What you want to match is the resistance of the BULB... not the LEDs... you want to make the LEDs "look" like a bulb, electrically.

 

Yes, simply wiring in parallel makes both the stock bulb and LEDs turn on at the same time. Starting from there, you have a few options. You can let them both turn on, or you can remove the stock bulb and the LEDs will still turn on, or you can add a switch as Steve has done to select between the two.

The built-in resistors are the bring the voltage down to the correct level for the LED. Very few LEDs are designed to run directly from a 12V source. For example if the LED is designed to run at 3V, the inline resistor brings it down from the car's 12V. Otherwise the LED would burn out without the inline resistor.

The parallel resistor is for a different purpose. When the boot light is supposed to be off, in the MINI there is sometimes still a small amount of electricity running through the circuit. It is not enough power to make the stock bulb light up or flicker. However LEDs require so little energy that the low current may be still enough to make them flicker. The parallel resistor is to drain off enough current so that the LEDs won't light up when you expect them to be off.

It's not quite so simple. If you find the matching resistance, you halve the current to the LEDs. Would that be enough? It depends on just how much residual current there is, and how much is needed to make the LED's flicker. I think some trial and error is necessary. If you are using 1K ohm resistors, try anything lower such as 500 or 800 ohm.

The resistance of the bulb is quite low. If you get a resistor that matches, it will get as hot as a bulb would, when the light is on. So, too high resistance and the LEDs continue to flicker, too low and the resistor gets hot when the light is on. You can use any resistance value below where the flickering starts. 1K ohm worked for some people but depending on which type of LED and how many you use, you may have to use a lower value resistor.

 

Does anyone know how to re-wire those flex strips? I have some left over bits, and would like to re-wire them. I tried, but that ended in epic failure. lol

 

Never heard of it being done successfully....

 

Basically the stock bulb is absorbing any residual current that is passing through the circuit in the stock setup correct? And because LED's take so little power to light the resistor acts as the bulb to soak up any residual current? So how come if 1000 ohms is not enough resistance to stop the current then a lower number would be? shouldn't I increase the resistance if the 1000ohms isn't enough? what about the wattage? the ones I'm using are 1/2 watt but I know they make other ratings.

 

No... the resistor you're adding is in PARALLEL to the LEDs. Its job isn't to "stop" the current. Its job is to act as a lower-resistance path for the current, so the current flows through the resistor, not through the LEDs. But it has to be high-enough resistance so that when you turn the current all the way up, enough of it still goes through the LEDs to light them (hence, why you can't just put a piece of wire across there... the LEDs would never light up then...)

BTW - I think I'm using 1K Ohm, 1Watt resistor in mine.

 

so I went to Radio Shack...UGH!! and picked up some 680 ohm 1/2 watt resistors. One of the sales guys (actually he was assistant manager) asks me if I need help so I decided to tell him what problem I was having and we started talking. Well he tells me I should take the resistor out completely. He then goes into this analogy about cars going into a tunnel and if they all go into one tunnel then the other tunnel is empty. I think he was trying to relate traffic with resistance....I dont know. So in the process of trying the 680 ohm resistor I decided to hook everything back up without a resistor just for the hell of it. Well then it was flickering constantly the whole time the car was running. Worse than what it was doing before! So I soldered the 680 ohm in and it does the same thing that the 1000 ohm was doing so I guess I need a lower resistance. I guess the next step is 500 and I just continue to go lower and lower either until the flicker stops or the LED's dont light up anymore then I know I've been defeated and the flicker cannot be stopped!!!!

 

Man, I just threw the rest of my package out. Crap. Otherwise I'd be able to get you the information on those...

 

Assuming that you picked up a package with more than one resistor, just double up 2 resistors in parallel, which will halve the ohm value. Or rig up in parallel any combination of the resistors you currently have to adjust the resistance. It will look ugly but electrically the same as a single resistor.

 

oh crap no way!?? That's great info to know so I can take first try two 1000's giving me 500 and if that still doesn't work then I can take two 680's giving me 340. Sweet!! Thanks for the help rkw....AGAIN So I should just take two resistors and line them right up next to each other and that will halve the resistance...ok sounds good I'll give that a try and report.

Steve

 

I know its been a while, I'm a big procrastinator but I finally got around to putting some more resistors in.....well I put 4 count 'em 4 680 ohm resistors in parallel and still the flickering continues. I'm really about to give up. I took a few pictures to help you all see what I've got going on and maybe you can help me out a little bit MORE cuz you all have already helped so much!

Here's the pictures:

And the whole circuit


With 4 680 ohm resistors wired in parallel that give me a total of 85 ohms which is considerably less than you guys running a single 1K ohm so what gives???
Tell me what you guys think......please

Steve

 

The resistors are correctly wired, but it is difficult to make out the rest of your circuit. Can you post a circuit diagram of how everything is connected together?

As a sanity check, I suggest that you check how it behaves if you connect the LEDs (with resistors) directly to the 12v/ground.

 

Ok I edited the second picture to give some more details. Essentially I took the factory + and - circuit, took the positive from the car and ran it directly to the switch. From the switch, one positive went to the phono plug for the LED's and the other went to the factory boot lamp. Factory ground was snipped and spliced into two wires. One to the negative side of the phono plug the other to the boot lamp. Switch just directs power either to the LED's or factory boot lamp depending on what position its in. I'll try and draw up a circuit and upload it later but that's about as detailed as it can get. Its not a very complex circuit, just spli the power between the factory boot lamp and LED plug via a switch.

 

Here's a little diagram I drew up in MS Paint...the symbols probably aren't electrical standards so I labeled everything to avoid confusion.

 

It looks correct to me, and a mystery why it's still flickering.

Just for grins, try sticking a wire jumper between the two outer terminals of the switch. The bulb and LED should turn on and off together. If the LED still flickers, I'm stumped.

 

I wired all my LED's in both my car and my dads car directly to the oem bulb cradles and I have no flickering at all. (and no resistors) Why do some peoples flicker?

 

I don't get flicker in my car either. There seems to be some variation between individual cars. When the light is supposed to be off, on a MINI there may still be a tiny amount of residual current in the circuit. It isn't enough to make a regular bulb light up, but may be enough to make a sensitive LED flicker. Did you leave any of the oem bulbs mounted? That could prevent flickering.

 

Oh I see so basically have both light up at the same time....ok and I'm gonna try you're other suggestion of just wiring the LED's directly to + and - and see what happens then...although I would think they are just going to behave like everyone else's as that is how you all have them wired up. Just a side note I put two other LED strips in my footwell's and no flickering whatsoever from them...just the boot.

 

I'll go take a look at mine to see if I can help. I removed my bulb from the stock boot light, and put the resistor in there. Then the positive and negative wires that go to my jack for the LED lights, are directly soldered to the ends of the bulb holder for the stock boot light. Does that make any sense? I need to locate my compactflash camera stick, and then I can take a picture for you. I have no flickering by the way...

 

yeah well that's what everyone has done so far in this thread.....Mine is a little different as I tried to retain the factory bulb for times when the rear shelf is out of the car. I incorporated a switch, as you can see in the diagram, that allows me to "switch" between the factory boot lamp and the led's on the rear shelf, problem is I get a little flicker at start up for about 4-5 seconds that I can't seem to get rid of. The resistor in the boot lamp prevents the LED's from flickering constantly while the car is ON. Mine don't do that so I know its working up to that point. But they do flicker on start up for a few seconds and then stop. So i'm just trying to figure out how to stop that initial start up flicker and then I'm good to go.

Steve

 

Just thinking...Why don't you set your up as others have, but instead of removing the bulb, keep it in there with the resistor? You should have both lights functional and when you disconnect the LED's, the original bulb would still work. Just thinking...

 

Yeah that's an idea. You're saying have the factory boot lamp and the LED light at the same time and when I take the shelf out the boot lamp will still work? Yeah that's a thought I was just trying to be a little different and wire it up the right way but its looking like that's not possible I also think if you leave the factory bulb in place there is no need for the resistor as that is what its purpose is for...to take the place of the bulb (which is a natural resistor in and of itself). Thanks for the idea's though...much appreciated

Steve

 

Correct, you shouldn't need the resistor(s) with the bulb in place. You had the right approach. I'm an engineer and I don't see why it didn't work. If you have a meter and want to go any further, it would be interesting to see how much voltage is there when the LEDs are flickering. It may be at an unusually high level in your car.

 

Yeah well first I'd like to apologize to everyone in this thread that has helped me along with my little dilemma all this time. Ok don't ask me why I never did it, but I didn't so just accept it!! Tonight after some talk with a friend of mine and thinking about what you all said here I just for the heck of it flipped the switch from the LED strips to the boot lamp before I turned the car on....well the results were very disheartening. Turns out the boot lamp bulb flickers just like the LED's do. Now I'm thinking either I did something to my BCM while wiring up this whole setup or the boot lamp has always done it since new and I never noticed it because, who actually pays attention to that little bulb during start up. I cant go to the dealership with it cuz they're gonna say I did something to it when I wired up my LED's so I'm faced with a problem. I know that the BCM overall is functioning properly because I have no other symptoms from any other parts of the car that it controls but there could be a problem with whatever part of the BCM controls the boot lamp. Everything else controlled by the BCM is working fine, but this flickering obviously is not just related to the LED's, it's something in the wiring. So again my apologies to everyone, I should have tried this along time ago, and I can't explain why I didn't. Anyone got some ideas with this new problem? I could try starting over with just the factory wiring and see if the boot lamp flickers, if not then I know its somewhere in my wiring. If it does still flicker I either have a problem in my cars wiring or the BCM. What do you think?

Steve

 

Ok so I realize that this thread is over 2 years old and Vernon you have probably accepted the flicker or sold the car. I am no electrical genius but it could very well be your switch causing the problems. Have you tried a new switch? And if it wasn't your switch, I would try rewiring back to OEM and see if it flickers on start up. If it does the only 3 reasons i can think of would be what "rkw" said about your car having a peculiar case of higher voltage, something wrong with the BCM, or the car starting up causes the voltage to increase for a very brief moment and causes the flicker.