Replacing ignition key light bulb

[05joenov]

I've had my interior lights swapped over to LEDs for quite some time now, but always kept forgetting to do the ignition cylinder. Today I had to replace the driver's side heated seat switch because the backlight was out, so I had the dash off. I see the bulb for the ignition, but it doesn't really like a 194. Plus it has a cap over it that looks attached to the ignition cylinder. Has anyone replaced this bulb with an LED? How does it actually come out?

Did a search on RockAuto's site and it comes up with http://www.rockauto.com/catalog/moreinf ... 476&jpid=0

Looks like a 194 almost but hard to tell.

[ddalder]

The bulb is in a socket that twists into the ignition lock housing. It's not a 194. It's the same style of wedge base, but it's the same physical size as the bulb in the shifter assembly. Andrew (harofreak00) and I replaced his a number of years ago. It was a long time ago so details are a little foggy, but I believe we used a standard T-1 3/4 LED and added a current limiting resistor.

[ddalder]

It's a little bit of a pain to access. I can't find pics (maybe Andrew has some). I believe we removed the terminals from the socket base and bonded the LED in where the bulb sits with the leads exiting from the bottom. The original wires were cut from the lamp terminals and soldered to the leads with a 560 ohm resistor in series with one of the leads. The lamp normally consists of the socket, wires (about four inches long) with a connector that plugs into the instrument panel wiring harness. We used heat shrink tubing to insulate the connections and protect the resistor.

[05joenov]

Wow that sounds like an incredible amount of work for such a bulb....but worth it.