Need help choosing LED&#039;s

The reason I have never put led's in a game basically boils down to indecision. I've read the sticky but it seems incorrect compared to what I have read in other threads. For instance, the sticky suggests using frosted 1-led lights in clear white inserts but it seems most people would use a superbright cointaker for this insert, which is brighter than 3led ablaze and obviously brighter than 1led frosted. So what should I do with my Barracora? I would like the inserts to be brighter than they are but not blinding. I also need help with GI and BG slection. I tried some of my frosted 1led in GI and it killed the color of the plastics which are mostly deep blue, yellow, red. Its hard because they are a mixture of warm and cool colors. I was thinking about doing a color that matches the overall theme of the pin like maybe blue and having that blue light bleeding out from under the plastics. Any suggestions?

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#2 12 years ago

BOB

beatmaster

this is what i do:

small white insert = one white led flat top or frosted

big white insert = 3 white leds

small color insert = 3 leds same color

big color insert = 3, 4, or super (go with the size of the insert) same color

G.I,

i tried the cool white 2 leds from cointaker and look great.
or i use 4 leds or super.

in the end it's a matter of taste and color.

#3 12 years ago

CAT

Butterflygirl24

Pinside member

12y 84,575 1,449

HMMM...lets see in my Barracora, I have color matched 180 wide leds from Cointaker under the inserts....and under the clear ones in the bonus area, I have purple (my fave color!!)...When I redid it I changed the posts to purple, and I have purple Clippy posts on it also. The purple ties into the purple in the BG...For GI, I might try some cool white 180 wide, they give off a sort of blue tint that would probably tie in good with the blue plastics and such. They are a bit brighter than the warm white, and the warm don't give off the blue tint...Maybe try the same in the GI in the backbox...the wide spread the light out a bit more than some of the others so you don't have the "spots" of light effect. I have the 4+1's in the pops, you can color match them to the caps or just use the cool white, because the yellows tend to not have as much of an effect as some of the other colors.

I love picking LEDs...that is half the fun, just get a selection, and start playin' with them to see what you like best!

Phoebe

#4 12 years ago

Blackbeard

Pinside member

12y 106K 12,101 6 20

Go retro warm white for GI.

Colored 44 super brights for inserts. Match color bulb to the color of the insert.

#5 12 years ago

DSD

Winball_Pizard

Inactive member

Quoted from beatmaster:
this is what i do:
small white insert = one white led flat top or frosted
big white insert = 3 white leds
small color insert = 3 leds same color
big color insert = 3, 4, or super (go with the size of the insert) same color
G.I,
i tried the cool white 2 leds from cointaker and look great.
or i use 4 leds or super.
in the end it's a matter of taste and color.

Are the one led flat tops brighter than frosted?

#6 12 years ago

BOB

beatmaster

OP
Quoted from Winball_Pizard:
beatmaster said:this is what i do:
small white insert = one white led flat top or frosted
big white insert = 3 white leds
small color insert = 3 leds same color
big color insert = 3, 4, or super (go with the size of the insert) same color
G.I,
i tried the cool white 2 leds from cointaker and look great.
or i use 4 leds or super.
in the end it's a matter of taste and color.
Are the one led flat tops brighter than frosted?

i'll say the frosted one are more even, look softer.

#7 12 years ago

ROB

RobT

Pinside member

OP
Quoted from Winball_Pizard:
The reason I have never put led's in a game basically boils down to indecision. I've read the sticky but it seems incorrect compared to what I have read in other threads. For instance, the sticky suggests using frosted 1-led lights in clear white inserts but it seems most people would use a superbright cointaker for this insert, which is brighter than 3led ablaze and obviously brighter than 1led frosted. So what should I do with my Barracora? I would like the inserts to be brighter than they are but not blinding.

You are actually ahead of the game just by realizing that there is conflicting opinions on what to use!

I went through the same thing when I started adding LEDs to my pins.

Bottom line: you are going to have to find out for yourself! You will need to try various LEDs and decide which look and brightness that you prefer. Get some sample of several different types of LEDs and take it from there.

To confuse matters even more, some inserts seem to be more opaque than others, so they can use a brighter LED without being blinding. Yet, I have the 1 LEDs in inserts on a couple of my pins and they are perfect.

#8 12 years ago

ROB

RobT

Pinside member

Just South Of The Middle Of Nowhere, MS

Quoted from beatmaster:
this is what i do:
small white insert = one white led flat top or frosted
big white insert = 3 white leds
small color insert = 3 leds same color
big color insert = 3, 4, or super (go with the size of the insert) same color
G.I,
i tried the cool white 2 leds from cointaker and look great.
or i use 4 leds or super.
in the end it's a matter of taste and color.

He said he didn't want to be blinded.

#9 12 years ago

WIZ

wizzardz

Pinside member

12y 71,400 1,532 22

Quoted from Blackbeard:
Go retro warm white for GI

I have yet to see a good warm LED. They all seem to be too green.

Quoted from RobT:
Bottom line: you are going to have to find out for yourself! You will need to try various LEDs and decide which look and brightness that you prefer. Get some sample of several different types of LEDs and take it from there.

I think this extends to deciding those that aren't changed to LED. I have many incandescent lights left because I want the warm white

Overall I find the LEDs will be somewhat brighter anyways. If you mix, say, retros with super brights, you may find that the light broadcast ends up unbalanced - being brighter in some areas and not so in others.

#10 12 years ago

DSD

Winball_Pizard

Inactive member

I forgot to mention that I did try a frosted 1led from PBL in one of the larger 10 20 bonus inserts and I liked the color and the effect but it wasn't quite bright enough. I dunno if that helps anyone steer me in the right direction? I did notice cointaker had 2led frosted would that be twice as bright?

#11 12 years ago

ROB

RobT

Pinside member

OP
Quoted from Winball_Pizard:
I forgot to mention that I did try a frosted 1led from PBL in one of the larger 10 20 bonus inserts and I liked the color and the effect but it wasn't quite bright enough. I dunno if that helps anyone steer me in the right direction? I did notice cointaker had 2led frosted would that be twice as bright?

Cointaker Super Mini.

Not as bright as the Super, but brighter than a 1 LED

#12 12 years ago

BOB

beatmaster

Quoted from RobT:
beatmaster said:this is what i do:
small white insert = one white led flat top or frosted
big white insert = 3 white leds
small color insert = 3 leds same color
big color insert = 3, 4, or super (go with the size of the insert) same color
G.I,
i tried the cool white 2 leds from cointaker and look great.
or i use 4 leds or super.
in the end it's a matter of taste and color.
He said he didn't want to be blinded.

it's all a matter of inserts and size, 3 leds in a color insert look great.
thats what i have and my vision is perfect!

#13 12 years ago

BOB

beatmaster

OP
Quoted from Winball_Pizard:
I forgot to mention that I did try a frosted 1led from PBL in one of the larger 10 20 bonus inserts and I liked the color and the effect but it wasn't quite bright enough. I dunno if that helps anyone steer me in the right direction? I did notice cointaker had 2led frosted would that be twice as bright?

thats why i said 3 leds (from PBL) for large insert.

#14 12 years ago

DSD

Winball_Pizard

Inactive member

beatmaster what are you using for your GI on your space invaders? Its intense from the pics

#15 12 years ago

BOB

beatmaster

don't trust the camera, it makes it look brighter.

up PF are 4 leds
Middle are red super (one red led won't do anything, the darker the brighter you need)
Slignshots are 4 leds
one led for the queen chamber x 8 (don't need more they are so close to each others)
rest of the playfield are 3 leds

but like i said the camera makes it look brighter but in person it looks great.

like i said before it's a matter of taste, like you i tried a lot of different things on different games.
it look good on some games on others it doesn't.
the best thing is to get a few of each and make some test, thats the best advice i can give you!

#16 12 years ago

DSD

Winball_Pizard

Inactive member

Ok I ordered a bunch of mini's frosted 2 leds for starters.. Ill do a comparison next week hopefully.

#17 12 years ago

BRI

gweempose

Pinside Moderator

13y 154K 20,204 37

Quoted from RobT:
Cointaker Super Mini.

Minis are often overlooked, but I find them to be the perfect LED in some situations. They are particularly well suited for very small inserts, or in the backbox when you want to avoid hot spotting.

1 week later

#18 12 years ago

DSD

Winball_Pizard

Inactive member

OK well I finally got my order from cointaker 6 days later thanks to USPS. The mini's are just about perfect in the small bonus score area, brighter but not overpowering. They are not good in the small milky inserts and larger milky inserts, almost giving a greenish tint. They look pretty good in larger clear colored inserts but they are equally as bright as regular bulbs and I was hoping for something brighter. They look good under the top lane plastics but are useless in the pop bumpers. So basically Im back to the drawing board. I ordered some 3led ablaze from PBL so we'll see how that goes.

#19 12 years ago

WBP

ThePostmaster

Inactive member

Hermantown, MN

13y 52,800 2,383 4 8

Awesome pin. Post some pics with the LED"S in it.

#20 12 years ago

DSD

Winball_Pizard

Inactive member

So far the cointaker mini are only good for small clear or colored inserts and kinda ok for milky inserts. A row of 9 staring you in the face right between the flippers is way to much though.

Ablaze 3 led are perfect for the colored inserts imo They are brighter than the mini's but not a whole lot. They have a better design though and I think thats working in their favor. The mini is about as big as a regular bulb base with the bulb broken off so the light source is further away from the insert. The Ablaze is about the same size as a regular bulb and it has 3 different light sources so that combined with slightly brighter output seems to be perfect.

I guess I'm getting closer and I think im going to use frosted white in the bonus score section, its intense. Anyone have any luck taking pictures of leds? Even the frosted bulbs behind the backglass look like they are burning a hole through the back of my head.

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#21 12 years ago

KWD

v8torino

Pinside+ Frequent

14y 74,550 1,531

I'm with you on the whites,they burn right thru your brain matter,I had a bunch of white inserts on my HSII and went back to regular incandescent bulbs,they look like bleh compared to the LED bulbs,but the absolute blinding/piss me off effect of the LED bulbs is fixed.

#22 12 years ago

DSD

Winball_Pizard

Inactive member

Im going to put frosted single led from pbl when they get them in stock again.

#23 12 years ago

GLM

ovfdfireman

Pinball Pro

12y 115K 4,914

You can always use any color you like in the white ones, personally I would leave white in the two larger and put blue in the big row. That will take care of being blinded, and if you don't like it, disperse the blue bulbs into inserts of other machines. Never money wasted.

Also warm white is less blinding

#24 12 years ago

DRM

iceman44

Pinside+ Pro!

Boerne, TX

13y 162K 26,867 28 49

I'm going to try the frosted singles as well from PBL...white and blue....

I now have just about everything else!

#25 12 years ago

NimblePin

Pinside member

13y 121K 5,415

I would definitely mix some color into that white row near the inlanes, unless you want to land the Space Shuttle...
If it were me, I would do full colored frosted bulbs with an alternating pattern (purple and cool white), then I'd do two blue bulbs for insert 10 and 20.

If you have the dough, go for a full slow color changer row!
Good luck W_P!

#26 12 years ago

JEF

Jeff_PHX_AZ

Pinside member

Mesa, AZ

12y 48,150 2,055 1

OP
Quoted from Winball_Pizard:
So far the cointaker mini are only good for small clear or colored inserts and kinda ok for milky inserts. A row of 9 staring you in the face right between the flippers is way to much though.
Ablaze 3 led are perfect for the colored inserts imo They are brighter than the mini's but not a whole lot. They have a better design though and I think thats working in their favor. The mini is about as big as a regular bulb base with the bulb broken off so the light source is further away from the insert. The Ablaze is about the same size as a regular bulb and it has 3 different light sources so that combined with slightly brighter output seems to be perfect.
I guess I'm getting closer and I think im going to use frosted white in the bonus score section, its intense. Anyone have any luck taking pictures of leds? Even the frosted bulbs behind the backglass look like they are burning a hole through the back of my head.

Dont use frosted bulbs behind the backglass, use the Super Brights LED's, no direct beam effect like you mentioned. There a real nice spread of light and you wont know that there LED in there. Just call CT, Chris will confirm this as well on the spread of light the SB's do.

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#27 12 years ago

DSD

Winball_Pizard

Inactive member

You can always use any color you like in the white ones, personally I would leave white in the two larger and put blue in the big row. That will take care of being blinded, and if you don't like it, disperse the blue bulbs into inserts of other machines. Never money wasted.
Also warm white is less blinding

I actually have some blue,orange,white and purple frosted. I got some to test them out in the backbox and never thought of trying them in the clear inserts. Thanks!

Heres a little bit of the experimental back box action. I have changed some of them since this picture was taken but it looks good in person and not so great in this pic. The hot spotting is insane in the pic and non existent in person.

2012-02-22_19.13.56.jpg

#28 12 years ago

ROB

RobT

Pinside member