OK, so I need some help. I was converting over my interior lighting to LED bulbs and I put one in my center overhead console and it worked fine. So far so good put one in the passenger side map/reading light and it worked wow this is easy! Put one in the driver side and it doesn’t work so I then took them both out and put one in the driver side that didn’t work and it came on so then I put the other one in the passenger side and the driver side wouldn’t work again. When I took the passenger side out and just had one side it would work. Anybody have any idea what’s going on?

** UPDATE. OK kind of weird. I tried it again and they will only come on after I turn the middle center console light on and then they’ll come on and I can turn the center console light out and they’ll work but as soon as I turn them all off, they won’t come on unless I turn the center one on and then off

 

One thing about LEDs is that they have polarity unless they are modified. If one doesn't work one way, turn it around.

 

The circuits were designed for incandescent lights and might need something in their properties to work correctly. As an example, I tried replacing the halogen lamps in a bathroom fixture with LEDs, and everything worked fine as long as I kept at least one halogen in the circuit. Wouldn’t turn on if all the lamps were LED. Turns out that the switch, a dimmer switch, depended on the ability to leak a little current through at least one filament while the lamps were off, to power the switches internal circuits. When using all LEDs (dimmable LEDs), there was no leakage, and the switch wouldn’t function. (Resolved by using a different switch that didn’t require filament leakage.)
If Cee Jay’s polarity trick doesn’t solve the problem, you might need different LEDs.
(Thought there was a thread where someone was successful at using LEDs, and listed the types/brands that were used. Might try searching for that.)

 

As an fyi I wanted to convert all mine interior and exterior to LED lighting, interior worked using the canbus compatible bulbs so thats some advice. however, exterior lighting for indicatiors stop/tail, for etc caused heaps of problems. They worked but caused builb failure on the dash so to the resistance even though were supposed to be canbus compatable so no resistors should be needed and splicing resistors in was going to be a PITA so did not bother. Only one not effected were the side lights in the head lights.

 

so were you able to use LED headlights? Or just the side lights? or did they both work? Thanks.

 

There are the main xenon lights whihc I just replace to xenon ice blue (non led), but headlights, indicators etx were a no, just the 2 side lights which did not cause canbus issues. Interior age no can bus issue and just remembered number plate seemed OK as LED bulbs again canbus compliant.

 

I noticed some interior OE lighting has to do two levels of shine and some led replacements can't do both. I am living with only one led light above the mirror from the previous owner. I guess you explained why.

 

Whenever I got my XKR a few years ago, the original interior lights were yellowed and faded, so I decided to see what it might look like with some LEDs instead.

I installed the blue version of these lights over a year and a half ago under the dash, in the map light area and in the trunk, and haven't had any issues since then.



To CeeJay's point, there was one T10 bulb in particular that didn't work when first inserted, but once I flipped it 180 degrees it immediately worked.

Cheers.