LED headlight upgrades - any reccommendations?

[phutyle]

Originally Posted by Bendolfc

phutyle, can you park 25 foot from a wall and take a picture of the beam pattern?

I'll head out to Tesco after sunset tonight and try. I'd be interested to see what the thoughts are on it myself.

Edit: This thread has a pic from a Mini with the H4 version of the bulbs. Not what I have, but I thought I'd share for what it's worth:

http://www.mini2.com/forum/second-ge...ml#post4441151

[yannickc]

Originally Posted by phutyle

I'll head out to Tesco after sunset tonight and try. I'd be interested to see what the thoughts are on it myself.

Edit: This thread has a pic from a Mini with the H4 version of the bulbs. Not what I have, but I thought I'd share for what it's worth:

http://www.mini2.com/forum/second-ge...ml#post4441151

The mini is using reflectors. This is no compare to the lens headlight like a v50,c30,...
For this cars you just get a nice perfect line. no blur.

[phutyle]

Originally Posted by yannickc

The mini is using reflectors. This is no compare to the lens headlight like a v50,c30,...

Doh, of course! Not thinking when posting...

[phutyle]

Originally Posted by Bendolfc

phutyle, can you park 25 foot from a wall and take a picture of the beam pattern?

So I'm a couple of hundred miles from home and not familiar with walled public places here that are open and safe at 10.30 pm. Local Tesco car park, it turns out, is surrounded by shrubbery. So here's the best I can do at the moment:

Exposure on brightest point:


Zoomed:


Normal exposure:

[LizardOfBodom]

Originally Posted by phutyle

So I'm a couple of hundred miles from home and not familiar with walled public places here that are open and safe at 10.30 pm. Local Tesco car park, it turns out, is surrounded by shrubbery. So here's the best I can do at the moment:

+1 for request to see it on the plain wall if possible, but tbh it doesnt look too bad at all on those shrubs :} \_\_ pattern pretty well kept and light is exactly where it suppose to be.
Really interested to see wall pic now.

EDIT - btw, I think it is important to emphasize - phutyle has facelifted model. That mean the projector lenses are PLAIN, not frosted, as on pre-FL models and hence by design, are better designed to handle bulbs with brighter output (like xenons or LEDs). 2005-2008 cars, like mine did, have frosted lenses that disperse the light more and may create more unwanted light floods. The fact that beam looks good on his installation does not mean it will look good on pre-FL frosted lens. So anybody please consider this before jumping to conclusions.

[phutyle]

I might be in an indoor car park later on, I'll see if I can find a free wall. Otherwise it may be the weekend when I get home before I get another chance, as I have a few other things going on at the moment (Dad in hospital).

As an aside...

Back home I do two 30 km clear motorway commutes a day, so I have no DPF issues (I've the infamous 109hp 1.6D engine), but I've been in Dublin for the past 2 weeks and only doing very short journeys in traffic. So last night I decided to do a run out the M1 to give the DPF a bit of a clear. Just as I got onto the M1 (still in the 80 km/h zone), I suddenly lost all boost - putting the foot down did absolutely nothing. I was out in the 3rd lane in fairly heavy traffic, and actually had to check to see if the engine was still running at all. I managed to limp back to base.

My laptop with Vida is at home but luckily I had a wi-fi OBDII dongle in the boot and DashCommand on the phone. A quick scan showed DPF regen failure codes. Cleared the codes and boost came back. Ran out to Laytown at 120 km/h in 4th gear (revs at 3K), and checked the scanned for codes again - all was clear. Checked again today and still all clear and everything running fine. Lucky I had the dongle with me and was able to sort it out, as I don't really have time to be finding a mechanic here, and need to get back home to Co. Clare later in the week. But the LED dips worked well on the backroads around Laytown, so that's something!

[LizardOfBodom]

Ah, joys of diesels... :/ I always keep OBD dongle on glove box aswell, good you had it handy. If it happens again, do 2 quick runs trough M50 at midnight and you should be sorted in 20 mins :P

[phutyle]

Found a wall:

[T5R92011]

Personally, I will be installing an HID kit (along with the mentioned SKBOWE PWM filters) in my facelift S40.

Having read through the reasons as to why HIDs are not designed to run on the Halogen circuit on these cars (and having naively fitted an HID kit myself years ago and having it spectacularly fail), I wouldn't do it again without running them with the SKBOWE PWM filter.

With the S40/V50/C30/C70, we're lucky to have headlamps that can very easily taken apart and uprated. Personally, I wouldn't go for LED bulbs as the amount of times an LED bulb has failed or starts flickering is annoying given they're supposed to last about 15 years. LED bulb circuitry also gets very hot, so I think these bulbs aren't the best option for aftermarket installation.

HIDs with clear lenses are pretty epic even by todays standards, so that's ultimately what I'd go for now.

Below is an interesting comparison between the OEM LED Headlamp option, vs OEM HID Headlamp option on a Porsche 911. The guy tests the brightness between the two using a light meter:

+ YouTube Video

[Bendolfc]

phutyle, thanks for the pics, whilst the pattern isn't perfect, it is miles better than what I got from a cheapo set in my pre FL car.

As for heat, I don't think the modern LEDs circuitry is too bad, the ones I had used the ribbon type heatsink and I stuffed the lot into the unit, it didn't produce excessive heat. The light output was as crap as the halogens though but that may well have been down to them being cheapo LEDs and well worn reflecters given the car had done 180K miles they are well past their best.