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I want to rig up a tail/brake light on my 05 200 with standard lighting coil (40 watts ?).

I have a Fredette brake light kit that feeds the tail light 1 watt and bypasses the resistor (?) with 10 watts thru the brake switch. I also have a 3 wire socket for a standard 1157 bulb that will fit in the stock rubber mount with some work. The 1157 blub is stamped SE-12V-P21/5W E19 2K2. Is that 2.2, 5, or 26 watts? I can use an LED bulb that claims to draw 1W and be 50% brighter.

Is the stock 10W bright enough for a brake light or should I rewire and use an LED?

I can't offer any advice on the Fredette Kit, though I'm sure it will work just fine with the stock setup.

What I did was to modify the stock housing to take a cheapo 1157 housing. I put an LED in there for a couple reasons. Number one being a standard 1157 bulb would draw too much juice and make all the lights dim when you hit the brakes. Second, I couldn't get a filament bulb to last more than a couple rides. My neck of the woods is rocks, rocks, more rocks and tree roots. The bike takes a pounding and a filament just doesn't stand a chance. I put a hydraulic pressure switch in the front brake line (wouldn't clear the reservoir in the back brake). I split the hot wire going to the tailight and ran one lead through the pressure switch and back to the tailight. This became the brake light. The other line stayed the same for the tailight. The LED draws about 1W. Setup has been working great for a couple thousand trail miles now. Haven't had to replace the LED yet (knocking on wood).

Hope this helps.

OverTheHill wrote:I want to rig up a tail/brake light on my 05 200 with standard lighting coil (40 watts ?).

I have a Fredette brake light kit that feeds the tail light 1 watt and bypasses the resistor (?) with 10 watts thru the brake switch. I also have a 3 wire socket for a standard 1157 bulb that will fit in the stock rubber mount with some work. The 1157 blub is stamped SE-12V-P21/5W E19 2K2. Is that 2.2, 5, or 26 watts? I can use an LED bulb that claims to draw 1W and be 50% brighter.

Is the stock 10W bright enough for a brake light or should I rewire and use an LED?

The OEM lighting coil is generally considered to be 45 watts. I've never put a rheostat (load) on the output and monitored the system with a meter to determine exactly what mine puts out. It will vary from machine to machine I'm sure....flux densities, coil proximity and such being things that would make a difference.

1157 is the base type. Whatever voltage bulb you use that fits it is pretty much up to you. Your description is of a 21watt/7watt brake/tail bulb. Well...considering that it's wired it that way. ;)

Re: 'Is the standard 10w...'
I presume you mean for use with the resistor setup? It could work fine with the proper choice of resistor..and if FRP sells it as a brake light kit, I'd expect it to be suited for that purpose. It'll work fine.

Re: 'Should I use an LED...'
The less watts on the backside the better from the standpoint of a 'better' headlight.


Maybe it's just the quality of junk I found available, but I've not had a lot of luck keeping an LED in my bike. They fall apart.

Mine works great...cost? about $70... LED, switch and rewire if you already have the MX fender.
Looky in the gallery too. If your interested, I'll tell ya how to do it.

Here's a reference thread...

http://kdxrider.net/forums/viewtopic.ph ... d+tailight

If you are looking for just an LED bulb to replace the 1157, here is the place to go. They make replacement bulbs for just bout any automotive bulb curently used. Tends to be good stuff as well.

http://www.ledtronics.com/

Vince, you epoxy floor looks like mine.

Mark

Sorry to get off topic, but Mark W, what do you mean by epoxy floor? What did you do to your garage floor? I have seen the Rust-Oleum epoxy shield floor kits at Lowe's and have wondered about them.

Thanks.

Look at mine... that's about 1 1/2 years use. It has to be at least 1/4 thick to be any good.

What product did you use? I can't seem to work on anything in the garage without spilling some kind of grease or oil.

That's part of the problem. Unless you use it on virgin concrete... the stuff is useless. I think it was a rustoleum product. I talked to the guys who do it here at Cat and they said fresh concrete only.

I'm not sure if this is relevant but I thought I'd chuck in my 2 cents.....

I help a friend paint his garage floor a few years ago. We used a paint made for painting the bottom and walls on inground pools. We hit the concrete floor well with a high pressure washer and let it dry for 2 days. We applied the paint with big fluffy rollers and gave it 2-3 coats letting it dry completely in between coats. It is still unmarked to this day (not including burnouts). He parks his car in there everyday and it has only worn very faint tyre marks after about 4 yrs.

I kept blowing tail light bulbs also. What I have done to correct this is using a silicone around the gap of the tail light assembly. Take the Red cover off and you will see the gap. Now, this gap moves, shakes, whatever. Fill the baby up with silicone and let it sit overnight. Put the bulb, red lens back on and go ride. It has been 6 months since my last bulb change. Just my 2 cents

Yeah...the rubber mounties (no offense to our Canuck friends!) get wallered out quick.

I took mine out, spaced them with 'properly' sized washers. Same effect. Kept the tallight assembly from bouncing around so much.

I tried the same as you CC, but One bolt just spins in the lighting assembly, so I couold not get off w/o busting something. See silicone is just not for implants

waking up this thread...

I'd like to turn my stock tail light into a tail/brake light. (without having to add a fender/light extension) Was there ever much sucess with the fredette brake light kit / 1157 / led idea?

What other successful mods have there been?

I'd like to use an led if they are giving good results.

And, I guessa are you guys just using 1156/1157 leds from the auto parts place?

Thanks!

If you want to keep your original rear light but use a good quality LED for brake/running light here is what I have found to work perfectly:

We have used them in KLX 650/250/300 which all use the same light as KDX200/220. I never needed in my KDX as I went with a MX rear fender and a DRC edge tallight to make it road legal. This is a popular kit for XR650 as well and I have never seen one burnt out. Can be found at wheeling cycle supply.

I'll jump in with my 2 cents. First off, my bike had a Baja designs kit on it when I bought it with a MX fender, BD LED tail light, and rear hydraulic swith that he had jerry rigged on. The tire rubbed a hole in the brake line my first ride on the bike.

I fixed the line and made an ugly bracket to hold the reservoir and line out of the tire's way. You have to bend the reservoir bracket out of the way to clear the pressure switch properly. It looks like hell, but is under my frame guards and has worked fine with much recent abuse.

I don't know about the stock setup, but if you can get an 1157 in there, try to get at least a 3 watt rather the cheaper "cluster" style you'll find at the auto parts stores as they are not very bright behind a lense in my experience.

I've been running a 3 watt red 1157 LED (PN Red 1157-RLX3 ) from Superbright LEDs on my Husaberg for a couple of years with no issues, and it's much brighter than your standard cluster LED bulbs, but not quite as bright as the stock incandescent. They now make brighter 4 and 5 watt bulbs which I plan to try if mine ever fails.
http://www.superbrightleds.com/cgi-bin/ ... 71639.6647

Re: 'Was there ever much sucess with the fredette brake light kit / 1157 / led idea?'

The Fredette brake light kit doesn't have anything to do with an 1157. It runs with the OEM 1156. It works as originally stated: '..feeds the tail light 1 watt and bypasses the resistor (?) with 10 watts thru the brake switch.'

I don't know about the power figures noted...but it is a resistor/switch by-pass setup.

I would doubt such a setup would work with an LED. The reduced voltage through the resistor probably won't light the LED for the taillight part of it.

The resistor is on the return side of the lamp socket, btw, NOT the hot side.

This is all making my head hurt . I have the problem of over-reasearching something to death just to save $5. So.....I just went to procycle.com and ordered:

KDX light housing that includes the 1157 socket

hydraulic brake light switch

1157 led bulb

The guy there seemed quite knowledgable about the bike. He said all I need to do is follow the wiring instructions and I'll have a functioning "stock" tail/brake light. I'll update everyone once it get's put on the bike. Thanks to everyone that took the time to reply.

Sorry. I do tend to beat some things quite to death..if I don't pick 'em to pieces first.

Your first post on the subject did put some things together that don't go together...so I didn't know what you knew, didn't know, or what direction you were heading.

The basics of what you mention will work fine..room for the switch probably being the biggest question.

Probably more than $5 over what a simple resistor/switch setup would cost...but it should work a good bit better, too.

Take some before/after pics!

canyncarvr wrote:
I didn't know what you knew, didn't know, or what direction you were heading.

Don't worry...I didn't either Was trying to piece together this rear light project but you know how posts go....there usually isn't one post that is perfect.

I hope I've got it figured out now. I'll be glad to post up some picks in the next week.