LED upgrade for vintage filament bulbs

The brake, running and indicator lights on my '79 BB512 were pretty dim by modern standards. The other day I pulled up behind a pickup at a red light with my turn signal on and although I could clearly see the big amber turn indicator reflected in the trucks shiny tailgate I couldn't see that it was blinking. I thought the bulb must be out so I checked it when I got home. Nope, it worked, but in the daylight it was just hard to see that it was flashing in that huge boxer lens. I started thinking this could be a safety issue, plus it just looks lame. I've heard of people successfully converting vintage filament bulbs to LED on a variety of other cars so I figured I'd give it a go on my Boxer. Bottom line, with a little bit of research it was easy and I'm very pleased with the results so I'll share what I did. I got all the parts from Amazon for about $100 and they arrived the next day.

Bulb types:
Single Filament bulbs are for lights that just have one purpose, for example a reverse light, or the rear indicator lights on my Boxer. These have a single electrical post centered in the base and two locating lugs on the bottom that are symmetric. The bulb can be placed in the socket either of two ways and it won't matter as the post still makes contact properly. The LED replacements for these are type BAY15D.

Double Filament bulbs are for lights that serve a dual purpose, i.e. tail light + brake light, front turn indicator + running light. These have two electrical posts on the base and two locating lugs that are asymmetric, one is higher up the side than the other. This is so that the bulb can only be installed one way as they are polarity sensitive so you don't mix the circuits up. The LED replacements for these are type BA15S.

LED bulbs don't have filaments, but rather many small light emitting diodes along the sides and top of the bulb. These are made with the circuitry and proper bases to fulfill the respective roles of single and double filament bulbs.

LED color. Since LED's are so much brighter, putting a white LED behind a red lens will actually make it look pink rather than red. Likewise, an amber lens will look pale (but bright). Fortunately, LED's are made that emit a variety of colors. In our case we need Amber, Red, and White.

Resistance. Although LED's are brighter than incandescent bulbs they also use less power. Sweet deal, but this creates a problem as the flasher module is designed for the higher resistance of the old incandescent bulbs. The solution used to be to wire in a resistor into each individual line to the indicator bulbs. Fortunately, now there is a simpler solution. Just replace the flasher module with one designed to work with LED's

Flasher Module. These are typically a rectangular black box that looks like a solenoid and is probably where the other solenoids are in your car. Flasher modules have three pins on them, a '+' and '-' opposite each other, with an 'L' 90 degrees opposed in between. The problem is modules are made in two different configurations. With the 'L' at the top, some have the '+' on the right, and some have the '+' on the left. You need to make sure the LED replacement module has the same configuration as the one you are replacing. My Boxer has the '+' on the right. The flasher module with the '+' on the right is type CF14 JL-02, "+" on the left is type CF13 EP34.

The video below shows the "after" results. The pics show the types and quantities of bulbs I needed as well as the location of the flasher module on my BB512. This worked out so well and was so easy to do that I'm going to convert all my vintage cars. Incidentally, there are also small LED's to replace those little bulbs that barely illuminate your dash at night. That's probably my next project.

After video:


Running lights: LED's on the driver's side, incandescent on the passenger side.
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What I used:
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I believe LED's generate less heat.