Quote:
Originally Posted by arctan
I changed over to LEDs back in February. And, for an Amazon 'Flash' sale, of £24, I'm mostly very pleased. I had nightbreakers previously, at least one would blow within less than a year. The difference is almost 'night and day'.
These bulbs have a single LED per beam- earlier designs had multiple LEDs so multiple light paths, and lots of room for creating dazzle. I've done a quick check 'against a garage wall' and nothing worrying going on. Driving around town and country I've not been flashed by anyone. I don't mind the higher colour temperature- I much prefer it to the ( relative) yellow orange of conventional bulbs.
The drawbacks with the particular LED model I have include:
I had to modify the original Volvo bulb retaining ring, to make it thinner. Almost an excuse to buy me a Dremel! Removing the ring now needs a small screwdriver as a 'drift'. Not a big issue, as I don't remove the bulbs often.
There is a bit of radio interference. On my model year ('97 940), the headlamps are slightly on during the day. At this lower voltage, (poss around 10 volts), the interference is much less. The LED light output is just a little lower in this mode. (I've always driven around with headlights on during the day, a version of Volvo's daylight running lamps, and I have a less visible grey car). I tried different ferrite beads with no joy- this needs in line suppression at least. There are products out there that might resolve this, for a silly price. I could experiment with some components, at low cost- but it's not a big issue.
Annual car test in August was a fail due to these lamps! 9am on a Monday, at a local council centre, probably didn't help either. The sheet said:
Front Headlamp light source and lamp not compatible xenons fitted to OEM headlamp (4.1.4 (c)). It seemed easier not to point out that these where not Xenons! I should have made the effort to put the old bulbs back in beforehand. I have an idea that not all test centres fail people for LEDs?
So. If you are buying LEDs, you'll probably need some that are not as cheap as these! Although they now have four stars plus on Amazon, I'm sure better can be had. The make is Novsight. In spite of the drawbacks, I can't imagine going back to conventional lamps.
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If they're the ones i'm thinking of John, i've got a set of those in the shed. Been sat in thre for a few years now, since i tried them and pulled them out because they wouldn't give a beam pattern. They'll do for when i hook up some extra lighting in the shed.
I tried several sets before i found the ones from powerfuluk.com, since then i've also found these which are the same almost :
https://www.classiccarleds.co.uk/col...nversion-9-32v
However they have CE and RoHS approvals so might be better for anyone who is fussy that way. That said they're the same as the ones i originally bought.
If you look at the link, you'll see why your single LED per beam jobbies didn't work well for the MoT, kind of obvious when you think about it.
