Atta boy.....Gave up on words years ago.   

Oh wow, thats justa cool!

I’m sure most Pontiac faithful know some of the history of Pontiac’s red dash lights! They are of legend. And while I can’t find specifically when the first Pontiac used it,  I can’t think of a time they weren’t. Why & where the decision to use red came from I can only speculate! Perhaps Frosty knows? Or can obtain that info, but till then I would argue for my usually reason; the old timers were pretty damn smart. You see, because of the wavelength of red light, it offers some distinct advantages that came in very handy, noticeably so during WWI forward. Red light does not night blind, but all other colors do, but in various degrees depending on their wavelength. This means when you glance up from your gages that are not red your eyes have to adjust to the darker conditions around you. It may only take seconds, but that may be all the difference needed between seeing a deer coming from a darkened area or not! Also when you look forward out the windshield, above the dash, the red lighted dash basically disappears from your peripheral down vision. So you are not distracted by that light. That is not the case with the brighter greenish or blueish etc. dash lights.

Today in cities & most urban areas you don’t really notice the night blindness issue as much as you did 30, 40 or 50 years ago. One, most of these areas are well lit now! Way back even 20 & 30 years a lot of these areas had no lights at all! Yet when they did start to light them they did so with white light. Over time it was realized that the white light not only cased certain visual problems, but we’re less effective! So, do you realize that the principal behind those red dash lights are why most street lights started changing over to amber/reddish street lights we have today. 

Anyway, long way around to my purpose. What light color to use for the sill plates? JustA’s Pontiac down light that I have shining on the front carpet is red! My side dome lights are red! When is red to much red? So take a look & tell me what you think. And it is really hard to get a good representation of what these sill plates look like when lit!

1st, thank you for that bit of very interesting information. With that said I would personally stay with the red. After all the work that has gone into those custom pieces it would be a shame to change the color justa on them and make them look like an afterthought. Justa my 2 cents bro. Again, amazing work Last Indian.

By the way, I wish I had that knowledge a couple weeks ago... when I changed every light inside my car except the bright light indicator to BLUE. The bright light indicator stayed red since it was already red. 

That’s epic! Always wondered about the red. 

i am a blue boy Last Indian !!! ...BUT 

my call is RED !!! it pops 

Me N Santa votin red.   Blue is lookin a LIL Disco

HEY, I went with blue!!! 

Well right now with the car up for winter I can’t really get the doors open wide enough to take the old sill plates off. But this is the red interior they would get added to.

 

i vote red. Blue lights scare me lol

On 12/21/2023 at 11:00 AM, Wrongway said:

HEY, I went with blue!!! 

https://video.search.yahoo.com/yhs/search?fr=yhs-reb-ext_onelaunch&ei=UTF-8&hsimp=yhs-ext_onelaunch&hspart=reb&p=john+travolta+santa+commercial&type=0_1001_101_6434_101_230517#id=2&vid=1a8340d6ff2b4516d41108c7a31cd1ee&action=click

Ohhh hell yeah. I've never been a disco man myself but damn that man CAN dance!

That said I did go with blue lights, and I do have a couple of special touches with purple crushed velvet hidden in the car. 

   Originally I was thinking red, but after seeing the pictures with blue and the red Indian I am leaning more toward that. It is reminiscent of the old Pontiac signs, red neon against a dark blue porcelain background. Just my 2 cents.

On 12/20/2023 at 8:21 PM, Last Indian said:

I’m sure most Pontiac faithful know some of the history of Pontiac’s red dash lights! They are of legend. And while I can’t find specifically when the first Pontiac used it,  I can’t think of a time they weren’t. Why & where the decision to use red came from I can only speculate! Perhaps Frosty knows? Or can obtain that info, but till then I would argue for my usually reason; the old timers were pretty damn smart. You see, because of the wavelength of red light, it offers some distinct advantages that came in very handy, noticeably so during WWI forward. Red light does not night blind, but all other colors do, but in various degrees depending on their wavelength. This means when you glance up from your gages that are not red your eyes have to adjust to the darker conditions around you. It may only take seconds, but that may be all the difference needed between seeing a deer coming from a darkened area or not! Also when you look forward out the windshield, above the dash, the red lighted dash basically disappears from your peripheral down vision. So you are not distracted by that light. That is not the case with the brighter greenish or blueish etc. dash lights.

I can indeed answer that question Last Indian.

The first production use of red dash lights on a Pontiac was the 1979 Tenth Anniversary Trans Am (sometimes referred to as the TATA). They were not available on any other Pontiac that year. They finally became standard on all Firebirds in 1982 (with the 3rd generation Firebird). They were later integrated into all other Pontiac models during the 1980's. Interesting to note that the 2004-2006 GTO does not have red dash lights since it was built in Australia.

Edited December 27, 20232 yr by Frosty

How in the heck did you know that!  Seriously though, your knowledge never ceases to amaze me Frost one.

On 12/27/2023 at 9:21 AM, 31pontiac said:

   Originally I was thinking red, but after seeing the pictures with blue and the red Indian I am leaning more toward that. It is reminiscent of the old Pontiac signs, red neon against a dark blue porcelain background. Just my 2 cents.

I agree with you 31, but everyone seems to like red! Although I would say as I did before, that what these look like in person is much different in the pictures. That said I still have a long way to go before I’m done. Still have the other side to do, plus the two back sills which will be different, but I don’t know how yet. And of course there is still some playing around to do!

On 12/27/2023 at 3:40 PM, Frosty said:

I can indeed answer that question Last Indian.

The first production use of red dash lights on a Pontiac was the 1979 Tenth Anniversary Trans Am (sometimes referred to as the TATA). They were not available on any other Pontiac that year. They finally became standard on all Firebirds in 1982 (with the 3rd generation Firebird). They were later integrated into all other Pontiac models during the 1980's. Interesting to note that the 2004-2006 GTO does not have red dash lights since it was built in Australia.

Thanks Frosty! I could have sworn that I remember way older Pontiac’s having them! Must be olds timers! Or maybe it’s just because I’ve never had anything but red dash lights in anything. As I always change them. That is until the Lacrosse’s! Not even going to attempt that dash! What a nightmare!

On 12/27/2023 at 11:30 PM, Wrongway said:

How in the heck did you know that!  Seriously though, your knowledge never ceases to amaze me Frost one.

I have a lot of Pontiac reference and history books. Plus this particular fact was mentioned by Steve Magnante in an episode of Junkyard Gold.

Finally managed to get at least the aluminum cover plate done for the right side, which is the reverse of the left. All in between 2 solid weeks of multiple fix it projects for the kid, neighbors & ourselves! Just crazy! 
In the process I decided I need to rethink the polycarbonate bottom plate design. So I don’t know what that’s going to look like yet.

Finally settled on a final design. Really impossible for me to capture what it looks like in a darkened room with the camera I have. The LEDs just overpower the light sensor & kind of wash out the color.

Edited February 3, 20242 yr by Last Indian

Lights give it some extra pop! Nice!

Hell yeah Last Indian! Looks amazing bro!

I've said it before and I will say it again, Last Indian has some seriously mad fab skills.

Ok, it might not seem that way, but matching a small right hand facing Indian head to a left hand facing Indian head, might not seem that difficult! Well it’s always a pain to hand make a second piece. And to make a opposite second piece is even a bigger pain. Than the size really complicates it. None the less here they are.

Looks great!!!