3rd Gen HID vs LED vs Halogen H11 projector headlights

Also, access to the headlight on my bike is meme worthy. It would be easier to just buy two of the same bike with different bulbs already installed.

 

Thanks for posting the 10' procedure. I can do that in my garage but a 25' 90* wall is hard to find.

 

Interesting test. I wonder why when I look at my lights hitting the wall I can clearly see the hot spot. Either way I still love my led lights.

 

I was going to try the hikari but wasn’t sure if I like the fan as far as reliability.

 

Likely distance. Focus issues are not apparent at short range.

Agreed on the fans an possible reliability issues. I’ve got Philips latest H11 LEDs on order out of Japan, Philips are fanless and as one of the largest names in lighting, reliability shouldn’t be an issue. I’ve tested their H4 model but not the H11. They are not sold domestically though, but you can find them from Japanese sellers shipping out of Japan on eBay. Note there is an H11 model available domestically, but it is a lower output foglight model, not something you’d want to try in a headlight. As usual I’ll sell the Philips once done.

 

I’ve got the

$36 Philips H11 CrystalVision Ultra Upgraded Bright White Headlight Bulb, 2 Pack

Philips H11 fogs and they’re insanely bright, so I don’t use them on the road. I even have yellow LaminX on the lenses and they’re still insanely bright.



it’s interesting... they have a VERY sharp cut off... but there is still a ton of glare.

 

The fog model uses cooling fans vs the headlight model that does not. Wise not time run them on the street, the factory fogs do a poor job of glare control with even a halogen bulb, which is why I recommend a replacement housing from the SAE LED fog thread. Then you can boost output while simultaneously making your lights more effective and safer for oncoming drivers.

 

Those are the ones I have as well, except with yellow integrated covers (Philips 12793UNIX2).



Now working my way back from drop-in LED bulbs. I think I'm leaning towards an entire housing replacement for the fogs. The Rigid 360s look promising, waiting for the release of the Toyota mount.

 

Philips fog LEDs are 700 lumen actual. The 360s are 3100 lumen raw. Based on other documents I’ve seen specifying Rigid’s raw to actual, I’d estimate the 360s around 1750 actual. Way more light, while also providing hard projector cut offs for far less glare than stock.

For others you can read more on them here in post #1518: Rigid 360 Series

 

The Philips led fogs provide a good example of glare produced by LED’s in halogen reflectors. Many people (myself included) will see the distinct cut off on a garage wall or door for the first time and think “wow, these are ok! The cut off is INTENSE and these should be totally ok for oncoming drivers!”

But if you actually pay close attention... the area above the cut off is EXTREMELY illuminated by the fogs. If you turn the fogs OFF, it will be nearly black above the low beam cut off. Then turn the fogs ON and you’ll see an intense fog light cut off, but you’ll also notice the formerly black area above the low beam cut off will be Illuminated pretty intensely by the scattered light from the fogs (“glare”).

 

Pretty sure these don’t have a fan... (am I right??)

I figured it was just an aluminum heat sink?

 

That would fall in line with the rest of the Philips line, and looking at it that does appear correct. At first glance it looks similar to others that use vertical fans to work with convection.

 

I searched for those in the beginning as it seems universal that the Phillips have the best chips from what I have read.

 

Keep in mind the LED emitters are only one part of the equation. The Xenon Depot LEDs covered in the original thread were higher output than the Sylvania and Diode Dynamics LEDs covered later, but the later LEDs out performed the XD LEDs because of the product design. It is really how well the emitters and product design work together to produce quality output.

 

What does everyone have against the fans? Sure, it's slightly more complicated with one more part to potentially fail, but what are the odds the fan is gonna fail before the LED? Personally, I don't think the odds are great.

Heat is what kills the LEDs. The fan makes the heatsink more efficient, thus will make the LED last longer. The fanless ones have to limit the power of the array to compensate. Even if the fan fails, there is still a heat sink, so the LED is now a fanless LED. They will undoubtedly fail faster IF the fan fails depending on how much air flow it has where it's mounted and how the heatsink is designed, but that's still a big "if."

Being a bit of a gaming nerd that has spent countless hours of research on PC cooling, I know I would never opt for a fanless heatsink on anything that relies on cooling for longevity unless I knew I could get it a good supply of cool air. In the hot engine compartment of a car, that cool air can be tricky to get where you need it.

If you drive on gravel a lot, the fan might be the first thing to go, but fans usually give you plenty of warning before they completely fail.

That said, if I were going fanless, I'd get the ones with the ribbon style heatsink, and make sure they are installed in a way that will optimize convection. I don't remember what video it was, but I'm pretty sure I saw a video by Headlight Revolution in which their installation instructions included jamming the ribbon heatsink, along with the driver box into the headlight assembly of an F150. I can't find it now, so it may have been removed. Whatever you do, if you see instructions that tell you to mount the bulb in a way that will cut the bulb off from all airflow, DON'T.

 

Nothing wrong with fans per se; but in this application they're a bandaid, a result of trying to shoehorn the LED into the halogen optic. By making the chip blades as thin as possible while also driving the emitters to push the most light, active cooling was the next step. But like I mentioned, it's a bandaid. Like introducing frogs with no natural predators into an existing ecosystem to reduce the amount of bugs. Now all of a sudden you have a frog problem, how do you get rid of the frogs? Let's add snakes, etc. ad infinitum. You're solving a problem that didn't exist before, answering questions that no one asked.

I doubt OEM assemblies originally designed for LEDs would use anything other than large passive heatsinks. For example, I wouldn't buy a light bar that depended on a fan to operate. Fans are only present in clumsy adaptations. They're a symptom, not a feature.

 

Fans do make heat sinks more efficient and can help push the output to higher levels, but what that is really saying is the heatsink is inadequate and the fan needs to be added to compensate. Ideally you'd want sufficient heat sinks so you don't need fans so the design could be static. OEM LEDs are passively cooled. If the fan fails the LED will fail as well, unless it has some thermal management protection built in. LEDs that have this feature may then start to strobe. Somewhat of a wasted feature as well IMO, unless the fan got jammed, as people are unlikely to try and repair the microprocessor cooling fan vs just replace the LED and I don't really think a strobing light is better than a burnt out one. Fans on PCs are a good practice for PC cooling, but that is on a steady stable platform in a clean indoor environment. Ideally you wouldn't want to mount your PC fans somewhere exposed to vibration, harshness and dirt/mud/water like in the environment of a pickup truck engine bay. That isn't to say they won't work, just that ideally you wouldn't need them.

You definitely want your heatsink to be installed in a way to work with physics by going with convection. Though I don't necessarily think those ribbon heat sinks are the best design, I think they were designed for the purpose where a traditional heat sink may not fit well or at all, giving greater product flexibility. Including jamming them into places that are clearly a poor idea with no airflow.

 

The Philips LED’s with the larger aluminum heat sink on the back almost has a propeller shape/look to it. I’ve wondered if it’s shaped like that with “fins” so that air moves through them, generating a mini-vortex or something to aid in cooling.

 

I believe it is about surface area. In a heat sink you want to maximize surface area for more efficient cooling. By curving all the heat sink blades, they have a longer blade distance which then provides more surface area for better cooling while not making the heat sink package any larger.

 

I agree with both of you. Having a fan is not ideal. My point is that when it comes to universal aftermarket LED bulbs going into a halogen housing, I think the active cooling option is the better one. Obviously if there were an affordable option with passive cooling designed specifically for a given vehicle that can perform as well as or better than the drop-in actively cooled options, that would be the way to go. I just kinda doubt any of the tiny universal fanless heatsinks can offer the cooling required to effectively dissipate enough heat to keep the LED cool if the LED is one of the higher output options. They look neat, but if you know anything about heatsinks, it's pretty obvious they aren't well designed for passive cooling. To be honest, though, the Hikari has a terrible heatsink design, and is probably not a whole lot better than some of the fanless heatsinks.