Fog/DRL LED's

[amrjon]

Seeking some advise from anyne who knows a bit about LED's

I was just about to buy these high intensity LED 'bulbs' for the DRL/Fog lights,

but then I also saw these.

Anyone out there know the difference between a
1W High Power LED (Xenon White), and a "18" SMD LED?????

The 2nd ones aren't the correct HB4 fitting in the pic but the listing says they are available.

Also saw some non-led ultra-white halogens that claim to be >100W output but thinking that may be too bright for the fogs?

has anyone tried either of these?

first ones above,

2nd ones

 

[Maverick]

Seeking some advise from anyne who knows a bit about LED's
Anyone out there know the difference between a
1W High Power LED (Xenon White), and a "18" SMD LED?????

The 2nd ones aren't the correct HB4 fitting in the pic but the listing says they are available.

The 18 SMD LED uses conventional surface mounted led's shaped like a globe.

The other unit is a 1watt luxeon style emitter facing outwards.

Both of these will perform poorly because the fog light is designed for a incandescent globe and the reflector won't work well with other types of globe.

The same applies to the LED brake light replacements, they all perform poorly because of the shape of the reflector.

Where LED and Luxeon/CREE/etc style units do perform well is where the light fitting is designed for them. For example the OEM LED brake light units.

In other words don't buy them, you'll be wasting your money on what are often poorly made units (no properly voltage regulation, poor soldering and so on) that may look bright but actually put out substantially less lumens and do nothing.

 

[amrjon]

Thanks for that Maverick,

so you dont think even the 2nd one that throws some light sideways would work with the reflector?

How about that 3rd one then, which is an incandescent with a whiter colour and higher output?

 

[Maverick]

Thanks for that Maverick,

so you dont think even the 2nd one that throws some light sideways would work with the reflector?

How about that 3rd one then, which is an incandescent with a whiter colour and higher output?

The one that throws light sideways may work a little better but you still have the reflector design and much lower light output to contend with. Pretty worthless IMO.

The 100W+ unit (assuming that it uses 100W+) will probably end up melting your wiring loom and light housing. If it's a 55w that puts out over 100w+ I'd love to know how it does it!

 

[amrjon]

I'm going to give those 2nd ones above a go.
Not dismissing your comments Maverick, they may well turn out to be a waste of $, but at $30 I don't mind giving them a go.
Even the originals put out so little light, I think these lights are more about being seen than lighting the way, so I'm hoping that these might look OK.
I'll see how they turn out.

 

[SevenW]

LEDs will throw a bulb out code, on your MFD.

 

[amrjon]

I 'think' these may be designed not to (include resisters) but we'll see

 

[amrjon]

Update after install

Well the LED fogs are now in, along with some matching LED parkers.

Seven was right, the car detects both the leds as lights 'not working'.

In the case of the parkers, the lights are shut down a couple of seconds after the fault is detected, the fogs stay on, but the light warning light stays on the dash.

Both were fixed with the addition of resistors in parallel with the bulbs. The resistors are sized to create a similar load to the original bulb, and everything works well once the resistors are installed.

Its pretty hard to get a pic that shows what they look like, but I’m pretty happy with them. They do bugger all in terms of casting any usable light in front of the car, but they are very ‘visible’ (if that makes sense) and not only from straight in front, the Leds work Ok with the reflector to still be very visible from a fair angle too.

Anyway, here’s a couple of pics to try and give you some idea what they look like. Theres not editing on the pics, the first one makes them look possibly a bit brighter than they actually are to they eye.

 

[srbsta]

that looks awesome....i want hahah

 

[revdes]

Isn't that illegal?

 

[amrjon]

why would it be? it's a less powerful bulb in a standard light?

 

[funny]

Might be "technically" illegal as the colour temperature falls outside aussie light specs for what is considered "white" light.

 

[amrjon]

really? aren't they the same colour as HID xenon?
I dont have the colour specs, but many of these LED's are advertised as a colour match for those?

 

[funny]

Sorry should have been *might* be illegal.
It's why some lights that you can buy are illegal for use on the road (off road ok) due to the type of light output. Lots of the "xenon-match" lights are so far into the blue they aren't even visibly white!