3rd Gen HID vs LED vs Halogen H11 projector headlights

You're right, I agree with you larger wires would help with halogens particularly, When I did my SR Fog light install, I notice that the already installed wiring from the relay to the radiator area was a single pair of small what appears to be 18 awg wire, then the "engine room harness" (fog light harness) I bought splits into two runs, one to each fog light. I did a quick calculation and at around an assumed 8 amp draw for both fogs (I=P/V=110W/13.8V), the voltage drop for the relay to fog light harness run, for an assumed 6 ft run of 18 awg, would be around 0.6V just for that portion of the run.
As far as the Diode Dynamics LED fogs I would love to have them, with less current draw they would have less voltage drop. But I'm busy right now just taking baby steps in upgrades for my SR, OEM fogs beat no fogs by far, lol. I've done the OEM Intermittent wiper stalk mod, the fog light OEM mod, and have the Southeast Toyota keyless entry kit being shipped as we speak, so that's the next upgrade.
I appreciate all the work you've done in this thread on lighting, it's been a big help!

 

I'll try to explain my thinking with this "universal harness" idea.

Given stock fogs are H11, stock lows are H11, stock highs are H9. Someone wanting performance without appearance changes might want to go H9 x 6 for all bulbs. Minor modification to the bulb is one option, given 250h of life that might be an annual thing for the lows and every few years for the fogs? Then add on a little bit of uncertainty with stock wiring due to 65w vs 55w (that's almost 20%). The Amazon extension harness is an idea but at least one review notes it melted due to high temp, not sure how accurate that is but for $10 I wouldn't expect it to be performance quality.

So, instead, something in the $100 price range which offered
1. Heavy gauge insulated and flex loom'd wire from battery to relay (10 gauge) then relay to bulb for all 6 bulbs ( 12 gauge perhaps )
2. 3 high quality dedicated relays which can be easily replaced
3. 6 easily located fuses which can also be easily replaced, vs hidden inside an inline harness
4. Plug and play connection to stock headlight/fog switches
4. Perhaps additional storage for 2 extra H9 bulbs
5. Higher performance connectors which do not require bulb modification for h9 use

If I didn’t have kids I’d attempt this with a 3D printer as I have plenty of wire but sourcing h9 connectors and a pluggable interface to stock and figuring out DRL certainly exceeds the time I could allocate.

TLDR, I would personally pay a fair bit for a fully pluggable/bolt on solution to go full h9 at max power for all 6 bulbs.

 

I might check those guys out. I am pondering kc g4 (and I know this isn’t the fog thread so I’ll stop there).

I was a bit surprised installing my H11 +130’s at how chintzy the wire felt. Definitely don’t feel overconfident plugging in a h9 for lows.

 

Well when you 'splane it like that, it begins to make sense.

 

But it literally takes 10 minutes to modify the bulbs with a dremel type tool. And the stock headlight fuses are in the under hood fuse panel, easy to fine.

Nokya makes h9 connectors with 14ga wires, they’re on eBay and I’ve seen them at Autozone. A stand-alone harness upgrade would be interesting for power gains at the lights, but an unnecessary complication imo. The stock headlight does pretty good with good bulbs and re-aiming. I’d be most interested in a fog harness that using the engine room harness plus to but haven’t gotten to it.


You don’t need 6 h9 bulbs; the high beams are already h9, and they don’t perform well in fog in the fogs. I’ve tried, the lack of glare shield on the bulb tip causes a ton of light scatter and glare reflecting off the fog or rain or snow and blinds you as well as oncoming drivers.

 

Just to clear things up for 2020 Tacoma Owners:

H11s are for low beam only. The HIGH and FOG lights seem to fit only H16s. Hikari says that H11s will fit in H16s but I am here to tell you, at least on a 2020 Tacoma TRD Sport 4x4, that is not true.

The H11 receptacle circumference for LOW is larger than the HIGH and FOG. At least for my Hikari H11 LEDs, you cannot shoehorn them in there. This may not be the case for the 2016-2019 models but at least for my 2020 -- no bueno.

Now I have to find the person that wanted to buy my Hikaris -- if he still wants them or I can save them as backups. I cannot find any Hikari LEDs that fit high and fog slots.

 

@jarbarian

My 2019 SR5 came with:

Low beams - H11
High beams - H9
Fogs - H16

I now have:

Low beams - H9
High beams - H9
Fogs - H11

I had to do very minor trimming on the H9 tabs to fit them into the low beams. Otherwise they all fit easily.

Others have had mixed results. Not all bulb manufacturers dimensions are equal.

 

Not sure where to post this issue I have so I will start here.

So I upgraded the mirror housings with sequential flashers and replaced the mirrors with LED arrows in them with no issue. Then decided to replace the front signals with LED and everything appeared to work for a day. Then I started getting hyper flashing so I installed this resistor pack on the front LED flashers. Still getting hyper flashing. Anyone find a solution for this that does not involving replacing the front headlight assembly entirely?

 

You may find some interesting info in my high output halogen fog thread:
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/the-ultimate-foglight-upgrade-h11-not-led-or-hid.435419/

I do not recommend high output halogen fogs. As @skierd mentioned, you need glare caps on your H9s. I ran custom glare capped H9s in the fogs, but you still get excessive glare. I also experimented with Subaru fogs that have a built in glare cap in the assembly and was able to get significantly higher output with H9s while keeping glare similar to stock but the beam pattern was different and not what I was looking for. At the time when I was pursuing those halogen options, all SAE fogs for the Tacoma were ultra high color temp lights and could not clear snow, the options were unacceptable to me. After SAE LED selective yellow with higher operating lens temp lights became available, switching to LED became the way to go. And for those that still want white, without being high color temp, Diode Dynamics 4000k is the way to go.

I've not checked out a 2020 yet, but the high beams are definitely not H16, that is a very low output fog bulb. The highs should still be H9. I'm surprised you are having trouble getting them in the high beam, being they are advertised as H11/H9.

2020 did standardize the fogs on H16, which was previously only on the non-TRD models. 16-19 had high output wide angle H11 TRD fogs. The H11 Hikari Ultras are not listed to fit H16, and they should not be run in the fogs anyway due to excessive glare and the performance would not match that of a proper SAE LED assembly. Instead, I'd suggest replacing with Diode Dynamics SS3s. You can see the SAE fog thread here, Diode Dynamics SS3s are linked at the very top:
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/the-led-sae-j583-fog-pod-fog-light-review.554813/

 

Thanks for this info, I had read OP's ultimate fog thread and mis-remembered it as H9, didn't realize he used special H9's.

I found the h9 connectors I think you're talking about from another post you made on a different thread, will give them a whirl and see, maybe I'll try one of my H11's vs one H9 w the mod harness and see for myself what I think.

Got some driving in tonight, the H11 130+ are really quite bright, I'm impressed with them.

 

I tried the Ultra 130 in the low beams and the were so much better than the stock. However my son tried Diode Dynamics LEDs and I was so impressed I got a set and never looked back. I live in the country and these roads are pretty darn dark. I can see further and the sides of the roads can be seen better. After driving these dark roads for years I know a difference when I see it. Passing on coming traffic I never get flashed by high beams for blinding people as I have passed some neighbors when asked saw no issues. Hope this helps because I totally thought the LED lights were a no go for our lights as I was against them and preaching to my son do use them. Its ok to eat a lil crow every now and then.

 

Thanks. I did try to put my extra Hikari H11s in the high slot, but much like the fog slot, the actual receptacle is smaller as is the actual 3 teeth. I cannot find a Hikari H16 fog light either so I will check your option. I would really love the high/low to match with fog (color, density) but it appears I won't be able to do that.

 

The Diode Dynamics lights will produce more light to the sides and more foreground light that the GE +130s, but they will not project nearly as far, they actually project slightly less than a stock bulb in the Tacoma projector. What looks so impressive is the foreground light, and that isn’t good in a headlight. If wanting LEDs the Hikari Ultras are a far better option, which project further than stock, unlike the SL1. They do so much better because they are smaller and better designed to be closer to a halogen size, giving them better focus for improved distance projection.

Edit: I should add that the H9 swap will provide more light to the sides than the LEDs while also significantly outperforming them in distance projection.

 

If you go with the Diode Dynamics SS3 Fogs in 6000k they will be a close match to the Hikaris. I’d recommend selective yellow for better actual poor weather performance though. The yellow will be so different in color that most people do not mind them not matching. I’ll take a pic of mounting my Hikaris in the high beam headlights later today and we can see if there are any differences.

 

I cannot seem to find which Hikaris are for 2020 Tacoma for HIGH and FOG! At least maybe Hikari is unaware the sockets changed.

 

I have rigid industries fog LEDs, to me I can see further down dark country roads so much better with the DD SL1 than before. Plus I rarely drive at night, we typically dont leave after dark. I can't remember when I cut my headlights on. IMO they project better im sure some test show otherwise but my test I think they are better. There some areas I can see so much better than I could before. Driving down these roads for 35 years I think I know what works best for me.

 

Do they fit on a 2020 Tacoma without cutting anything?

 

The should fit fine.

 

What model did you get of the lights?

 

Regarding your recommendations for Diode Dynamics for fogs, looking over your test reviews for those and comparing to your reviews for halogen headlights, looks like higher lux ratings for the halogens, so how are these LEDs better? If you’re speaking specifically about the selective yellow only, I would love to see a comparison to the yellow/amber H11 halogens available vs the SS3 sports and pros for the fog light application.