Is there any available LED substitute for the type of bulb used in MTH Realtrax switches and lockons? Thanks, joe
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I don't know what's in the RealTrax switches, but TrainAidsA has the common bayonet and screw type LED bulbs for use in our trains. They are also rated for 18 volts. I use them in my Lionel lights and bumpers.
Autolumination is another place with a larger selection at a bit more cost. I am not sure they have the 18 volt bulbs? Town & Country hobby is another place that has LED bulbs. I believe they also have 18 volt bulbs. Others here have used these last two sites, I have not. I have only purchased from the TrainAidsA site.
Those bulbs have wire leads like used in Christmas light strings. I figure someone ought to be making them by now but several years ago I couldn't find them and rolled my own though I can't imagine anyone else going through the effort! Detailed how-to described in the O gauge archives here:
http://www.jcstudiosinc.com/OGaugeLEDSwitchLight
Some photos from that writeup showing the 2 style - upward for the switch controller lenses, and side-ward for the switch direction indication and lighted lockons.
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Oh, those lights, I don't think the places I posted have those either. I have looked for them before. Stan2004, not sure I can see well enough to duplicate your project. That does look difficult at best. (I saved your blog link, looks like you have more interesting projects there for me to look at.) 
I did have some yard lights with bulbs like that which I converted to LED. I managed to get a 5mm led in the plastic bulb socket to replace the bulb with no room for anything else. That required a separate external power supply. Probably not easy or practical to do on the switch machine bulbs.
Years ago, when the OGR Forum was hosted on the other server ("eve"?) forum member Daylight_Don (Grabski) posted an example and schematic of a basic LED conversion (LED + rectifier+ resistor) for both the Realtrax switch and controller bulb locations.
I believe that we have not heard from Daylight_Don in some time. Don posted many helpful tips to the forum. I bookmarked some (all lost with the change in servers) and thankfully I printed other very helpful tips. I hope he is well.
Thanks for all the information gentlemen. Looks like I'll be using the original bulbs for a quite a while longer. As Stan says, I can't imagine me going through the effort to make them myself. Still working on converting my passenger cars to LEDs. That's enough for a electronics klutz like me for now. Thanks again. Joe
