I wanted an LED bulb for the glove box.  Much brighter and cooler running than the pale yellow incandescent bulb that was there originally. Yeah, I know, seems simple, right?

So I searched and found a perfect sized bulb from www.LEDLights.com.  The ba9s-5-ultra-bright-smt-led-light seemed to be just what I needed.  BA9 (9mm diameter base), 12 V, white LED, small enough to fit.

I was jazzed when it arrived.  Plugged it in. Nothing.  Nada.  Zip. Checked the fuses – all good.  Put in a ‘regular old bulb’ – it worked. “No way” I thought – “they are not polarized, are they?”.

To my bench supply.  Sure ’nuff, they are polarized.  Ground must be on the barrel and +12v on the tip. Sadly, the Z glove box is the other way around. Go Figure.

So, I decided to try my hand at pulling it apart and switching the polarity. To my delight, by carefully unsoldering at point ‘A’ and confirming the lead is indeed loose, grasp the barrel and the white ring and pull apart in the direction of the arrows. Try to NOT pull on the LED assembly, just on the white ring.   It is a friction fit between the white ring and the barrel.

Solder on a new, longer ‘-‘ wire, bend the + wire around the white ring, push it all together, resolder the ‘-‘ lead at ‘A’ and we’re good to go!

A pain in the ass for a single bulb, but it works, it is bright and I am happy!