I would like to replace the factory dash/instrument bulbs with red ones, to match the color of my new Blaupunkt. Can anyone tell me what size (numerical id) this bulb is? I thought it was 167 but that is much too big. Better yet, can anyone provide me with a site selling them?

I have done this on my 88' 740 wagon. You can get these red bulbs anywhere, Canadian Tire is where I got mine. The P/N is 194, a common wedge bulb used in many vehicles. I think it was $5 for a pair, you need 4 for the dash.

I read on this board several months ago that a fellow brickster used theatrical light film and "melted" it onto the bulbs to get the color dash he wanted. Worked well and did not cost a lot.
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Regards,

David
1991 744 NA 139+K Miles

I would go to a place like allelectronics and replace all your lights with red LED's. They will outlive you and your car, and use like zero electricity :)

kevin
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1980 244DL, 1982 245GL, 1987 744GLE, 1991 245SE, 1996 855GLT, 2001 V70

i don't think you can do that. most LEDs run on a low voltage around 2-5V. in order to use higher than that, you'd have to scrounge around pretty hard for ones with integrated resistors. plus LEDs don't backlight well. well, they backlight well, but only if they're directed in a forwards direction. in other words, the way the dash is done on our Volvos with backlighting I don't believe will work.

when my Aiwa faceplates lights went out, I opened it up to replace the bulb. the bulbs were 9V. i did a lot of research on this, and finally found some LEDs from mouser.com that could take 5-10V. it was a green diffused LED with 8mcd of luminance with a viewing angle of 60 degrees. i thought that was good enough. unfortunately, it is not.

incandescent bulbs illimuninate in a spherical fashion allow light to go in all directions, and thus those light 'tunnels' (you know, the little tubes with clear plastic/light) to catch the light and channel it where you want. LEDs do not work well with that.

now, if you had an LED behind every single dash component in your vehicle, that would be different, but there isn't a little light fixture behind every thing. :)

i ended up having to special order these stupid little 9V mini-bulbs, and basically ended up wasting $6 from mouser.com i'm pretty pissed that Aiwa didn't use several LEDs instead of this bulb+light tunnel crap. :/
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Kenric Tam
1990 Volvo 740 base sedan (B230F)
My Volvo 'Project'