through various slits and unseen openinngs. I think for the W210, the blue light shines through the characters.

Thanks,

-robert