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LED off road lights/ work lights




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Your turn signals should make more light than the ones in your first link. I would be surprised if they made even 120 lumens, and if they did, they wouldn't make it for long before the LEDs failed from the heat they would generate. The second ones are roughly 8x3x2.5".... With their 36 watt draw, I would start to worry that they their heat sinks might not be large enough to dissipate that much heat, but, lets assume that their heat sinks do for a moment. They don't list the type of LEDs used in the lamp, but given the output of most high powered LEDs, I would assume that they produce anywhere between 1600 and 2400 lumens, which is quite bright. 2 55w HIDs in hellas would make about twice as much light as one of those though.
 






Trail worthy fab has a set that looks "like" the ones in your 2nd link.

I have t heard anything bad about them. We have a pair of 6" omes to put in the bustang bumper, but I havent had the tome to install them uet. I have played with them and so far I really like them.

http://www.trailworthyfab.com/Trail-Series/

~Mark
 






Would love to continue going to more LED's but they are just still too expensive for what you get :(
 






got you i will stick with halogen
 






One thing I really like about LEDs is the lack in power you need to run them.

I have 2 off-road lights (non LED) on the truck now and those 2 alone pull 200 watts (thats around 15 amps).

I'd like to add a couple more lights but the voltage already drops down (and isn't charging the battery) if my aux fan is on with those 2 lights when at idle. That means I'm going to use LEDs for my next set of lights so I'm only adding 6 more amps.

I've run a smaller pulley on the alternator before to get more charging at idle but its hard on the alternator bearings and the higher amp alternators get more amperage at idle via the smaller pulley (at least the ones I checked out did).

~Mark
 






Aside from the low power requirements, you also have to consider the longevity and durability of LEDs. You get almost same lumens/watt as you do in an HID, much closer to full spectrum light out of LEDs than HIDs, and a light that turns on and off instantly, no warm-up. LEDs absolutely beat halogens these days though, and the good ones are giving HIDs a run for their money. Plus, if you are buying higher quality LEDs, they usually make better beams. Spots with less glare and floods without the same kind of hot spots.

Plus, with the HIDs and Halogens, you have to contend with the fact that you have them in giant housings adding to your wind resistance everywhere you drive. Granted, you are driving in an SUV with aerodynamics slightly better than a brick, but...
 






that espcially the last one. say if i had 2 mounted side by side. would those put out more light forward then say 2 55w hella 500s?

YES. Even 1 of them will overpower the hella 500s. I put a 6" LED bar similar to that 2nd link on my rock crawler since I couldnt see the trail good enough at night using 2 Hella 500s as my headlights. (Assuming it is the same quality as my China LED bar, the single mounting point and price make me think it may be slightly less quality of a light.)
 






YES. Even 1 of them will overpower the hella 500s. I put a 6" LED bar similar to that 2nd link on my rock crawler since I couldnt see the trail good enough at night using 2 Hella 500s as my headlights. (Assuming it is the same quality as my China LED bar, the single mounting point and price make me think it may be slightly less quality of a light.)

so your saying the LED bars would be better? even though the guy above dissagreed? anything i need to look for in a LED bar?
 






so your saying the LED bars would be better? even though the guy above dissagreed? anything i need to look for in a LED bar?

For clarity's sake, I was saying a 55w HID would output more light at a lower cost. A 55 watt halogen makes a beam a little less impressive than your headlights. Plus, I made my original statement assuming you were talking about one of those bars compared to 2 HIDs.

Though, I would try and find a better quality bar than those... The size makes me worry at the wattage that those are running... Mainly just because of heat issues. LEDs don't make much heat, but it doesn't take a lot of heat to ruin them either.
 






I wasn't trying to cut you down. I just was trying to clarify. So what sort of wattage and lumens would I want in a led bar?
 






I wasn't trying to cut you down. I just was trying to clarify. So what sort of wattage and lumens would I want in a led bar?

No, it's ok. I realized that my original comment might not have been very clear. Now I'm probably going to ramble a bit and say stuff you already know since the answer to your question is so subjective.

The basic specs of the bar you posted are fine, it's bound to make a lot of light, probably more than both your headlights from that single bar. What you want though is entirely up to your needs. But, let's look at this as this bar making roughly 1.25 times the useable light of your headlamp, and most of it will be a near field flood lamp. (just a note, a 55watt HID will emit around 3500 lumens, a 55watt halogen around 1000, and I'm going with the assumption these LEDs make 2000)

Essentially, given the design of the beam pattern of a headlight, you have almost tripled your near field lighting, since your headlamp is made to project some light far away. But, the amount of light from a headlight is designed only to make it so you can see on what should be fairly straight, obstacle free roads, but cut off at a point where it would harm other driver's ability to see. So, as we all know, they aren't going to give you enough for off-road use, because you need to be able to see obstacles. So, people add off-road lights. Now, we could probably estimate the light output of a 55w halogen Hella as roughly 1000 lumens. So this one bar would be worth two of them. Plus, it is at a color temp closer to daylight, so it is closer to a full-spectrum light, meaning you will be able to see more of the colors of the objects the light is being reflected off. This means, even though you have the light of two of those Hellas, you are seeing more than what you can with two. Make sense?

But, on to the question of how much light do you want... Well, once again, that is dependent on your own needs. Basically what kind of terrain are you expecting, and what kind of speeds do you want to go through it. You know what it is like to overdrive your headlights right? Same issue here. You need enough light to be able to see the obstacle in enough time to react to it. But, you can go too far with this. If you are going through terrain where there are a lot of obstacles, and you are making too much light, you are going to blind yourself to anything beyond what is really close to you.


I guess if I were to make a suggestion, I would suggest buying some of the cheapest lights you can find at walmart or harbor freight or something, and seeing for yourself how much light you need. The nice thing about a halogen bulb is that 55 watts makes roughly the same amount of light no matter what, so one can estimate what you need. Though, you will likely need a lot less than you would get from the cheapie stuff, since they are going to do unsavory things with the photons the light emits into their junk reflectors. As to the light you posted, I want to reiterate, the output and the wattage are not really what I see a potential issue with. What I'm saying is that, looking at the pictures, I have doubts that there is enough surface area to dissipate the heat from those LEDs. You can find other LED bars for cheap, albeit maybe not that cheap, but still cheap. To a point, you are getting what you paid for. Aluminum, LEDs and electronics have a bare minimum price. If you are going too cheap with things, you know they cut back somewhere. For instance, they may be using LEDs that are made for a lower power application and overdriving them, or it may be a matter of cutting their costs by using less materials to make the cases. In this case, I suspect both.
 






No, it's ok. I realized that my original comment might not have been very clear. Now I'm probably going to ramble a bit and say stuff you already know since the answer to your question is so subjective.

The basic specs of the bar you posted are fine, it's bound to make a lot of light, probably more than both your headlights from that single bar. What you want though is entirely up to your needs. But, let's look at this as this bar making roughly 1.25 times the useable light of your headlamp, and most of it will be a near field flood lamp. (just a note, a 55watt HID will emit around 3500 lumens, a 55watt halogen around 1000, and I'm going with the assumption these LEDs make 2000)

Essentially, given the design of the beam pattern of a headlight, you have almost tripled your near field lighting, since your headlamp is made to project some light far away. But, the amount of light from a headlight is designed only to make it so you can see on what should be fairly straight, obstacle free roads, but cut off at a point where it would harm other driver's ability to see. So, as we all know, they aren't going to give you enough for off-road use, because you need to be able to see obstacles. So, people add off-road lights. Now, we could probably estimate the light output of a 55w halogen Hella as roughly 1000 lumens. So this one bar would be worth two of them. Plus, it is at a color temp closer to daylight, so it is closer to a full-spectrum light, meaning you will be able to see more of the colors of the objects the light is being reflected off. This means, even though you have the light of two of those Hellas, you are seeing more than what you can with two. Make sense?

But, on to the question of how much light do you want... Well, once again, that is dependent on your own needs. Basically what kind of terrain are you expecting, and what kind of speeds do you want to go through it. You know what it is like to overdrive your headlights right? Same issue here. You need enough light to be able to see the obstacle in enough time to react to it. But, you can go too far with this. If you are going through terrain where there are a lot of obstacles, and you are making too much light, you are going to blind yourself to anything beyond what is really close to you.


I guess if I were to make a suggestion, I would suggest buying some of the cheapest lights you can find at walmart or harbor freight or something, and seeing for yourself how much light you need. The nice thing about a halogen bulb is that 55 watts makes roughly the same amount of light no matter what, so one can estimate what you need. Though, you will likely need a lot less than you would get from the cheapie stuff, since they are going to do unsavory things with the photons the light emits into their junk reflectors. As to the light you posted, I want to reiterate, the output and the wattage are not really what I see a potential issue with. What I'm saying is that, looking at the pictures, I have doubts that there is enough surface area to dissipate the heat from those LEDs. You can find other LED bars for cheap, albeit maybe not that cheap, but still cheap. To a point, you are getting what you paid for. Aluminum, LEDs and electronics have a bare minimum price. If you are going too cheap with things, you know they cut back somewhere. For instance, they may be using LEDs that are made for a lower power application and overdriving them, or it may be a matter of cutting their costs by using less materials to make the cases. In this case, I suspect both.

super long post. but makes sense. I like the idea of the Hella 500's because i am able to use them while doing daily driving. i feel like a LED bar would be super blinding to other people.
It was honestly just an idea to see if anyone else has used them, their success and whether or not it would be a good investment for say a roof light bar.
Thanks for all the advice though. i may still look into a legit lightbar for the roof that is LED
 






Yeah, sorry about the tl;dr there.
 

































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