Last Updated on March 2, 2021
The traditional 12V LED light strips I used for my Main Instrument Panel (MIP) lighting were starting to go out. Sections of 3 LEDs were starting to regularly flicker and it was slowly getting worse, driving me crazy.
As I was looking to buy replacements on Amazon I came across some LED light strips called COB (or Chip On Board) LED light strips. I had never heard of them before. Rather than a light source every inch or so with traditional strips, COB LED strips have a light source at much smaller intervals. In my case, every 1/10th of an inch! That really piqued my interest so I decided to give one a try. Wow, they’re way better.
Traditional LED Light Strip 
COB LED Strips have much more continuous light with LEDs every 1/10th of an inch rather than every inch compare to traditional LED strips. 
You can really see how nice these COB LED strips are by looking just above the MCP at the top of the dash. It looks like one continuous light.
These LED strips come in various voltages and color temperatures but I went with 12V and 2700K temperature. That worked out perfectly, even if the color still wasn’t quite as warm as I was expecting.
The lighting is uniform and even. They cut in sections just like the traditional strips and you solder wire to them the same way. They also dim down well without any noticeable flicker and get very bright. Plus, they look great, too, since you now have one solid strip of light like the real aircraft.
If you’re looking for great under-dash lighting consider taking a look at these COB strips. Note, they’re a bit more expensive (2 to 3 times the cost), but worth the money based on my experience so far.
1 comments
Thanks for pointing to these LED strips!
I have traditional LED strips for backlighting in my sim. While strips in my MIP work fine for 10 years so far, the strips from another batch in overhead started to fail after a year and I had to replace them all.
Next time (if I need to do it again) I will get COB strips.
Nick