Elite LED lighting

[bdub]

For those wanting to try this, it's definitely possible and quite easy. The results look amazing in person. My phone just couldn't capture it.

[trickyricky]

Assuming you use an LED strip....or individuals? I found some LED's at mouser that are freaking bright and same color (wavelength) as the original. I did replaced the LED's on a members ZX400ti amp and I had to add resistors to dim them a bit.

[bdub]

Yeah, just a couple of LED strips, cut to about 21"

[trickyricky]

Sweet, I like it.

[Drock]

Nice job. Is that the .4 ? I did the same thing to my ti21600.5.
Where did you put connections for the LEDs? I will be doing this to my elites as well. Bought the LEDs some time ago, just haven't had time to put them in yet.


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[bdub]

Nice job. Is that the .4 ? I did the same thing to my ti21600.5.
Where did you put connections for the LEDs? I will be doing this to my elites as well. Bought the LEDs some time ago, just haven't had time to put them in yet.


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It's the .2 - I'll be doing the .4 tomorrow (still haven't received it yet!).

I have a bunch of paper-thin speaker wire that I soldered to the LED strips and then ran it between the chassis and the endplate. Then I can run it under the amp and through whatever mounting board I use. No visible wires and 100% reversible!

I used your TI21600.5 as inspiration. The spot for running the LED strips is the same for both amp lines.

[Drock]

Cool. Good to know. Thanks


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[dbjury]

I have a .5. I'd like to know how u access inside. I've undone the 2 Allen key bolts for the strips. But the strips don't seem to come out. What else is needed. I'm doing something wrong. Don't want to break my nice amp


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[Kirghiz]

When you do the four channel, please post a step by step process. A video even if you have that ability. That's cool as hell.

[Drock]

I'll be picking up the clear plexy glass tomorrow to switch out the smoked glass. And then installing the LEDs. I will attempt a video, but my last one didn't work out.


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[ttocs]

one suggestion on the leds is try a 7 color strand. I know the chance of you doing pink/orange is probably rare but I bet the flashing/fading options on it would look pretty cool. You should also experiment with putting a frosted decal on the back side as it would lite up in the color of the leds SUPER bright and almost float there.

[Drock]

Cool idea. I'll be trying a few different ways. See what looks best.


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[bdub]

OK guys, on to the Elite 4 (thanks Drock, it looks good). I'll post a few more progress pics for this one.


Cut an LED strip into 2 sections, each slightly less than 21". Then solder on 2 very short lengths of primary wire. Test with a battery.


Cut some lengths of the paper-thin flat speaker wire and solder it onto the primary wire. When I say paper-thin, I mean it - this stuff is less than 1/16" thick! Test with a battery.


On the RCA endplate, remove the 2 hex screws holding the aluminum plexi retainers


On the power/speaker endplate, remove the 6 larger and 3-4 smaller hex screws. You can now take the endplate off and the slide/lift the aluminum plexi retainers off.





Remove the 10 hex screws holding the plexi in. They'll probably be under some tape, unless your amp has been serviced.


Take the time to blow out your board and clean both sides of the plexi.


I don't trust the adhesive backing of LED strips, so I first laid down a rubber adhesive double-sided foam tape along the underside of the chassis. Basically right under where the aluminum plexi retainers sit. I know this tape retains its stickiness under heat too, which is essential because this area will get quite warm. Then I stuck the LED lengths to the tape.


Here you can see the speaker wire hanging out of the amp.


Screw the plexi, retainers, and endplate back in. Position the wire such that the endplate is compressing a flat section and don't cover any screw holes! Remember not to overtorque.


Solder the wire ends together whichever way works best for your install and then do the final battery test.

All done! The 4 looks even better than the 2 all lit up, thanks to the extra board components. This looks amazing in person guys, photos can't do it justice. It really brings these amps to life cosmetically.

I decided to do blue LED's because the rest of my install is highlighted in blue. The color-changing ones would be cool though and I hope someone takes that on. I might do a frosted emblem down the road, but right now I feel like just highlighting the board with LED's contributes to the classy looking nature of the amps without being too flashy.

If anyone wants some of that thin flat speaker wire, I have a ton left. PM me to send a few bucks to my paypal and I'll ship a few feet out.

Hope that helps guys!

[ttocs]

I tried to take the end off of mine for that reason when I got it but it seemed like it wasn't going to come off easy. I think the cursive PHOENIX GOLD logo or even the new ELITE down the middle would light up so nicely that I would have to try it out. You can test the theory with just some scotch tape as long as its the satin finish style rather then the glossy style. You can get the 7 color strips off of egay to your door for cheap. They are usually out of asia and will take a week or two but they do not cost much and normally have a couple of different flash/fade/speed options. Bet the different colors around the blue leds in the middle would be cool.

Now we need to find a way to light up the easter egg on the board so we can read it......

[bdub]

In person, you can totally read it. If only I had a better camera (yeah, blame the equipment, lol)

[bdub]

[ttocs]

that is better but bet a couple of white leds and not even super bright ones just to show it off even more. hell if we don't 99.5% of anyone looking will never know they are there.

[bdub]

that is better but bet a couple of white leds and not even super bright ones just to show it off even more. hell if we don't 99.5% of anyone looking will never know they are there.

That's a great idea.

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[Drock]

X2


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[Drock]

Looks great. I love it.


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[ttocs]

if the easter egg happened to be by the same end as the power it would not be hard to wire in a couple different colored ones.

[Kirghiz]

My truck just happens to be at my installer's getting the amp racks finished up, which includes blue LED's under the amps casting what should theoretically look like a blue silhouette around the outside of the amps. They were done working on it yesterday I think, but between my job and this snowstorm I can't get down there to get it until Friday (They're 2 1/2 hours away) and my truck will be down there idle for three days. I sent this link this morning and was like "Do you have white LED's in stock right now?" Blue outside, blue inside, and blue Elite subs would be a bit too much blue, but white inside should look badass against all the rest of the blue, and light up the amp guts a bit better. I saw a cell phone pic of one of my amps just now and you can see the transformers a bit better it looks like by using white.

I absolutely can't wait to see it in person.

[bdub]

My truck just happens to be at my installer's getting the amp racks finished up, which includes blue LED's under the amps casting what should theoretically look like a blue silhouette around the outside of the amps. They were done working on it yesterday I think, but between my job and this snowstorm I can't get down there to get it until Friday (They're 2 1/2 hours away) and my truck will be down there idle for three days. I sent this link this morning and was like "Do you have white LED's in stock right now?" Blue outside, blue inside, and blue Elite subs would be a bit too much blue, but white inside should look badass against all the rest of the blue, and light up the amp guts a bit better. I saw a cell phone pic of one of my amps just now and you can see the transformers a bit better it looks like by using white.

I absolutely can't wait to see it in person.

I can't wait to see your finished build. I love what you've done with it so far.

[Kirghiz]

My truck just happens to be at my installer's getting the amp racks finished up, which includes blue LED's under the amps casting what should theoretically look like a blue silhouette around the outside of the amps. They were done working on it yesterday I think, but between my job and this snowstorm I can't get down there to get it until Friday (They're 2 1/2 hours away) and my truck will be down there idle for three days. I sent this link this morning and was like "Do you have white LED's in stock right now?" Blue outside, blue inside, and blue Elite subs would be a bit too much blue, but white inside should look badass against all the rest of the blue, and light up the amp guts a bit better. I saw a cell phone pic of one of my amps just now and you can see the transformers a bit better it looks like by using white.

I absolutely can't wait to see it in person.

I can't wait to see your finished build. I love what you've done with it so far.

Thanks, I'll post pics as soon as I get it home.

When you see pics like this you pretty much end the arguments about any of the vintage amps being better than these Elites. These boards are absolute works of art. I still can't believe that Phoenix Gold didn't go with more of an "MS" look on these amps to show off the boards, and we have to resort to modifications like this to show the amps off.

EliteAmp.jpg (148.58 KiB) Viewed 18261 times

[ttocs]

I think they just followed the heard and went with the black/plexi look but I have too agree they would have been better off too stick to their heritage and done a nicely decorated plexi for it.