Hella marker light (caravan/vintage car) - what bulb type?

[Tim Watts]

Anyone remember what bulb these take?

I've been looking for some soffit lights (bungalow). Want 12V, water resistant, smallish, cheap and not bloody big hole needed.

So it occurred to me - what about a caravan/Landrover style sidelight/marker/parking light - retro fitted with an LED bulb?

Should be able to drive several from a standard SELV PSU - seems like a novel idea.

But without buying one, I wanted to figure out what my LED bulb options were. I really want to avoid "festoon" (tubular) bulbs as they have horrifically unstable contacts - and stick with something that at least takes a 12V BC car type bulb as LED replacements will be available forever.

[ARW]

Are they not Daleks ears:-)?

[Nightjar]

...

I thought they took a standard 5W bayonet side light bulb. It looks a lot like the Lucas standard (i.e. non vehicle specific) side light they used to sell in the 1960s, which took those.

[Tim Watts]

Yes - indeed that are. I thought they'd look cool.

[Tim Watts]

Possibly the 207 base (15mm dia) then. Which means these would work:

Time for some experimentation - not looking for spot lighting - that would be too harsh here (countryside, it's fairly dark).

Something dim with a wide wash would be just the ticket.

Thanks!

BTW - I started by looking at custom LED fittings for outdoors or bathrooms. I object to integrated LED units - they will fail and I will not be able to change the bulb, because the whole fitting is the bulb. Hateful idea.

And everything else assumes I want to drill 80mm+/- holes everywhere. And pay a lot of money.

That's when I had the idea to go for something ancient and ubiquitous - which means cheap and long lived.

[newshound]

Are you going to have a row of matching sink plungers?

[Tim Watts]

Only to shoot JWs with...

[Nick]

Can't remember the bulb numbers. Probably 5w double pole. Have some @ work and will check in the morning. Possibly 209. Don't know of an LED alternative. Nick.

[ARW]

Must find a solution. These could be be sellers to the right market. Minis used the same lights fittings (or looked the same).

I want some.

[Nightjar]

Those links only give me blank auto bulbs direct headed pages. However,

15mm sounds about right, from what I remember.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

In article , Nightjar I thought they took a standard 5W bayonet side light bulb. It looks a

It does - but the same basic fitting was also used for flashers and stop/tail. With just a slightly different bulbholder.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

There are LED side marker units available which come in white red and amber with LEDs already fitted. The amber ones are bright enough to be seen in daylight, so I'd expect the white to be similar. Can be bought for quite a bit less than the one you've linked to.

[Trevor Smith]

As they are flush mounting chances are they use a festoon bulb. The Lucas one's used on minis protruded out of the base for the bulb holder.

[Tim Watts]

Not sure about Minis. but Landrover ones have been rejected as they assume a big hole at the back:

Rather than a tiny hole for the wire.

I'm already watching out to make sure it's got two flyleads and not earthed through a case screw!

You can get some pretty all-LED fittings for Landrovers/caravans - but they've been rejected too:

I am a believer that the lamp should be a small removable component and not built into the unit. It's a principle that's served well for 100+ years. You'll always be able to get an LED lamp with a 1/2" base BC but you'll never match a fitting when it fails in 10 years...

This is why I hate all the modern "single unit" LED house fittings and would rather shove an LED GU10 or G4 into a fitting that was less than optimum.

This was all proven to me the other day... Someone running a dance club at the school blew their amp up that docks with their iPhone. I offered mine. Of course it wouldn't dock as their iPhone 5S had a new "Lightning" connector and mine has the original Apple dock which has been around for what, 8 years?

So I gave them an 3.5mm jack lead so they could hook up to its 1V PP line in, a standard that's been around at least since my dad built his valve amp in 1950-something and probably several decades before that.

Modern ideas - pah.

[Tim Watts]

Ah - so definitely 1/2" 15mm base. These must be the bulb with the single contact and earthed through the cap. Thank you sir...

[Tim Watts]

I'm staying away from all in one units. In 10 years when the LED dies, I will not be able to source an identical unit. I just know it. Plus changing it will involve wiring a new fitting in rather than unscrew lens.

I'm sticking with replaceable bulbs (even if suboptimum) as a 15mm BC

12V will be available for the next century at least :)

[Tim Watts]

Oh.

I was wondering how they managed to fit a 15mm base in there. I guess the Landrover/Mini type had the base sticking out the back.

Festoon bulbs are crap. I might concede to having a hole and using a Landrover type. At least it's not as bad as having an 80mm hole for a downlight.

There might be some bigger car marker/reversing lamps that take a proper bulb - size is not an issue - just thought of the little round ones first.

[Tim Watts]

Backtracking slightly - Landrover reversing lights seem to be astrong contender - 33mm hole, acceptable:

That's a 382 bulb and has the advantage it's brighter - loads of LED retrofits in the 2-3W range which seems nice and safe as these will be mounted in/on wood.