OEM LED Tail Lights - 4 LED's stopped working yesterday. Help!

Hello,

First time poster here. Hope someone has some insight. I have had a set of these Valeo/OEM LED Tail lights from ECS Tuning on my MkV GTI for about two years.

http://www.ecstuning.com/Volkswagen-Golf_V--2.0T/Lighting/Tail_Lights/ES10177/

Yesterday, four of the LED's on the outside circle stopped working. I had a look at the housing and it doesn't look like individual diodes can be replaced. Can these lights be repaired or does this mean I have to buy a whole new set? I can't seem to find anywhere that sells driver or passenger side lights individually so having to splash another $439 for a whole new set just because of four diodes in a large cluster have failed is going to hurt a bit.

Any help or insight would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

I have never seen the back side of the OEM led tails, but if you can get inside them, there is a good chance you can fix it if you have some DIY skills. It is common for a group of 3-4 leds to be wired together and share one resistor. In that fashion, there are probably 20+ groups of 3-4 leds in that circle. What has most likely happened is one LED has failed causing the other 3 LEDs to quit as well (LEDs "never" burn out like regular bulb, but they can malfunction and die, just like any piece of electronics). If that is the case, you would simply need to find the dead LED and replace it. This is most likely easier said than done, but if you can provide pics of it disassembled, I am sure I and other members can help you diagnose the problem.

Thanks for your quick response. I'll try to get some pictures posted later today. The camera on my phone is busted too. Seems like everything is falling apart these days lol.

I had the same issue when I had the OEM Valeo LED tails. First it was 2 amber led's then eventually over 6 months almost all the amber blinker LED's failed. When that happened it started to affect the passenger side tails. I tried VAG COM and all other solutions but they failed to do anything.

Should of have bought them from me

604GTI said:

I had the same issue when I had the OEM Valeo LED tails. First it was 2 amber led's then eventually over 6 months almost all the amber blinker LED's failed. When that happened it started to affect the passenger side tails. I tried VAG COM and all other solutions but they failed to do anything.

Click to expand...

Yeah I think they are pretty much screwed. It doesn't look like failed diodes are replaceable. Even if I wanted to try and replace the diodes I wouldn't even know where to look for individual replacements, especially since the outer ring matrix has two diodes (amber for turn signal, as you well know, and red) attached to one tiny substrate or board. I don't know the correct term.

The stock lights are on now, I will probably buy another set of LED's at some point but for now there are other mods I want to do and I'm not willing to spend the money on another set at the moment, so stock lights it is. Sad that for $439 they only lasted two years. Especially since part of the motivation for getting them was for their supposed longevity.

cosedsc said:

Should of have bought them from me

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Fetch me the DeLorean, I'll hit 88mph, and you have yourself a deal fine Sir. :wink:

Bummer. You may be able to get a couple bucks out of them if you sell.

Hey,

Me and my friend are having the exact same problem.
Although he has only one led out, I have several on each side. for my case they tend to flicker or be out at different times.

Something I noticed is that when I got them and ran them in the normal all red non euro mode, all the leds worked perfectly. shortly after I did the wiring for the euro amber as did my friend our leds stopped working.

I have reason to believe that the wiring for the amber has something to do with this.
If anyone has any insight on this I would also appreciate it because it sounds to be the same issue.

To the OP i would highly suggest trying to reinstall the tails but remove the wiring for the amber turnnsignals and go back to the all red and see if the leds start working again.
I have a strong feeling this may resolve our problems?
Well, I hope....

Let me know if you end up trying this method and your outcome if so

cosedsc said:

Should of have bought them from me

Click to expand...

Yeah, I bought them from you and both sides of my taillights starting to going off.

MKVLUV said:

Hey,

Me and my friend are having the exact same problem.
Although he has only one led out, I have several on each side. for my case they tend to flicker or be out at different times.

Something I noticed is that when I got them and ran them in the normal all red non euro mode, all the leds worked perfectly. shortly after I did the wiring for the euro amber as did my friend our leds stopped working.

I have reason to believe that the wiring for the amber has something to do with this.
If anyone has any insight on this I would also appreciate it because it sounds to be the same issue.

To the OP i would highly suggest trying to reinstall the tails but remove the wiring for the amber turnnsignals and go back to the all red and see if the leds start working again.
I have a strong feeling this may resolve our problems?
Well, I hope....

Click to expand...

I would be surprised if that is the cause.

I have a suspicion that the fixtures are easily compromised during install by over tightening the plastic nuts.
When I installed mine ages ago, I was really surprised how crazy low the torque spec was
(outers 3.0 Nm aka 26.5 in-lb aka 2.2 ft-lb, inners 3.5 Nm aka 30.9 in-lb aka 2.6 ft-lb)).
Barely finger tight!
Over tightening could cause the plastic to distort, compromising the seal.
From there, all kinds of bad things can happen.

I bought a set of VW oe euro LED Valeo tails from TMtuning December 2007.
Installed them with added wires and amber turn coding from the get go.
4.25 years / 140,000 miles later they continue to operate correctly, no LEDs out.
(Just checked parking lights and flashers to confirm).

Or maybe I'm just lucky :iono:

BTW I have heard it said that the cold diagnostic quick electric pulses
(at startup with lights off) would eventually damage the LEDs.
However, I observed my wife's b6 Passat with factory LEDs has cold diagnostic on from the factory,
so I left mine on too. So far, so good.

No problems with my valeos. Had em for about 3 years. Although I am getting these codes randomly now even though they lights seem to check out fine.

Address 09: Cent. Elect. Labels: 3C0-937-049-23-H.lbl
Part No SW: 3C0 937 049 AA HW: 3C0 937 049 AA
Component: Bordnetz-SG H45 1402
Revision: 00H45000 Serial number: 00000002280687
Coding: A78F0F2700000000002D00002D0000280000FF0F7D0000
Shop #: WSC 08272 444 67021
VCID: 68DF0EAC5B68FA3

Subsystem 1 - Part No: 1K1 955 119 E Labels: 1KX-955-119.CLB
Component: Wischer 260506 020 0501
Coding: 00038805
Shop #: WSC 08272

3 Faults Found:
01501 - Bulb for Blinkers; Rear Left (M6)
012 - Electrical Fault in Circuit - Intermittent
Freeze Frame:
Fault Status: 00101100
Fault Priority: 2
Fault Frequency: 6
Reset counter: 69
Mileage: 96066 km
Time Indication: 0

Freeze Frame:
ON
Voltage: 14.00 V
ON
ON
OFF
OFF
OFF

01505 - Bulb for Blinkers; Rear Right (M8)
012 - Electrical Fault in Circuit - Intermittent
Freeze Frame:
Fault Status: 00101100
Fault Priority: 2
Fault Frequency: 7
Reset counter: 69
Mileage: 96066 km
Time Indication: 0

Freeze Frame:
ON
Voltage: 14.00 V
ON
ON
OFF
OFF
OFF

01800 - Light Switch (E1)
008 - Implausible Signal - Intermittent
Freeze Frame:
Fault Status: 00101000
Fault Priority: 3
Fault Frequency: 3
Reset counter: 68
Mileage: 96089 km
Time Indication: 0

Freeze Frame:
OFF
Voltage: 12.40 V
OFF
ON
OFF
OFF
OFF

The light switch code was thrown when i installed a trigger wire for rear fogs and swapped my city lights euro switch to the "coming home" one.(I know, off topic)

Probably a cold solder joint is causing your problems.

Taking apart the taillights requires breaking the lens off of each assembly. (Not for the faint of heart!) Expect to crack at least one lens…

xola3que said:

Yeah, I bought them from you and both sides of my taillights starting to going off.

Click to expand...

Same.