If the same resistor (the coil around the light switch ****) controls the instrument cluster and the Radio and heater panel brightness, why does my radio and heater panel have a much wider range of bright to dark, yet the instrument cluster is only dark to darker.......

 

Have you looked at the colored lenses over the bulbs in your instrument panel? They become opaque over time, causing the panel to become dimmer. Some people solve this by removing the lenses altogether (giving a white lighting to the panel), other remove the lenses and bulbs both and replace the bulbs with dimmable blue LEDs.

 

Hmmm, never thought of that, I'd go with dimmable green LED's if possible. Keep it "stock" ya know....

 

Some go with blue, some with green. There are a number of threads out there on the topic, here's one: https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...sh-lights.html

For myself, I tried the LEDs and wasn't happy with them (not bright enough), so I ended up going back to white bulbs with the colored lenses removed. I don't have the stock blue-green glow, but what I do have are easily readable gauges.

 

Big Blue's gauges are easily readable due to the blue LED's:

 

Those are nice...had mine looked that bright I'd have kept them. Maybe I just had crummy LEDs, but they were barely brighter than the setup I had before I started tinkering. Now that I have white incandescents in there again (without the lenses) I keep them at about 2/3 brightness...bright enough to see the instruments clearly without causing a glare or ruining my night vision.

 

Here's a shot of all of the gauges. I really like them. Plent bright enough to see the gauges, but not so bright they hurt night vision much.

 

Bit of a side note:
Interesting article behind the "science" of cluster colors:

The myth and science behind your gauge cluster illumination color
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Ditto on what Gary said on the blue readability. Just right, IMHO. With freshly painted gauge needles, of course.

 

Interesting read. Thanks.

 

Went with blue in mine too and love it now.

 

Dave - Good pic! I even had my big 24Mp DSLR out and couldn't get it to focus that well.

 

The original filters were blue.

I am a great believer in what you do with your truck is the "right" thing!

 

Gary, here is the photo you took of the dash in my truck after you worked your magic. It was pretty clear. It, too, has blue LEDs.

 

David - That was taken with the little "shop" camera, the old Nikon 990. And it is better than the one I got with the "big" camera.

But, there's a very strong similarity in all of these pic's - blue LED's. I think they look "stock", but then you couldn't hardly see the color of the lights in any of my trucks when I got them, so what do I know?

 

Ordered green ones today, The original digital clock illumination is green, so green dash it is..