What is the consensus on what is better to simulate headlights on tanks, WWII vintage.

Clearly bright white/ blue leds aren't correct as I'd imagine the lamps of the era tended to be
yellowish. Yellow leds would be too yellow.

So does that leave grain of wheat bulbs? I believe that's what Tamiya used in their Pershing and probably
others.

I read parts of a thread here where the author mentioned 1.8mm yellow leds but still they see too yellow
then I haven't tried them.

What is everyone's thoughts on this?

Jerry

I found a site for rairoad stuff that sells the perfect LED for this. 1.8mm warm white and they will work on up to 9v.
www.modeltrainsoftware.com. I use them in alot of my builds now.

I am giving these a try - Grain of sand bulbs with a suitable resistor.

<font size="-1"><font size="-1">http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/WTI0095P?FVSEARCH=L5AJ6606+&amp;search=Go</font></font>

On my HL KV-1, I removed the LED, hollowed out the headlight housing, ground off the tip of the LED and reinstalled it in the housing. There was now clearance to fit a headlight lens over it. Before doing that I gave the LED and inner headlight a coat of yellow acrylic followed by coats of silver acrylic until it was the muted yellowy-off white I wanted. Looks better than the hideous glowing nipple of the original HL design. Sorry no pics, image loader seems kaput on this board...

Mike.

Hi guys !!! I bought some 3 mm high intensity leds a while ago for my smoking gun project ...Here's a couple of pics. to compare the shades...( I'm using a 240 Ohms 1/4 Watts resistors ) ...
Here's the link for the data sheet for the leds ...<a target="_blank" href="http://pdf1.alldatasheet.com/datasheet-pdf/view/282990/BETLUX/BL-L304UYC.html">pdf1.alldatasheet.com/datasheet-pdf/view/282990/BETLUX/BL-L304UYC.html

<br type="_moz" /></a>

I use "yellowglo white" leds. Simulates incandescent bulbs. Not too white not too yellow, looks like old headlights.

Anybody knows if " Yellowglo White " and " Warm White " are 2 different colors ; or are they 2 different names for the same color ?????

I went the cheap route, I put some yellow Teflon plumbers tape over the LED inside the light housing.  It is kind'a yellow, but it was already paid for.

Jerry......
My solution is simple, hope this helps.........All of the lamps on my WWII tanks have been shot out, damaged, stolen or taken off.

Problem solved.

Yep ... don't even install them on mine.


- Jeff

The warm white leds look pretty good to me according to those pictures ....www.google.ca/search

Rex:

That or hide 'em under a few German tin pots (helmets) like they used for lamp shades in quite a few or the WW2 movies (Patton in partiucular, for lighting his map-boards)

But if ya gotta choose... Tamiya ~does~ make a transparent yellow paint for lenses, as well as a red. Found that out a while back when working on my 4x4 Mountaineer (and his cousins) Then there is the simple idea of buying some colored overhead cels from an art store or even gift-wrap cellophane from the old stand-by, the dollar store!

And now that I think about it, any yellow overhead marker or highlighter should do for 'painting' the styrene. If ya got kids, try the markers first. Test it on a bit of sprue!

WhiteWolf

PS: And gently 'frosting' the inside of the lens helps diffuse the glow from a point to a full-lens glow. The Easy-Off/Mean-Green cleaners will frost the clear plastic... though a pit of coarse polishing compound on a Q-tip would do as good (if ya got any) In a pinch, Conet or any of those other 'grit' cleaning products do for a coarse polisher, and old toothpaste for a fine one (long as ya don't mind the lenses smelling minty-fresh! ;-) )

Modified headlight on my KV-1 with yellow and silver acrylics for dulling. Excuse the silver on the headlight bezeltank is still undergoing final paint and weathering.
Mike.

Rex as always your solutions are out of the box.... priceless...

Thanks to everyone for their replies.

While I like the warn white led idea I have a dozen or so 3-4v grain of wheat bulbs I purchased
at the old San Antonio Hobby shop years ago before they closed. A sorely missed shop.
I'll use those for this little project and see how they work; when they burn out I'll use Rex's
ploy...

Jerry