Dull brake & turning signal lights-IMPROVED

[Displayman]

WE have a 1947 Mercury convertible that we converted from 6V to 12v to
improve starting, brighter lights, convertible top motor etc.
Our car is bright yellow with a tan top. In bright sunlight you cannot see
our brake lights or turning signal lights.
I painted all around the bulbs background with gloss silver hoping to reflect the light a little better. It didn't really make much difference.

Read about LED bulbs quite a bit, especially how much brighter they were.
Purchased some the other day. 68SMD stop- brake- tail- light bulbs for 12V to replace my old #1157's.
The difference in brightness was AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! however, I didn't have any turn signals. I replaced the flashers with heavy duty
ones, and they work great!
I know some of the purist will dislike my upgrades, but the safety factor
in bright sunlight has improved greatly. Did not mean to offend anyone.
Hope this helps someone with similar weak light problems.
Bob-Hampshire, Illinois

[johnh7]

I have also switched to 12v, but have not switched to LED as my lights are bright. I personally have no problem with brighter lights for safety regardless of how they are constructed. I feel the same about installing seat belts, which were not stock either. Safety first.

[scooder]

Should have painted the light innards white, this reflects much better than silver paint. A proper Chrome type finish would be best, gloss white comes next. This is for standard type bulbs.
I have found that the led type bulbs are sort of directional, ie bright from directly behind the car but not so if you start looking at an angle to the back, did you find this?
Another observation, when I had to make some tail lights brighter for a chap, I found the brightest setup I went through was normal bulbs with a cut up torch (flash light) reflector behind them. Brighter than led. The led bulbs are directional by design, the focus the light at straight ahead from the base. So even with very shiny reflector behind him, there nothing to reflect. A normal type bulb gives out light from all over its glass area, only leaving out the 5/8" base where it sits in the socket.
I know you can get led one's with some radially pointed white leds for number plate illumination, tried these too, still not as bright from all angles.
These are observations from experience, not saying your wrong (except the reflector colour) just information that may help others out in a similar situation. Led bulbs might have got better since I did this job.
Will also add, 9 times out of 10, with dim lights, the problem is electric related. Be it dirty or loose socket, wiring, connectors, terminals, switch, fuse or breaker. An led bulb will work better in these situations and appear to "fix" the problem. An led bulb takes a lot less current to light up. And that current will happily go through marginal connections that would dull a normal bulb due to its higher current needs.
Make sence?
Martin.

[Displayman]

The LED bulbs that I installed have 64 panel of light in an octagon shape.
This allows the light to be seen at almost all angles.
I TOO , also added seat belts for safety, especially with a ragtop.
Thanks for the input.
Bob-Hampshire, Illinois

[donQ]

I've found that dim lights are typically due to poor ground connections. The sugestion about painting the inside of the lamp housing white is also good.
donQ

[fortyfords]

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That is not true that LED's use a lot of current, LED's use very little current, that is why you have to buy a solid state flasher because the LED's don't use enough current to make a 12 volt flasher work. And LED's are very cool because they don't use very much current. Usually dim lights are an electrical problem like one guy above said.