Lighting on Volvo 740...

[Anonymous]

Everyone,
I have 2 questions regarding lighting on the 1991 Volvo 740 Turbo.

1.) I would like to change the lighting behind the dashboard/gauges to be blue or red instead of the boring white colour it is now. How can I go about doing this?

2.) I want to have Xenon headlights instead of the boring dull ones I have now. I purchased these on ebay http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2401368493&ssPageName=ADME:B:EOAB:US:6 and I was wondering if I can just unscrew the old ones and put these in or what? Please advise as to what I need to do to get Xenon headlights. Thanks!

Sincerely,
John R. Cushma
VirtualPIT@Aol.com

[boostdemon]

you can use colored blubs in the dash, i know someone here has a 740 w/ red lighting.

Those are just colored H4 lamps, and blue cuts out quite a bit of visable light, so they're actually not as bright as your stock ones could be... real xenons would be between 400-600$ and would require an additional convertor and some major power. I know someone else on here has a set he ripped from a mercedes in the junkyard.

[boostdemon]

here, check this out: http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2402123994&category=33710

[bitjockey]

[quote:256e335a22]i know someone here has a 740 w/ red lighting. [/quote:256e335a22]

http://www.appstate.edu/~rr53784/DASH.JPG

8)

[Anonymous]

How do you remove the Dashboard from the 1991 Volvo 740 Turbo to replace the dashboard/guage lights? Thanks!

-John-

[SquareD]

Those are just colored H4 lamps, and blue cuts out quite a bit of visable light, so they're actually not as bright as your stock ones could be...

I don't doubt this, but I put blue"colored" bulbs on my wagon with the yellowed 240 headlight lenses (of course I clean and wax them ever few months), but I left one of the standard ones (which was only a couple months old) and compared it to the light from a phillips clear blue or whatever they're called and it was brighter and clearer. You know, they might just be brighter because they use a "Xtra vision" type bulb as the basis of the colored bulbs. Anyway that was my observation. The colored bulb does give my headlights a whiter look, before they were damn near brown :( On a sidenote... I found 2 passenger side headlights (and a turn signal lens) in mint condition at the pick n pull for cheap, just waiting to get a nice matching driver side headlight and lens. Should brighten up the front of the car and the lighting. Ramble mode off.....

[Volvo78GT]

heheh

that **** is ****

you'll find that STOCK wattage/clear lense, the cheapest stuff (Sylvania or GE variety) at walmart will do better than these.

besides, if its higher wattage and you've still got plastic headlights, you'll MELT everything.

anything on ebay that has neon colored text is consisered crap.

I've got a set of 100/90W blue tinted H4 bulbs and 55W blue tinted H3's... got ripped off. Paid something like 40 bucks on ebay from a guy in asia... they're ****.

check out http://lighting.mbz.org for any actual information.

[Chigga 744SE]

I used EuroLite ones for a while.

then suddenly the bloody low beam won't go on, I changed the light bulbs and still doesn't go on. @ the end, I tried w/my stock yellow ones, then its on.

so now my car is officially allergic to EuroLite for some strange reason.

I really like the white lights look, its much better than the lousy ass yellow lights.

[Anonymous]

TheMadChigga,

Your car is EXACTLY what I want to do to mine. please tell me step by step what u did and bought so I can get my car to be like urs.
I have a 1991 Volvo 740 Turbo, silver ext. black int.

Thanks!
-John-

[945ti]

he didn't have to do anything to make it look like that, it is just a 740SE with the OEM airflow bodykit, prettty cool huh. This is a curse and a blessing, the OEM bodykit looks nice and works well with the car, but the thing costs a fortune. I doubt I will get on anytime soon, but there was a guy on the mailinglist selling one for $600. That is a great deal considering they are about 2k$ new. I dunno if it was pre 90 or post 90 like the one on the 740SE like this one though.

[yorkbrick]

I wrapped each dash bulb with a peice theatrical gel material. I wrapped the stock green bulbs. You can get a 3x3 piece from your local theatrical stage and music rental center.

The dash insturment diplay will slide out once the two corner screws are removed. Its not a real hard job. On the bottom of the display.

I have super white plasma bulbs in my car that I bought off e-bay. They draw a little more current. I can watch my voltage gauge drop really fast once i turn on the lights.

Good luck
yorkbrick

[Chigga 744SE]

the lowering is not real!

mine is slightly higher, although much lowered compare to stock.

as a curse for the SE kit: its literally pain in the ass if u ever hit anything, u get scared of any scratch, and u are even more scared once the car is lower more.

there are certain places I can't go to because it will scratch the speed bumps very very nicely.

[vos]

Hi all, you know, if you don't want to do an HID conversion but would like at least a decent improvement in output, you could always do a relay conversion on your headlight wiring. My father-in-law and I had gotten one of the kits that IPD actually sells, but started making our own with genuine bosch components for our other cars (we have 4 700/900 cars between us).

Its no where near the improvement of HIDs, but it appears to be much better than stock, plus it eliminates the voltage drop when other electrical components kick on (if you ever noticed your headlights dim while operating your power windows you know exactly what I mean!).

Anyways, we are going to post the details of a "how-to-do-it-yourself" pretty soon on a website. I will repost to this thread when its done. I think we spent $45-$50 in parts...

I am going to try and get a light meter that works in the range of headlights so I can measure a before and after. Not to be subversive or offensive to anyone (and if I am I apologize) but all this talk about "whiter and brighter" is really just subjective nonsense (no offense, just being techical!). Light is measured in lumens, lux, candella, and foot-candles (and even there you are talking about differences in luminosity versus illuminance).

Anyways, I will get some numbers up sometime soon! BTW, that red dash lighting looks sweet 8) Reminds me of some of the BMW dashes.

[bitjockey]

If anyone is interested, I can get true HID conversion kits for our cars for around $400. High quality Phillips ballasts/parts/bulbs... my friend is a distributor.

Maybe we could get some kind of group buy going?

[760T man]

Be careful of those. Just snapping an HID capsule in the place of the 9004 bulb in our 744s with plastic DOT headlights will create an extremely hazardous beam pattern for two reasons.

1. The 9004 bulb they take has traverse filaments. The HID capsules are equivelant to a perpendicular filament bulb. Kindof like putting a 9007 in the place of a 9004. This will create a hazardous beam pattern.

2. HIDs MUST be placed behind E-code lenses. HID light is far more intense than Halogen light. DOT headlamps are required to produce a signifigant amount of light over the horizontal cutoff point. All this does is fling light in the oncoming drivers' faces, and is why DOT headlamps glare signifigantly more than E-code. If you put HIDs in these, you will be BLINDING the oncoming drivers.

I saw a 2002 Honda Odyssey with a snap-in HID kit installed recently. Even though its headlights are intended for perpendicular-filament bulbs and have a sharper cutoff than DOT headlights, the light was still blinding.

To safely utilize HID light you MUST have a lens and reflector that is specifically designed for it. Additionally, our DOT composite headlamps are high/low beam headlamps,as opposed to having separate highs and lows. HIDs cannot produce two beams, therefore you'll lose your high beam. THIS WILL CAUSE THE CAR TO FAIL INSPECTION.

If you want whiter light, you need to either go with the tinted H4s, replace your headlamps entirely and perform a wiring harness upgrade, or just live with it.

You can read about this on http://lighting.mbz.org/tech/bulbs/Hid/conversions/conversions.html

[760T man]

Well. Did I piss everyone off?

[vos]

Heh, I don't think you p'ed every one off, I think we are all just trying to find the cash for some e-code lenses 8)