05 Focus Lx Window Switch Illumination

[GRAHAM46]

Greetings.

The lighting on my electric window switches and the door mirror control is dismal you almost need a torch to see them in the dark. Is it possible to replace them or upgrade them to LEDs.

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[JW1982]

On the Focus MK2/MK2.5 all switches and panels are illuminated by LED's. Some of them are normal top LED's but the majority are SMD LED's which are soldered on the circuit board.

If you want to make the illumination of the switches brighter you have to replace the LED's by brighter LED's. It also might be necessary to change the resistors on the circuit board for resistors that match the new LED's. As long as you have some soldering skills this can be done without any problems

[GRAHAM46]

Thanks for replying. I feared it wouldn't be as simple as popping in an led in place of an old fashioned bulb.

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[Russ]

Assuming you have turned the rheostat up full?

[Stoney871]

Assuming you have turned the rheostat up full?

A rheostat (dimmer switch) if fitted doesn't alter the window switch brightness.

The switches are dim but I never found that a big problem, once you are used to their location you don't really look when operating them.

[GRAHAM46]

My car doesn't have one to turn up. It's not a big problem as you say I know where they are and my hand finds them automatically, I just thought if it was an easy job I'd give it a go.

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[Stoney871]

Maybe a bit of judicious scraping over the decals could increase the light's brightness?

[JW1982]

In my opinion the red illumination of the late MK2 and MK2.5 is a bit brighter than the green illumination of the early MK2.

[GRAHAM46]

I've just come back from a trip to a country pub for a family meal. It's completely dark on the road back and I looked at the mirror controls and the window switches and you can hardly see them to be honest. I might have to consider doing something with them. I did wonder if swapping the light switch to a switch with the rheostat included would make a difference? I should have taken a quick picture but it never crossed my mind until now and I'm not getting out from under the duvet now.

[Stoney871]

As I mentioned earlier- the window switches do not dim.

Anyhow a dimmer switch would only make them duller not brighter.

[troy45]

I swapped one of the SMD's in my drivers door switch for the passive sensing disable and it wasn't any brighter than the SMD I'd removed.

To get the door lighting working off the main light dimmer switch you'd need to run cabling into the door from one of the feeds out of the dimmer switch. The door illumination feeds all come from the door modules and isn't linked to the dimmer circuit.