This post is less of a question, and more of a sharing of my learnings for today... the sub-title could in fact be 'Oh, what an idiot I am?????'.

Recently, I replaced all my dashboard lights in my 1971 series IIa with LED bulbs. What a difference it makes! I can highly recommend this relatively cheap upgrade (see the E10 bulbs at www.LEDlight.com) - I can actually see what speed I'm doing at night now... awesome.

But then my alternator crapped out....

Bugger.

Never mind... I thought that this would be a good time to upgrade my 15ACR alternator to a 17ACR alternator and I bought a new one (not an original Lucas one, just a knock off). I thought that the greater amperage output of the 17ACR would be better now that I had upgraded to a nice big 720CCA battery (because I have a battery powered winch).

But the new alternator didn't charge either... nothing, nada, zip...

Many hours and a lot of colourful language later I realised that replacing the 'charge' light in my dashboard with an LED bulb was the wrong thing to do! An LED bulb does not draw enough amps, and so the alternator thinks that it doesn't need to do anything because it appears to the alternator that there is no draw on the battery.

WHAT A DUFUS!

So, here I am, sharing my embarresing (and somewhat expensive) learning experience with the world in the hope that someone else may learn from my painful experiences and not do the same dumb thing themselves. At the very least, I hope I've given you a laugh (at my expense)!

By all means replace your dashboard lights with LED - it make a great improvement. JUST DON'T REPLACE THE CHARGE LAMP!