How do you know the LED retrofits will glare others, but brighter halogens won’t?
Upgrading halogen to LED headlights
- Thread starter himemsys
- Start date
I recall WAY back getting 90/100W H4's and 100W H1's for my Hella glass headlights. I had to upgrade wiring and connectors but they were nice especially cruising Adirondacks late at night in winter.
I would get flashed randomly especially on hills. The H4 low/high did have the bulb shield in front of bulb.
The bulbs also had the "for off-road use only" on all of them.
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In regards to halogens, all halogen bulbs are limited to a set amount of lumens by law with some +/- deviations allowed, this includes performance halogen bulbs. For example, an H7 halogen bulb under ECE regulations, H7 bulbs must emit between 1350 and 1650 lumens at 13.2v. Under US regulations, H7 bulbs must emit between 1188 and 1512 lumens at 12.8v. A performance halogen bulb (like Philips Xtremevision, Osram Nightbreakers etc) won't go beyond those allowed limits. They'll be more towards the upper limits but they'll never surpass it. Also, performance halogen bulbs are designed to have the filament in the exact same position and spot within the bulb.
An entire halogen headlight assembly is designed around a specific halogen bulb, where that bulb's filament position is crucial for the beam pattern to be compliant, safe for you to drive with and not glare other drivers -- we're talking micrometers amount of precision here. Take a look at an OEM brand halogen bulb one day, you'll see weld points around the base so the filament is in the PERFECT spot when correctly installed. So, when you put a legal brighter performance halogen bulb in there, the filament is in the exact same place as OEM. So you get all the benefits and no negatives (other than bulb life taking a hit).
With the limit being between 1350 and 1660 lumens on the H7 halogen bulb, you're probably wondering what the point of a higher end performance halogen bulb is? It's the beam pattern & focus. The filament on a performance halogen is more tightly wound and is smaller and well within the window area where an OEM filament must be positioned, so you get a tighter beam pattern and more light in important spots within the beam pattern. So like in a 150%+ halogen bulb for example, you're boosting that much extra light within specific points in the beam pattern due to the smaller filament -- so you get a punchier hotstop for distance vision, some goes more towards the sides of your beam for better width and peripheral vision and some goes to improving the sharpness of the cutoff as well. In a sum of all parts, you just get more excellent legal light without blinding others.
PS: The aim of the beam pattern is also just as crucial.
So TL; DR in a nutshell: performance halogen bulbs are using physics and math to improve your ability to see at night without being illegal and blinding to other drivers. The bulbs cost more and the bulbs will burn out faster which would be the big cons.
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BrendanC
$100 site donor 2024
Led lighting in all three vehicles, truck has aftermarket LED projector housings and both accords have OE housings with LED bulbs. i go to a local church, park 20’ away and aim for ~3’ of elevation on cars and 5’ for pickups. never get flashed and can see much better. bonus that they don’t cook the headlight housings and don’t use as much power.
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Everyone should. Getting tired of all these aftermarket bulbs that people install, then have them aimed to the sky. Can't see anything on a dark backroad. I can only just barely see the edge of the road 15ft in front of me until they pass
It's not the LEDs fault that many of the people who install them refuse to aim them properly, you said it yourself " ...then have them aimed to the sky."
I've had my LEDs for several months now, and never flashed once because they were blinding another driver. Maybe that's since I purposely took the few minutes needed to make sure they were aimed correctly.
Blame the person responsible, not the thing.
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I thought if the vehicle already had clear headlight lenses you could just put led bulbs in. Not the older ones with the vertical lines and little teardrops that poke out
BrendanC
$100 site donor 2024
no. you need to properly aim them and use LED bulbs that mimic halogens. not aiming them correctly is why you get blinded by 90’s civics.
The halogen headlights on my old-style Ranger pickup were simply crap. I tried Auxito and Fahren LED replacements in the original housings, which come with cooling fans. Both made a massive improvement over OEM, with a slight edge to Fahren. The only drawback is a slight patchiness to the beam pattern. The reflector in the OEM housing is actually "fabricated" with vertical strips instead of being one continuous piece.
I was also careful to aim the LED headlamps immediately after installation. Very seldom do I get flashed by other drivers when I'm on low beam.
Some of you are fussing that these LED replacement bulbs are "illegal". They might be, but technically so are all the LED replacements for the other incandescent bulbs such as taillights, license-plate lamps, and side-marker lights. I'll bet a lot of you use those LEDs anyway. My truck passes state inspection without any problems with the replacement LED headlamps.
I was also careful to aim the LED headlamps immediately after installation. Very seldom do I get flashed by other drivers when I'm on low beam.
Some of you are fussing that these LED replacement bulbs are "illegal". They might be, but technically so are all the LED replacements for the other incandescent bulbs such as taillights, license-plate lamps, and side-marker lights. I'll bet a lot of you use those LEDs anyway. My truck passes state inspection without any problems with the replacement LED headlamps.
Projector headlights that actually use the lens to focus the light pattern and not just 'kind of direct" the light pattern about where it's supposed to be are ideal for LEDs, as they have a sharp horizontal cutoff that prevents the light from going high enough to blind other drivers.
'Old School' sealed beam housings, designed for halogen bulbs, DO NOT have that cutoff, so the light pattern is not as tightly controlled and the bright-azz LED output will "splash up" into oncoming traffic.
I just wish all the bright lights were banned. And huge tickets given out for using them.
We need the old candle power regulations of the 1950's brought back. On a 2 lane road especially these are very dangerous, and blinding.
People with good night vision hate them, and almost need to use a welding shield type dark glass to prevent the pain they cause.
This also goes for all the laser diodes used for tail lights. No wonder all these TV ads for people with eye problems now.
Back to incandescent please. Just do a bit of study of how detrimental LED's are to eyes.
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So im assuming my 07 dodge I can just put upgraded bulbs in?
If you have projector headlights, use LEDs, if you reflector headlights, get an upgraded halogen light.
Stick to what lighting source was in there. If you want LED/HID do a “proper” projector retrofit or swap in OEM headlamps if they were offered.
Aftermarket Amazon/eBay/Temu/Alibaba LEDs and some OEM installs(mainly trucks) blind others on the road due to glare.
Aftermarket Amazon/eBay/Temu/Alibaba LEDs and some OEM installs(mainly trucks) blind others on the road due to glare.
Times are changing
With cars the wrong direction, just don't ever complain about eye problems when you get older.
I already have to use reading glasses as I type this on my phone. 10 years ago I never needed glassesWith cars the wrong direction, just don't ever complain about eye problems when you get older.
