I did something similar with my R1150RT. At times I think cars ahead of me pull over, change lanes or slow way down because they think a cop's behind them. But at least they see me.




I rode home in this the other day. The total accumulation was three inches (75mm). The last ten miles of the ride were hairy. I stayed in the slow lane to the right of the lane in car's tyre tracks and waited to fall. The seat had a pinch mark in it.

"The seat had a pinch mark in it"

LOL , very good !

JR

Bigsax,

Looks good 'n bright. To be seen, more than to see I would imagine.

Question: how did you do it, specifically? I've had my headlight assembly apart and from what I can imagine it'd involve making a mounting bracket where the original plastic bulb holder/light refractor goes and mounting a row of LEDs to that. What LEDs did you decide on, too?

 Hi Bigsax !
Nice job, looks very bright... much better than the tiny standard bulb !
By any chance: would you be so kind to give us the 'how to' ? Maybe with the brand / source of your LED's ?
Much obliged !!

Cheers

Jos

The how

I was going to remove my lower fairings so I decided it was not too much more work to remove the upper as well and get at the headlight. It took about an hour as I was going carefully and quite enjoying it as well. 
I removed the headlight and separated the main body and lens.
I had purchased an LED strip (link later) on ebay for a massive $2 and glued it in place all around the inside rim of the light cavity using a silicone sealant as glue. As it happened the excess part of the strip was perfect when cut up to use as spacers between the main loop of LEDs. I discarded the old bulb housing and spliced the led wires and the wires from my previous LED sealed unit (see a previous post. "led $10") into the loom. Then put it back together, less the lower fairing.

The what

LED strip light about $2, see link

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/310719382748?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649

The after effects

Fantastic white light, highly visable. And looks almost factory!
The brake warning light stays on. I had also replaced the rear tail and brake lights with LED units. 
LED lights do not complete the testing circuit so I asked you guys through the forum for a solution and got it! I removed the BMU and shorted the wires accordingly. I no longer have a brake light testing system but I can live with it.

Apologies. I did not read your post carefully. I thought you said you replaced the bulbs in your instrument cluster not the bulbs on the bike itself. One of these days I really am going to have to learn how to read. Sounds like you have it sorted.

On a side note, I was looking at Kisan brake bulb replacements that have a builtin modulator to flash. They have an LED version I was considering. Now I wonder if it would work.

nice job big ....
been looking at the side mounted leds  for the halo (round the head light reflector )...at only 2mm wide

one day when my credit card comes active again ????

Some guys report upgrading to LEDs and keeping the BMU intact and functional.

I'm considering upgrading to LEDs, but I want the BMU to function normally.

Does the type of LED affect the BMU so that some LEDs cause the BMU to constantly illuminate the brake warning light and others only cause a very brief illumination?

Someone indicated that adding a resistor to the circuit is a fix for LED upgrades that allow the BMU to function normally.

Regards

I am sure someone will have the definitive answer to that.

But my answer is that most LED manufacturers claim 20,000+ hours for the life of LED units. I would suggest many of us will not live long enough to clock up that sort of time on our bikes. Making checking them almost obsolete.

not to steal from the thread .....but the "BMU " looks for a certain load ...ie 10 watts for the tail lamp and 21 watts for the brake light (amongst other things )

the principal is to measure the voltage drop when that load is in circuit and to compare  the reflected voltage difference to an lighter load (like a lamp not illuminating fully or dirty contacts etc ) this process is factory set for "most typical circumstances of globe operation "

if such a circumstance exists , that the globe fails to draw near the correct current ...and we have seen it many times .. the bmu unit warns the operator that a change has occurred ...

we know that leds draw far less current for the same ...effective output ,,as a standard globe ( usually the intensity is because of the diffraction versus - convergence of the light direction in primarily one focused beam instead of omnidirectional output )

there are multiple element led devices built specifically to emulate the wide dispersion of a globe ...but in globe operation, primarily the dispersion is reflected to concentrate a globe output in more or less a singular direction ...in the case of a tail lamp

so one could use a loading resistor to reflect the voltage drop (very inefficient use of energy ) or do away with the warning device ...alternatively  some re referencing of the "comparator circuit " internally  could be the "other fix"   but no one has done the homework yet ... for the value changes

you have to remember that the chip that does the measuring was designed back in the days when such things did not exist ....and for many of them, are no longer made, to purchase as new items ..but in their day were considered as luxury items to be installed to above average  speced motor vehicles .

hope that helps

Changing the subject very slightly: I was in the dealer yesterday and noticed that the new R1200GS has LED headlights fitted. They are not bulbs that you can fit into other headlights but complete units.
Would have loved to get my tools out and stripped on down, but I suspect that he would have called the police.

lol

Bigsax wrote:The how....

The what....

The after effects.....

  Thank's so much, Bigsax !
Great job; I'm up to ordering now...
Best regards
Jos

Start from first picture I have a tutor/album howto make the led-light;
Start here

Looks like

Extra light in the back;
Start here

And leds in the instrument cluster;
There you go

And a teaser   

I was expecting the first reply to be a hand drawn picture by Duck...

Wheeldigger wrote:Start from first picture I have a tutor/album howto make the led-light;
Start here

Looks like

Extra light in the back;
Start here

And leds in the instrument cluster;
There you go

Thank you, Wheeldigger.
Exactly the visuals I needed.

Thanks for the reply, I was worry it wasn't visible.
Due to the large pics thought it wouldn't be nice to place all of them here.
You can rightclick->save the pics and enlarge on the screen for more details.
Note on the headlight; I took it out with the fairing in place, can be done at any RT fairing. Not sure with the 1100LT fairing, front bracket might be in the way.

- When leds installed, first check if everything works well before reassamble.
- It's been said before on the forum, but again; placing the clips (6) on the headlight, first on the glass, then clip it over the plastic.

Here's an RS I did a while back. 
I put an LED set from duck into that bikes instruments.
Still not sure why

https://www.k100-forum.com/t5998p218-86-k100rs-resurrection

LOL