Headlights

[Crew11]

Hi everyone
New to this site , my question is can i put LED bulbs in and will they work the parts store i went too said that on some Fords they will not work?

Thanks Charlie

 

[J_C]

Don't do it! The reflector housing is not designed for LED bulbs so they will not be focused correctly, will cause blinding glare to other drivers, potentially being illegal in many states.

The issue on some Fords is (probably, hard to get into the mind of some random parts store employee based only on what you mentioned) they draw too little current and need a ballast (resistor in parallel) to trick the vehicle into thinking they aren't blown out due to using less current than expected. If you have a high series console option on your vehicle that displays when bulbs are out, you might get an error message due to that, but this vehicle feature was far more common on upper priced models like Eddie Bauer or Limited, than on the sports.

 

[German Engineer]

Hi everyone
New to this site , my question is can i put LED bulbs in and will they work the parts store i went too said that on some Fords they will not work?

Thanks Charlie

I upgraded my headlights to LED a couple of months ago with no problems. But there are several things to keep in mind.
First of all the design of the LED bulb. There is a ton of crap out there to buy. In fact the vast majority is crap and will produce very poor light patterns in combination with your headlight housing.

Secondly you very much need to keep in mind the condition that your reflector and lenses are in. If the lenses are old and discolored, installing bright LED lamps will only result in you blinding other drivers like crazy while you're still not seeing nearly as much as you should be.

I replaced both the old reflector housing with some after market clear ones, and replaced the light bulbs with LED ones.
Now my headlights are some of the brightest headlights currently driving around on the Island, comparable to those on a couple of brand new vehicles.

LED conversion light bulbs can be VERY bright. German authorities for example require not only automatic beam leveling, but also a headlight washer system to be able to legally install the lightbulbs that I have in my car in any street legal vehicle in Germany.

You will not only need to find and purchase a pair of LED bulbs that produce a good beam pattern, you will also need clear and clean lenses and reflectors, you will need to install them absolutely correctly, and you will also need to adjust your headlights carefully with respect to the imperfect beam pattern in order to not end up blind others insanely. I still have yet to see a YouTube video that fully correctly shows and explains how to adjust headlights with LED conversion bulbs which just don't produce as clear and sharp a cutoff in combination with classic reflectors, the way well designed Halogen and Xenon lights do. You'll need to keep the aim of the LED converted headlights respectively lower to compensate for the imperfect beam patterns. This will of course result in slightly less optimal visibility than headlights with perfect beam patterns will produce. But if the aim is not lowered a bit to compensate for the beam pattern then you will definitely blind others on the road. With a pair of good (and good is not necessarily equal to the most expensive here) LED conversion bulbs and when it's all done right, then the end result can still be much better than the old stock headlights were.

Another major issue of course is cooling of the LEDs along with the heat sink design on the LED bulbs, especially in place with hot and humid summers. If the LEDs aren't sufficiently cooled they will not last very long. This is another major factor to keep in mind. I have yet to see how long mine will last.

So to sum it up: Don't think you can just go and 'fix' your old dim lights and your old milky lenses, by simply throwing a pair of cheap 30 dollar LED bulbs in there. That is only a 100% recipe for blinding all others on the road!
If that's what you're planning to do, then you might as well just save the money and drive around with high beam all the time instead, the end result will be very similar, but you will have saved yourself 30 dollars - and possibly a 200 dollar ticket.

'Properly' converting the headlights on an old Explorer or any other older vehicles to LED lights WITHOUT blinding everyone else on the road is not just a simple 5 minute job! You really need to do some research, carefully purchase one of the few relatively well designed LED conversion bulbs (which requires a pretty good understanding about what design features to look for).
If you really do want to convert your headlights to LED you shouldn't go down the cheap and easy route cutting all the corners. German authorities have some very good reasons for demanding automatic beam levelling and headlight washer systems for any vehicle that's running these new and brighter LED headlights.

I only did my LED conversion because my old reflectors and lenses practically just turned into milk jugs, so I really had to replace them with new ones. I'm very happy with the result of my LED conversion and I don't get flashed for blinding others when I drive around at night.
But as the LED bulbs arrived before the new housings did, I just went and tried them in the old discolored headlights for a couple of days and the result of that combination of old and new was indeed just awful all the way.

 

[XLTrunner]

Thanks for bringing up the subject of the blinding impact these LEDs can have on other drivers. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has noticed the ever growing number of newer vehicles with LEDs that are so bright you have to squint or avert your eyes when encountering them (not safe, either way). There used to be stringent regulations on how bright headlights could be...but, it's as though all that has gone out the window.

 

[J_C]

I upgraded my headlights to LED a couple of months ago with no problems. But there are several things to keep in mind.
First of all the design of the LED bulb. There is a ton of crap out there to buy. In fact the vast majority is crap and will produce very poor light patterns in combination with your headlight housing.

Secondly you very much need to keep in mind the condition that your reflector and lenses are in. If the lenses are old and discolored, installing bright LED lamps will only result in you blinding other drivers like crazy while you're still not seeing nearly as much as you should be.

I replaced both the old reflector housing with some after market clear ones, and replaced the light bulbs with LED ones.
Now my headlights are some of the brightest headlights currently driving around on the Island, comparable to those on a couple of brand new vehicles.

LED conversion light bulbs can be VERY bright. German authorities for example require not only automatic beam leveling, but also a headlight washer system to be able to legally install the lightbulbs that I have in my car in any street legal vehicle in Germany.

You will not only need to find and purchase a pair of LED bulbs that produce a good beam pattern, you will also need clear and clean lenses and reflectors, you will need to install them absolutely correctly, and you will also need to adjust your headlights carefully with respect to the imperfect beam pattern in order to not end up blind others insanely. I still have yet to see a YouTube video that fully correctly shows and explains how to adjust headlights with LED conversion bulbs which just don't produce as clear and sharp a cutoff in combination with classic reflectors, the way well designed Halogen and Xenon lights do. You'll need to keep the aim of the LED converted headlights respectively lower to compensate for the imperfect beam patterns. This will of course result in slightly less optimal visibility than headlights with perfect beam patterns will produce. But if the aim is not lowered a bit to compensate for the beam pattern then you will definitely blind others on the road. With a pair of good (and good is not necessarily equal to the most expensive here) LED conversion bulbs and when it's all done right, then the end result can still be much better than the old stock headlights were.

Another major issue of course is cooling of the LEDs along with the heat sink design on the LED bulbs, especially in place with hot and humid summers. If the LEDs aren't sufficiently cooled they will not last very long. This is another major factor to keep in mind. I have yet to see how long mine will last.

So to sum it up: Don't think you can just go and 'fix' your old dim lights and your old milky lenses, by simply throwing a pair of cheap 30 dollar LED bulbs in there. That is only a 100% recipe for blinding all others on the road!
If that's what you're planning to do, then you might as well just save the money and drive around with high beam all the time instead, the end result will be very similar, but you will have saved yourself 30 dollars - and possibly a 200 dollar ticket.

'Properly' converting the headlights on an old Explorer or any other older vehicles to LED lights WITHOUT blinding everyone else on the road is not just a simple 5 minute job! You really need to do some research, carefully purchase one of the few relatively well designed LED conversion bulbs (which requires a pretty good understanding about what design features to look for).
If you really do want to convert your headlights to LED you shouldn't go down the cheap and easy route cutting all the corners. German authorities have some very good reasons for demanding automatic beam levelling and headlight washer systems for any vehicle that's running these new and brighter LED headlights.

I only did my LED conversion because my old reflectors and lenses practically just turned into milk jugs, so I really had to replace them with new ones. I'm very happy with the result of my LED conversion and I don't get flashed for blinding others when I drive around at night.
But as the LED bulbs arrived before the new housings did, I just went and tried them in the old discolored headlights for a couple of days and the result of that combination of old and new was indeed just awful all the way.

I do appreciate the time and effort put into your reply, but it's not possible.

There is no way to use a housing that is not designed for the specific LED bulbs, and not result in more glare to other drivers if you have any improvement in distant illumination. Even then, it is highly likely to blind other drivers more.

No matter how you aim it, to get more light up the road with an incan housing you will have more scatter into the other lane and into the vehicle in front of you. There is no way to have more useful light (unless you are going very slow off-road and need to see 10ft in front of you) without blinding other drivers more, and a large part of that is also the color temperature of the bulbs. Even if you have exactly the same beam pattern, you still blind other drivers more if the color temperature is higher, which it almost always is.

It can't be done. How is this not obvious? Even with every perfect thought and change possible, more usable light for normal road use will put more glare into others eyes. It gets to a point where it's time to just stop driving if you can't see well enough at night, or slow down to a speed safe for whatever the headlights support.

 

[donalds]

These new cars with led lightning blinds my wife and I as well
Should be illegal

 

[Mbrooks420]

I typically high beam guys retrofitting stupid LEDs into their factory lenses. If your lights are too bright for me to see, you can enjoy the same.

 

[Mr. Alligator]

^^^^ Agree. (even though blinding the driver heading in your direction might not be in your best interests.)

 

[German Engineer]

I do appreciate the time and effort put into your reply, but it's not possible.

There is no way to use a housing that is not designed for the specific LED bulbs, and not result in more glare to other drivers if you have any improvement in distant illumination. Even then, it is highly likely to blind other drivers more.

No matter how you aim it, to get more light up the road with an incan housing you will have more scatter into the other lane and into the vehicle in front of you. There is no way to have more useful light (unless you are going very slow off-road and need to see 10ft in front of you) without blinding other drivers more, and a large part of that is also the color temperature of the bulbs. Even if you have exactly the same beam pattern, you still blind other drivers more if the color temperature is higher, which it almost always is.

It can't be done. How is this not obvious? Even with every perfect thought and change possible, more usable light for normal road use will put more glare into others eyes. It gets to a point where it's time to just stop driving if you can't see well enough at night, or slow down to a speed safe for whatever the headlights support.

I'm sorry but your argument is completely missing the whole point of my post.

I never said or argued that installing a brighter LED lamp into a reflector housing designed for incandescent bulbs would produce LESS glare than the original combination with an incandescent bulb.
If you read my post, then you know that what you're describing is exactly NOT what I did, and that is NOT what I suggested anyone should do.

The glare is also not what really blinds other people, it is the "light cone" (which in this case is in fact not even a cone) and the (blurred) edges around it. That is why modern headlights have much better and more precise light patterns avoiding glare and focusing the light more precisely to where it needs to be than old headlights have and they still fall within the legal specifications of what is LEGALLY ALLOWED.
Now we can argue all day whether regulations should be stricter or not, but that is a completely different topic all together.
(And in fact I do agree with you that the regulations should preferably be a little stricter and that the existing ones should be enforced much more. But the VAST majority of headlights out there on the roads every night that blind others are in a condition that is in fact (strictly speaking) NOT street legal, simply because they are poorly adjusted and setup all wrong. And that's exactly why regulations should be enforced and fined more, at least here in GA. In Germany for example the headlights are even checked every 2 years along with the brakes and emissions and all other safety aspects in the mandatory "TÜV" inspections when the vehicle is legally certified for operation.)


It's mostly wrong adjustment of headlights that causes the vast majority of headlights on the road that really blind people. With LED conversion bulbs it's additionally also poor light patters that result from a poorly designed combination of light bulb and reflector housing. But there have been some major improvements with LED conversion light bulbs recently with designs where the LEDs mimic the location, size and shape of the filaments they replace reasonably well to produce sufficiently good light patterns. But as I said the vast majority of currently available LED conversion bulbs DO NOT produce sufficient light patterns and will produce unacceptable amounts of glare and will certainly blind others.

What I argued and described in my post is not that brighter light bulbs produce less glare. What I described is how you CAN upgrade the headlights on an old vehicle such as the Explorer in a way that the result is having brighter headlights and still staying WITHIN LEGAL SPECIFICATIONS for how much light the headlights can emit into any given direction.

I never said or argued that my converted headlights produce less glare than stock headlights or than they would when installing halogen bulbs into my after market reflectors.
But they do happen to produce less glare than my old discolored ones did while at the same time being much brighter, exactly BECAUSE I threw out the old discolored headlights, switched to new housings with clear lenses, very carefully selected good and suitable LED conversion bulbs designed to work with my reflector housing, and also adjusted the aim to compensate for the imperfect light pattern produced by the LEDs.

Of course my headlights would blind others even less than they do now if I took out the LEDS and put in halogen bulbs again, but then they would also be less bright than they are now and visibility at night when driving around in the country side wouldn't be what it is now. The upgraded and converted headlights on my vehicle do not blind others any more than the LED or Xenon headlights on a brand new vehicle do. But they also don't provide quite the same visibility benefits as those perfect ones do, but the result is still a major improvement over the old stock headlights designed over a 1/4 century years ago.

But as I described repeatedly now, to achieve that takes planning, very careful selection of the conversion LED light and avoiding all the mistakes and shortcuts most people unknowingly make, when they convert their headlights to LEDs.

PS: While we're already arguing over avoiding to blind others here a little question out to all the readers... Are you sure your headlights are adjusted right? - When was the last time that you checked if they still are? ;-)

 

[J_C]

Yes this is a secondary problem with these vehicles, having the headlights aimed properly if the vehicle has the typical rear end sag which results in them aimed higher.

The upgraded and converted headlights on my vehicle do not blind others any more than the LED or Xenon headlights on a brand new vehicle do.

I don't feel that this assertion is necessarily true and even if it were, the LED lights on many new vehicles are excessively blinding too which is why NHTSA has received many more complaints in recent years, and other solutions like adaptive headlights are being considered. Granted a large part of the problem is people who think a bluer color tint looks good. That alone, with exactly the same beam pattern and brightness, will cause more blinding glare. The other problem is some automakers want adaptive headlights in order to provide even BRIGHTER low beams, not to curb the existing problem without going any brighter.

The solution is pretty simple. Slow down a little. There is no need to increase glare to other drivers, decreasing safety, rather than slowing down which increases it. Of course this assumes the stock housings aren't degraded, and the incan bulbs do go down in output while the Vf drop of the wiring can further contribute to loss compared to output when factory new.

LED retrofits in incan housings are not the proper way to solve that. It isn't just about brightness either, it is not legal to put LED bulbs in housings designed for incan bulbs even if they're no brighter than a candle.

 

[Jason94sport]

I have good regular bulbs in newer housings & aimed them a little high to see better. If I blind others slightly, so be it. Rather make you mad then run into a ditch or another car.
If you need more light install an LED light bar. I have one & use it on dark roads & turn it off as you would high beams with on coming cars.

 

[XLTrunner]

No offense, but that's kind of a narcissistic attitude. What about the oncoming driver who risks running off the road (or, into your path) because of your lights being aimed too high? There's no way of knowing how high they can be adjusted for your needs vs the intrusion upon oncoming drivers. It's not about other drivers getting mad or irritated...it's about safety. As stated previously, if having your headlights adjusted to recommended specs isn't doing it for you, perhaps you may want to rethink driving at night.

 

[donalds]

I feel like this is going nowhere
Let's agree to disagree lol

 

[mic98xlt]

I feel like this is going nowhere
Let's agree to disagree lol

Well said.

 

[J_C]

Is it really as simple as one opinion vs another when talking about illegal modifications that pose a danger on public roads?

The only real excuse I've been seeing for it is "must be fine because nobody flashed me", when the last thing I'm doing when blinded and trying to see, is looking to flash my headlights instead of trying to SEE, knowing that flashing people does no good because they aren't using their high beams, that their screwed up LED lights don't go any dimmer so there is nothing they can do but blind people!!!

It's a criminal act and we should not pretend like this is merely a difference of opinion.

The irony is, I have extremely good night vision, can practically drive without headlights on at all, but I should be blinded by people who arguably shouldn't drive at night at all if their stock headlights aren't good enough to do that? Some people should accept that a handicap is a handicap and not be a burden on others if it breaks the law.

I wouldn't have bothered to state anything about this topic, except that it is getting worse. Once again, tech has evolved faster than LEO enforcement deals with it.

 

[Jason94sport]

Oh God.....I'm not talking about aiming the lights that much.....a little higher is fine. I use the wall method & a tape measure.

 

[German Engineer]

Is it really as simple as one opinion vs another when talking about illegal modifications that pose a danger on public roads?

The only real excuse I've been seeing for it is "must be fine because nobody flashed me", when the last thing I'm doing when blinded and trying to see, is looking to flash my headlights instead of trying to SEE, knowing that flashing people does no good because they aren't using their high beams, that their screwed up LED lights don't go any dimmer so there is nothing they can do but blind people!!!

It's a criminal act and we should not pretend like this is merely a difference of opinion.

The irony is, I have extremely good night vision, can practically drive without headlights on at all, but I should be blinded by people who arguably shouldn't drive at night at all if their stock headlights aren't good enough to do that? Some people should accept that a handicap is a handicap and not be a burden on others if it breaks the law.

I wouldn't have bothered to state anything about this topic, except that it is getting worse. Once again, tech has evolved faster than LEO enforcement deals with it.

There is no criminal act when DOT certified components are installed in DOT certified components to convert a vehicle with DOT certified headlights to DOT certified headlights.

 

[J_C]

^ DOT does not certify any retrofit LED headlight bulbs. Any headlight manufacturer selling an LED bulb alone and claiming anything about DOT, is lying. A manufacturer may certify an incan housing, but then only if used with industry standard incan bulbs.

Now, if you had an enclosure, designed for a specific LED bulb, used with it, and tested in specific vehicles, then a manufacturer could self certify the combination of the assembly as DOT compliant, but only for those vehicles, and then we are back to the same cat and mouse game of knowing they are marketing and selling bulbs for an illegal application so how much of a stretch is it to also lie about any resemblance to DOT requirements?

Fortunately it's not only subject to the honesty of the manufacturer or seller. What we have instead is automatic violation if a different type of bulb is put into the housing than it was designed for.

Would you believe this if an NHTSA spokesperson told you? That's essentially the conversation that went on over at Ars Technica, if you don't want to read the standards, quote:

"There are currently no LED headlamp replaceable bulbs that meet federal safety standards. NHTSA is aware of illegal retrofit kits that are being sold to consumers and works closely with US Customs and Border Protection to prevent shipments containing these non-compliant headlamp bulbs from entering the United States. NHTSA continuously researches emerging technologies with the potential to enhance roadway safety."

How do we stop people from blinding other drivers with aftermarket LEDs?

Good headlights make you safer, but bad ones actively hurt other road users.

arstechnica.com

 

[German Engineer]

Thanks J_C, learned something new.
In fact it does seem like they've blatantly lied about the DOT certification of their LED bulbs.

Now where to find that lawyer who'll make me win a 50 million dollar lawsuit?

 

[Mbrooks420]

Thanks J_C, learned something new.
In fact it does seem like they've blatantly lied about the DOT certification of their LED bulbs.

Now where to find that lawyer who'll make me win a 50 million dollar lawsuit?

Someone has die to collect that 50 mill.

Gonna continue to be an outlaw with those LEDs?