3rd Gen HID vs LED vs Halogen H11 projector headlights

I saw halogen high beam and led low beam metrics. This harness is from that to full led as I understand things? Maybe I’m mis-remembering?

 

The units @Spike Spiegel is picking up are halogen highs and LED lows, which is what he’d need the harness for. I don’t have full LED high/low units.

 

Gotchya. I’m off the hook then. I’m guessing what spike needs boils down to an H9 male to the female version of the 2 position in my harness? I could put effort into that I suppose? What bulbs are stock on the full halogen T4R?

 

H11 low, 9005 high

 

Yeah, so I assume that means the new assembly, with LED low beam and 9005 high beam, would be plug and play on the high beam side and only require a H9 male to {mating connector for 11254} female conversion on the low beam side. There is no H11 specific male connector, only a single H9 variant which works for either H11 or H9 female as it has no inner tabs. I have heaps of those from Tacoma conversion harness builds.

What I don’t have yet, but what I can purchase, are the females which feed the 11254’s used in the harness I did make, pictured above.

But what this entire mental exercise tells me is that I need to be very certain what the vehicle harness has and which exact assembly is replacing it, given that there are 3 possibilities for each?

 

I love the gaslighting "a reflector LED just looks like this and it's supposed to be wavy. It's better because I said so."

 

Your posts ended up talking me out of filming my OEM LEDs I retrofitted.

I just did the H11 --> H9 conversion in my wife's JGC. The OEM bulb is a

$77 Philips H11 CrystalVision Ultra Upgraded Bright White Headlight Bulb, 2 Pack

Philips H11 LL bulb. The JGC has one of the more painful headlight replacement procedures there is that involves either removing the airbox or going through a tiny access hole in the fender well on the driver side and the tiny access hole or your arm routed through most of the engine bay on the passenger side. Unfortunately they don't use a connector like Toyota does with the removeable part like @daveeasa sells, so I had to modify the bulb and tabs to get it to work, but what a difference! When I first tried this a year ago I ended up dropping one H9 into the headlight assembly and then closed the hood on the second that was sitting on the fender lip so I couldn't just buy a single H9. When I put the H11 LLs back in the driver side wasn't clocked correctly so the output was even more gabrage than stock.

With that being said, the H9 output is so far superior to the OEM it's unreal. The only thing I dislike is the projector cutoff. I don't want to blindly raise it up without aiming but I've been struggling to find the time and location to aim between two monsters taking an hour to get to bed and just being generally busy. I just dislike that there's zero light (outside of signage uplight) above the cutoff line. I know that's how it's supposed to be, but with a reflector setup it's just not quite so sharp (like the 05-15 Tacoma).

Regardless, this was a beatiful upgrade and I'm really pleased I went through with it, even if it took me over an hour to get the passenger bulb in the truck correctly.

 

I have good stock on h9/h11 males now so I could/can make you a super short extension harness so you don't have to hack bulbs, will try to whip you up a pair cause I like McFly.

 

There’s no room in the bucket for an extension harness, so don’t worry about it. For the small effort to tweak the bulb it’s a non-issue. I truly appreciate the offer though, you’ve been nothing but awesome to me.

 

Raincheck for your next project car/truck

 

I have a solution to the not having a flat place 25’ from a wall problem. It involves a 360 degree construction/project leveling laser, an portable outdoor movie screen and having a level garage floor. But rather than point toward a wall, you park in the level garage and face outward. Just waiting on getting my LED heaters swapped to test it out.

Edit: and 100% agreed on projectors.

 

I’m a little bit confused. I’ve been following this thread since the beginning and absolutely believe in function over form. That being said, after seeing the review about the gen2 Morimotos I decided that would be my headlight upgrade over my factory halogens. I get that the build quality is subpar to the oem leds, but the light output seemed adequate overall. I do prefer the look of the Morimoto headlights, but as of recently I see that they are being talked about as being crappy Chinese rebranded headlights. Did I misunderstand the light output test and should not even consider the Gen2 headlights and just opt for OEM leds? Thank you @crashnburn80

 

I think you’re confusing the “new” “GTR” LED headlights with Morimoto. The GTR units are rebranded low quality poor performing Vland units out of China. The Morimotos are significantly better CoPlus made units out of Taiwan. Both are owned by the same parent company. There is also the 2nd Gen (12-15) Tacoma LED headlights from Morimoto as well.

 

There has been lots of talk regarding the business conglomerate that owns morimoto. There seems to be some pretty drastic quality differences throughout the entire company and it has popped up more recently due to “new” offerings within the conglomerate.

 

That being said, are the morimotos a good purchase, or should I only be considering the oem leds? Somewhat personal opinion, but I value it regardless!

 

@Integerdy has the xb v2’s. And also spent quite some time considering which to go with. He might give you some perspective. I suspect almost all advice here is slanted to OEM. That is what I have, though compared to the OG xb it was an easy decision.

 

Take a look at the posted reviews. OEM has better patterns and higher quality but Morimotos are higher in output intensity. Due to no uplight in the Morimotos and hard projector cut offs though that isn’t as beneficial as it seems.

 

I custom cut sheets, install, and then remove LaminX clear headlight film twice on my '17 headlights with no damage to the plastic lenses, though I am removing and reapplying new stuff every two years. Get the film replaced sooner than later and it is much easier to remove.

 

Just because I found this interesting, we just traded in a 2014 Avalon with "quadrabeam" headlights. It's a single 9005 emitting light thru 2 projectors. Very odd. I think HID was an option though.

 

Wanted to get @crashnburn80 's thoughts on this. I have a 2005 GX with projectors for high and low beams. I'm perfectly happy with the Sylvania Basic 9011's for highs. I'm running Phillips H9s for lows and find them just ok. The headlight housings are clean and clear btw. So this person over on Club Lexus is very familiar with your lighting threads and how to properly set up headlights. He's running HIDs and "modified the stock Koito projectors with clear lenses and adjusted the lens focal for clarity". I haven't asked him what setup he's running but it sure looks dang bright!


https://www.clublexus.com/forums/gx...-you-do-to-your-gx-today-90.html#post11136161