I am glad to write a "glowing" review for these lights. I have been using them for approximately a week with several hours of night time driving in both dry and hard rain conditions. The lights are installed on a highly modified Ford Excursion. The truck has Anzo projector (low beam) headlights for a model year 2000 with DDM Tuning 55 Watt Slim Ballast HIDs at 4,500 Kelvin.
These new LED lights replaced a pair of 55 Watt driving lights that have performed flawlessly for several years. The old lights were from a tractor supply store costing around $30 each. The lights were a dark amber/orange similar to older headlights, guessing around 3,200 Kelvin. My intent was that the darker color would improve visibility particularly in rain and fog. The lights were mounted below the custom bumper on a truck with a mild lift and 37" tires. Looking at them in an oncoming position they appeared to be quite bright but did not provide enough useable light while driving even with a decently defined fog light like beam.
These LED Work Lights arrived within the time frame Amazon predicted, though they sent them to the local post office instead of my house. Packaging was sufficient. The lights are compact but feel solid in the hand, heavier than expected. Though compact they are a couple inches deeper than the lights they replaced, which required drilling new holes in the mounting tabs beneath the bumper.
I tested these new lights against my old ones using jumper wires from a battery. It was quickly obvious that there was no need to combine the new lights with the old. No longer any need for the old ones, these new lights are very bright and completely outshine my old lights.
The LED lights come with a rubber sleeve to protect the wires. There are two wires, ground and hot. The leads are plenty long but the amount of wire extending past the sleeve is minimal. The wires are of smaller gauge than I expected, maybe 14 gauge, 12 at the largest. I prefer to overbuild things but I don't think the size of the leads will present any problems. Interestingly, as other reviewers have mentioned these lights are very warm during operation. The heat is present very quickly. So far no heat related issues and no indications that heat will be a problem. But you probably wouldn't want to touch them if using them for a while on a hot night. And I wouldn't mount them where they could contact anything super heat sensitive. Haven't checked to see if they really get hot enough to be troublesome to paint, wiring, or anything else that could easily burn.
Other reviewers complained about the mounting. I had no issues at all. They are a tight fit needing just a little nudge to assemble. All necessary mounting hardware was included. You will just need to come up with your own connections to power and ground. If needing to do extremely fine tuning in aiming them, there could be some challenge due to some indexing that I expect is designed to keep the lights from being bumped out of position. Has not been a problem as I've tested and adjusted positioning and aim. There is no vibration, jiggling, or other movement while driving-which is very impressive compared to other bumper mounted lights I have such as Pro Comp 130 Watt lights and LightForce HIDs.
6,000 Kelvin seems high to me, though they are incredibly bright white. They seem to almost match my 4,500 Kelvin low beams, though because my headlights are 55 Watts they do wash out a little. If the LEDs had a darker Kelvin option I would have gone for something closer to 4,000 or lower. Because of this color temperature my experience is a lack of definition of objects. For this price point I can't complain too much.
30 degree beam as others have suggested is a desirable pattern. Distance is not impressive. My projector low beams have a very defined top line cutoff which is still distinctly visible even with these LEDs overlapping. The LEDs have a smooth shape to their beam and spread softly with no strong focal center like typical with a flashlight. Because my truck sits tall this is working fine for my setup. I use these lights to fill in the closer, lower area in front of my truck that my headlights do not cover well. Because the focus is not well defined I think they are too strong for oncoming traffic of not aimed lower than a headlight. I have not been flashed, but a couple vehicles have turned on their high beams just as they passed going the opposite direction. I suspect these lights were too bright for them so I lowered their aim. I have since been in traffic with and passed in opposing traffic several police cars and have not had any problems.
I have many hours on dark, rainy pavement and am very pleased with these lights. It is their brightness that overcomes what I consider a shortcoming of the light being excessively white. My father, who has excellent vision, has complained about my lighting being insufficient for years. Tonight he rode with me during light rain on mostly dark, damp pavement and was finally satisfied and pleased with night time visibility. I have been comfortable doing most of my driving with just these lights and my regular headlights on simultaneously. I have been able to see deer more easily in my peripherals on the sides of the interstates with these than my previous fog lights. On dark pavement visibility is decreased but on lighter road surfaces the whiteness of the LEDs highlights the road.
Another measure of the improvement I am seeing with these lights is when passing vehicles going the same direction. Likely because of the height of my truck my lights have always looked comparatively dimmer on the ground when I drive beside other vehicles. Now these lights match or better other stock headlight and driving light combinations. Haven't checked against late model projector beams in luxury vehicles but I expect these would compare decently at least within the first 15' of distance. If using these lights unaccompanied and as primary headlights I would say 50 miles per hour would be a comfortable speed on dangerous country roads. On highways 60 is also comfortable. That's to give an idea of what sort of distance the light carries. They are not designed for distance, they disperse as a flood. The 60 degree option would have been too much for my purposes and really for any purposes I can fathom on a moving vehicle.
Because the throw of these lights has a distance of only a few car lengths, I don't feel any need to add more to the front of my truck. I would definitely like to mount a pair under my rear bumper for spotting animals that may be behind me on the farm and for backing to and with trailers. The 30 degree spread should still be ideal as a backup light.
I used mostly existing wiring to install these lights. I have 100% constant duty stainless steel solenoids that activate my driving/fog lights when my low beams are activated. I do the same to keep my low beams on when my high beams are engaged. I have an inline fuse for the lights that was already in place with a jumper from one light to the other. I crimped eyelets to the grounds after running jumpers extending the ground wires to come back to where the lights are mounted due to the length of the shielding. The eyelets ground the lights where the mounting bolts go through the steel mounting tabs.
It was the positive reviews of other buyers that swayed me toward purchasing these lights versus others. I have no regrets about this purchase. I think they are a flexible, relatively low energy consuming option. Higher end, more expensive lights would have been out of my budget and based on the reviews of competitor's products these likely out perform the competition. While these are not spot lights, they are excellent driving/flood/work lights and so far are fine in fog. It will be interesting to see if they are overly reflective in snow. Also, for those not used to driving with LEDs, flood lights, or lights that are very bright white and powerful, while they do not bring out great definition on dark surfaces, the reflective surfaces of road signs will be greatly enhanced. Similar with bright and reflective markers and paint on the road's surface.
If I can justify the expense and usefulness I will buy more of these for my truck and possibly other farm vehicles such as an ATV, tractor, Jeep, etc. I highly recommend them. So glad there is a company offering affordable quality. Hopefully they will continue to be trouble free for years to come. I will plan to update if any issues arise.
| Brand | Nilight |
|---|---|
| Color | 2Pcs Led Pods +2" tow hitch +Wiring Harness |
| Specific Uses For Product | Rear Lights |
| Vehicle Service Type | Truck |
| Special Feature | Waterproof |
| Wattage | 18 watts |
| Auto Part Position | Rear |
| Lens Color | Clear |
| Item Dimensions LxWxH | 3 x 3 x 10 inches |
| Manufacturer | Nilight |
| Part Number | ZH441 |
| Item Weight | 4.77 pounds |
| Product Dimensions | 3 x 3 x 10 inches |
| Country of Origin | China |
| Item model number | ZH441 |
| Finish | Alloy |
| Material | Aluminum |
| Item Package Quantity | 1 |
| Special Features | Waterproof |
| Included Components | 16AWG Wiring Harness, 2" Tow Hitch Bracket |
| Batteries Included? | No |
| Batteries Required? | No |
| Warranty Description | 2 years warranty. |
