I received my led bulbs a few days ago that are to be put behind my gauges and I have some questions. For someone who has never done this before, would you recommend me trying it on my own or getting it done by some1 with experience? Also, what are problems I could run into if doing it on my own? How hard is it to take off the trim before I get to the gauges? Thanks guys & girls.

 

Haha it's not difficult at all. I'm sure you are able to do it. I had LEDs in mine before, but I decided to take them out until I got a new cluster set. They looked too blue for me. But anyway. It takes some finagling to get the trim off. I ended up just breaking off the little clips that are around the steering column. It still screws in fine and doesn't rattle. You'll have to work with the steering wheel, keeping it all the way down and just twist and maneuver it around. The cluster itself just pulls out and I don't think anything else has to be taken apart. If it does, it's all just screws. There's 5 bulbs that twist and come out. I had to use pliers to help grip them, they weren't easy to twist and I didn't feel like struggling. You'll have to figure out which ones light up the correct things on the cluster, I don't remember which ones they exactly are. But put the bulbs back in and push the cluster back in until the pins snap back together and turn the lights on to test. If everything checks out, then put it all back together the way you took it apart. Should only take about 10-15 min to do it.

 

how did you break those clips? you're talking about the ones you need to take off first above the steering wheel to remove the trim around the gauges right?

 

On the inside of the trim itself, there are 4 plastic pieces that stick out and snap into the car or the cluster, I don't remember which. There's 2 around either side of the steering wheel notch, and 2 on the very ends of the trim. The one around the steering wheel notch broke, and I broke off the other one. It kept getting caught up, so it was easier without them.

 

Oh ok. Well how the hell do you remove the 2 bolts that are holding the trim up on the underside of the top of the dash, right above the steering wheel?

OK I may have found the answer to this on the write up. I swear I was trying all the sizes and nothing was working. Hmmm let's see

 

Oh and something off topic, your MBA shift ****, do you just spin it right onto the MBA adapter to get it on? The shift **** I bought actually has 3 screws around it, which dig into the adapter and would mess up the grooves where you would screw one into. I'm going to exchange the **** later today.

I received the new MBA adapter in the mail yesterday so hopefully I have better luck with it

 

That's good you got your new adapter. Mine just screwed right on.

 

Lol Darling, now that I get to that step, I know what you're talking about with the clips. I'm almost tempted to cut 1 of them off cuz its giving me a hard time

 

You don't need them really...but that's up to you. Just think of it as weight reduction, lol.

 

Lol weight reduction and bulb swap all at once! Only the left side clip by the steering wheel was the pain. The right one didn't really cause any trouble so I left it there.

I completed the swap earlier. Thanks for the help Darling and Specter for the write up. It looks 10 times better.

The turn signal bulbs, which you don't want to replace are not the 2 lowest ones that are running parallel but the 2 above that. So they are the 2 that are on either side of the half circle formed on the cluster to fit the steering wheel. I hope I'm not confusing anyone but I'm just trying to help anyone visualize it if they go to do this LED bulb replacement in the future.
The third one that you don't need replaced is towards the far right top part but not the highest one up. There are 2 bulbs that are close to each other, you want to leave the lower of the two alone. That is the Brights Indicator I believe.

**These views are if you're looking at the bulbs from the back of the cluster. It should be common sense, but I just wanted to be clear.