Tech Session – LED Lighting for Classic Porsches

by: John Odden
Photos by: Dick Pitman

Region members were provided a very in depth and interesting session on exterior and dash lighting by fellow member Engelbert Meulhaupt. Engelbert has been assembling LED lighting kits to retrofit into classic Porsches for 8 years. He has determined the correct LED for each application. To our amazement, he also has an LED manufacturer producing to his specifications. The kits he provides are all pre- engineered with complete instructions.They are literally plug and play.

We were given demonstrations on the different headlight illumination systems over the many years lighting has evolved. Engelbert has built a Porsche gauge display showing the level of illumination of the original incandescent bulbs and the engineered LED systems. When it comes to taillights, we learned that amber and red must be the color of the LED, not a clear bulb as with used with incandescent lighting combined with a colored lens.