3rd Gen HID vs LED vs Halogen H11 projector headlights

I have a 2020 Sr and replace do my halogens with a generic hid kit from Amazon. It was the 5000k H11b for $38. Bought a heavy duty relay from eBay for $8

I’ve always been a fan of TRS and even had a full Morimoto mini h1 retofit on my previous taco. But I’ve read about their bulbs bouncing issues and their Morimoto hid kit runs about $150


We’ll see how long these will lasts. But so far, much better lighting that halogen for sure

Bottom picture is with my truck on the sloped driveway pointing down

 

As covered in the thread, the bounce issue is with the Tacoma headlight assembly, not the TRS product, or any specific vendor. If you don’t have it with your chinesium kit, you likely won’t with a Morimoto kit. As with everything, you get what you pay for.

 

Diode Dynamics recently released a sharp looking amber DRL replacement for 3rd Gen. Personal taste but I'm not a fan of the white DRL and much prefer amber, I think amber looks more unique and more aggressive.

https://www.diodedynamics.com/2016-2019-toyota-tacoma-drl-led-boards.html

 

Nice alternative

 

I knew there was a reason I opted for the amber raptor lights in my grille. I was prescient and didn’t even know it.

 

@crashnburn80 are HID kits generally safe on the electrical system? Would you recommend buying the additional relay harness as well? Which kit and bulb type do you recommend? I have the XD LED's and honestly, I wish I had read this forum before buying them a year ago ....

 

It depends on the ballast. HIDs require a very high voltage to ignite, and a much lower voltage to maintain the arch once stabilized. The maintenance voltage is easily handled by the stock system, as the power draw of HIDs is less than stock. The question as to whether it is safe depends on the amp draw of the ballast for the high voltage ignition to establish the arch. Some ballasts like XD are advertised as low startup draw, meaning they don’t peak as high as conventional ballasts, often making them capable of running off a halogen headlight circuit power, without standalone wiring and relays. I measured the XD ballasts startup at 4.5A, or 54w. The stock H11 is 55w, so the startup draw is safe for the OEM circuit, for these specific ballasts. It will depend on the ballast. But the XD ballasts pulled higher than spec wattage to maintain the arch, which isn’t good for the bulbs. I haven’t tested them, but I would suggest the Japanese made Denso ballasts converted to H11 plugs. Denso is Toyota’s OEM supplier so they will be much higher quality than the China made aftermarket gear. TRS sells the converted units that have the D2S plug swapped out for your plug base of choice. They are of course more expensive, but OEM grade vs China grade. I would then run the XD rebased German Philips bulbs. (The original bulbs were German, but I’m sure rebasing was in Asia). I do not know what the startup draw is on those ballasts, so I cannot say whether they are safe for an OEM circuit.

The correct way to run HIDs is to do a retrofit with proper HID projectors that have complete cut offs. The halogen projectors have uplight above the cut off designed for halogen level light sources. HID is much brighter so the uplight is also much brighter as they were not designed for the HID levels of output, making them not very kind to oncoming drivers. For HID projectors, OEM RX350 are some of the best, then you can run legit OEM grade German made Philips/Osram D2S bulbs. With Japanese OEM Denso ballasts of course.

 

Those look great! Question regarding J581- are additional pairs of driving lights permissible? That is, additional to your existing pair of high beams?

Also, what is the best way to aim auxiliary driving lights to be the most useful on the road? I'm familiar with the low-beam aiming process, and the high-beams follow suit since they're in the same housing. But there's no cutoff or recommended aiming distance for driving lights that I'm aware of.

 

Just wanted to say thanks for all the great info @crashnburn80 , picked up and installed a set of Phillips H9s that are immensely better than the stock bulbs.

For anyone who may not have a dremel, I used cuticle cutters to trim the small plastic tab and the small metal piece near the bulb to get it to seat snug in the housing.

 

Technically 'Raptor lights' are legally required 'wide vehicle indicator lights' for vehicles over 80" wide (unlike the Tacoma).

For some fun reading, check out Table 1 of §393.11—Required Lamps and Reflectors on Commercial Motor Vehicles, row 3, which covers wide vehicle indicator lamps.
https://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/retrieveECFR?gp=1&ty=HTML&h=L&mc=true&=PART&n=pt49.5.393#se49.5.393_111

SAE J581 driving lamps are street legal and use is permitted in conjunction with your high beams. In short yes! SAE J581 driving lights are also covered in the previous regulations link.

Here is instructions from JW Speaker (a highly respected lighting brand) on how to aim driving lights. Essentially you are looking to position the light to aim directly forward with no tilt in X or Y axis, for maximum distance projection.
https://www.jwspeaker.com/wp-conten...ing-instruction-high-or-driving-beam-2016.pdf

 

Thank you for the detailed answer! Honestly the potential to short out something in the electrical system is what's been holding me back from HID. Have you personally seen or ever heard of major issues after a HID retrofit?

 

Personally, in recent day, no. Realistically your fuse should protect the vehicle of any serious electrical problem (assuming you have it properly fused). More typical is ballast EMI causing static on the radio, unreliable ballasts causing bulb flickering or failure to start. Chinese relays of the aftermarket systems failing causing the headlights to not work, ect. All these issues are easily over come by buying high quality components, which is why I reference OEM grade as the desirable standard so often. OEMs will design a product to a far higher standard with significantly longer designed lifespan than the aftermarket looking to sell you some HID conversion kit.

 

For the visual learners on here who think reading the feed is a chore...

 

LOL. In reflectors yes. In projectors not so much.

 

I used to always think to myself as I was blinded by oncoming vehicles with LED'S "how the f**k are those lights legal" lol.

 

I know the photo is a joke, but there is so much generic LED bashing based on ignorance in this thread that you're gonna scare people away from LEDs entirely, rather than directing them toward an educated decision that may include a quality LED that actually works. The problem with drop-in LEDs isn't that they are all bad. The problem is that there are so many options with horrible designs that don't even come close to resembling a halogen filament. Even the 'name brand' bulbs seem to miss the mark in the focus department, so people have to spend days scouring the internet, trying to become a lighting expert to find a decent bulb. After all that, you still wont know until you try a particular bulb in a particular reflector assembly. Not all reflectors are the same, and hundreds of bulbs are wildly different. I have LEDs in two reflector vehicles now. One of them has no glare at all (less than stock, even), while one has a little bit more. While the uplight on the latter is only marginally brighter, it is a white light which probably makes it more offensive to other drivers. I also attribute a lot of that to the hazed lenses scattering a good bit of the light coming out of them. I personally think a lot of reflectors get their uplight from the bottom part of the reflector bucket, which (if you're using one of the blade style bulbs) is not well lit, if it's even lit at all.

Sorry for the rant, but I get tired of people bashing what I have chosen based on what they don't know. Yes, you may have been blinded by a dickbird (or several) with LEDs. Was that/were those dickbird(s) running the same LEDs I am? I doubt it. I was blinded by about a bazillion cars last night, and only one of them was due to suspected bad LED drop-ins. The rest were HIDs or assholes with their high beams on.

 

I personally would love to run some LED's. I've read all the bashing and it hasn't scared me away one bit. I would have picked up "The Eye of Megatron" but i've read too much about them either completely dying after a few months or flickering. I didn't want to roll the dice and hope i get a set that worked well. Yes they have a 2 year warranty (i think it's 2) but i just didn't want to deal with the hassle of having to send them in and waiting for a replacement. Until there is a drop in replacement that works well or there is an affordable LED assembly replacement i'm going to stick with Halogens.
What i do know, there are vehicles out there running LED's or HID's and they are blinding the shit out of drivers. Maybe they are stock? I highly doubt it though.

 

Actual Engineers > Garage Engineers (sans @crashnburn80 who runs the night shift working both). You notice no one that I've seen has bashed the new OEM headlight or other cars that have them stock. What this pertains to is the high majority of amateur MacGyver's who jump on Amazon and buy $20 LED's driven by fashion over function and then claim the function is the same, if not superior than halogen options. Same "dickbirds" as you say who are rolling around with non-DOT approved setups. For many, the LED vs Halogen debate has become like trying to explain to flat earthers that the world is round.

Do I think the LED's look cool? For sure and it would match the DRLs and Rigid Fogs of my Pro way better. But until there is a legit viable option, I switch to Lexus RX HIDs, or I swap out for the 2020 Pro headlights I'm happy with my GE +130's and the quantitative and qualitative improvements and lack of controversy they provide.

 

try these. no fans to break. excellent reviews. I have used these since new for 8 months now. They are excellent for the money especially.

 

Which ones? Megatron's eye's? Lol.