How To: Dismantle and Swap LEDs in a Carling Contura

After a quick internet search on these switches I couldn't find any description of how to change LEDs in these switches and spent a few minutes figuring out how in preparation for my LED swap to take them from OEM orange with green indicators to white with blue. That said I thought I would throw this up in hopes of helping someone else and help me remeber how to do this in a week or two.

Please note that this requires a steady hand and some patience.

Materials:

2 5mm LEDs (One for the face, one for the indicator)
1 small flathead screwdriver, or pocket knife
Tweezers

Step one

Pry up gently on the "wings" as shown to pop them up and allow the two halves of the switch to seperate. Be very careful while seperating the halves there are 3 different springs that could fly/drop out




Step 2:

Remove everything from inside the switch seen below. I tossed in a thumb-tack for scale





Step 3:

Remove the top by gently prying on each side as shown.





Step 4:

Now the fun part, push down from the top on the exposed LEDs to pop them out. They sould come out with a light push with the tweezers.


Step 5:

Bend the leads on the new LEDs to match the stock ones and insert them into ALL the correct slots. (Haven't done this yet, but it should be interesting)

Here is what it looks like:





Step 6:
Begin to reassemble the switch. Start with the metal rocker piece. There is a pad on the bottom of one side seen on the lower end here:



This pad goes in facing down opposite the pad that is inside the switch housing. With the tweezers place the rocker in with the correct orientation so that the slots on the sides pivot on the slot between the two connections and rocks freely.

Step 7:

Gather the springs. Notice that one is longer then the other two. This one goes to the center negative terminal on the side that faces up when installed (#8). The other two go in as shown into terminals 7 and 10. Before you put them in however slide a resistor down each slot (little black thingy). This is what you should have:





Step 8:

Pop the top of the switch back on.


Step 9:

Now pick up the white rocker with the wheel on the bottom. There is a female end on the top which mates to a male end on the bottom of the switch. Put them together and orient everything as shown:



Check that the top of the switch is facing terminals 7and 8 and that the wheel is on the same side as the metal rocker.


Step 10:

Carefully put everything together and push the snaps on the wings home.



That's it! If you would like to see how these switches look in our dashes look in my build. A link is provided in my signature below this post.

 

I know this is old, but it helped me out a little bit.
Accidentally pulled one of my switches apart and shit went everywhere.
Cool idea to replace the LEDs.

 

Weird, EXACTY 2 years later someone finally responded in this thread. Great idea OP, I may do this myself since my arb compressor and locker switches have green lights instead of orange.

 

I know this is an old thread, but is it possible to reverse the polarity of the LEDs? I believe it would make it much easier to use as a replacement fog light switch for our trucks.