3rd Gen HID vs LED vs Halogen H11 projector headlights

He's ignoring the most obvious solution: don't drive on hills. [SOLVED]

 

Haters are going to hate. My solution.

FUCK ‘EM. I don’t hate, I do.

Now let’s see if I can get this right.

I installed the 30% brighter Philips the other day. Unfortunately, I couldn’t swap out the fogs. The top plate( for lack of the correct term) was longer, and I couldn’t get it into the slot, so I could then turn it clockwise. But a dremel and a diamond wheel will take care of that.

So…We were coming back from the Mojave Desert on the 14 just as it was turning dark. I turned on the lights anxiously and began to observe attentively. I could see the pattern and output. I thought it looked a little better than stock. I waited till the car in front of me went over the crest and I put the high beams on. Oddly enough, it looked almost the same. So it was that desert ambiance at dusk doing its thing. It then got difficult to observe as it seemed almost every vehicle had blinding LEDS. It made it hard to see the full output. So I waited patiently (Fugazi style) and when we got into the city, it was still hard to truly tell what was the verdict. The picture was taken as we left the desert. One thing I could tell, it projected further down the road(arrow shows where it stops).

It wasn’t until I got to the 27 to head back into the canyons and home that we were pleasantly surprised. I COULD SEE THE ROAD AHEAD OF ME WELL!!!!! No, not very bright, but damn, I could finally see the edges more and well established. The P’s beam the lights further down the road. Stockers sucked for that as we all know.

Going up the hill, it’s going to obviously hit the oncoming eyes 30% brighter, but for this cool cat, 150 LED wrongs don’t make a right. (Don’t worry haters, no one that I know are running H9’s




EDIT: Just saw the fogs are H16, much lower wattage

 

Not sure if this has been posted before.... I bought a couple of Phillips H9s to replace my low beams and found that there were Phillips H9s installed from the factory. They were even bulbs manufactured in Germany. My truck was built on Jan. 9, 2017 and there were no headlight upgrades.

 

That might the high beam position you felt. Low beams should be closer to the fender.

 

As mentioned above those are the high beam bulbs. Common mistake. Factory low beams are H11.

 

OK, I'll double check them. Thanks.

 

Although I don't drive in the mountains or very hilly terrain, not once have I been flashed with H 9 in the lowbeams in 7 months of them being installed

 

Yup, you are correct. I was looking at the high beams. I was able to trim the tab and install the H-9s in the low beam sockets OK. Thanks, Tim

 

Anyone have experience with OEM LED direct replacement headlights such as these claiming "Replacement headlights are built to OE standards, using the same manufacturing processes"? According to the Q an A section, they aren't made in China. Y'all think there's any chance they perform the same as OEM?

 

OEM copies are becoming more common, some that claim OEM like performance are quite bad with irregular patterns that have dark spots and low output. The OEM units have 5 low beam emitters and 2 high beam, some aftermarket units will reduce the emitter count to reduce cost. You can count the emitters by the bucket shapes in the reflector, it is difficult without a head on picture of the headlights though. I haven’t seen that brand specifically, and it is nice to see that they are not made in China, but I very much doubt they will match the performance of OEM. Keep in mind that claims about matching OEM performance are likely applied to their whole product line not a specific comparison of this headlight against OEM Tacoma LED. While many vehicles have poor performing OEM LED headlights setting a low bar, the Toyota Tacoma LED units are quite excellent given the highest ratting by IIHS. Personally I’d pay a little more knowing you are getting the highest quality best performing headlight vs gamble $800+ on aftermarket units.

 

Thank you @crashnburn80 for your hard work. You also pushed me off the nest and have taken that step to better lighting. Not quite the H9’s, but a whole lot better. H11 30%+ Philips.

Unfortunately I moved a bit, so I didn’t get the exact same picture, but interestingly, the high beams changed the sign color to yellow.

On a side note, digging the reverse lights mod more and more.

Both of these mods give better situational awareness overall.

 

The H11 Philips +30 will be an improvement over stock, but you can get substantially better improvements from higher efficiency and more performant H11 options. At minimum I’d suggest the Philips H11 +100s over the +30s, more preferably the Tungsram Platinum H11s.

 

Goodness gracious, really? TMI..I'm just needing to know if LED's are okay to replace my H11, if so what brand? 2018 SR5.

Thanks

 

They are not. If you want LEDs to perform correctly you need to get complete LED headlight assemblies.
TL;DR is skip LEDs in your halogen housings and use H9s. They are considerably cheaper, perform better and don’t blind oncoming traffic. Extremely minor fitting is required and detailed in this thread

 

See post #3894 and #1579.

 

I got some today

 

lucky

 

What more can be said @crashnburn80 except that you are a master at your craft. I've been reading on this thread for a couple of years and switched out of OEM for the Philips H9 for my "old" 19' and was quite pleased. I've been reading this thread again now that I bought a new 23' Trail Edition. Lights are just terrible and I need a solution. You mentioned below concerning the Morimoto 2 Stroke 3.0,

Have these been updated yet? I am a little confused by this thread as it's a ton of great information but it's easy to get lost. You list out the "Recommend Setup for Best Performance" with halogen lights but I didn't see the same for LED lights. Short of replacing the headlights/projector, (in your opinion) is the Philips H9 still the best over the other halogen and LED options?

Thank you for all the great information and research!!

 

This is very helpful. Thank you for breaking it down. It seems the H9 is the best solution but then why are folks buying $200 LED Morimotos or other LED bulbs? Folks just don't like their money?

 

They look really good from the drivers seat. When you never leave the city you don’t notice that the throw is absolute garbage without streetlights. When you see them reflecting off road signs down the way it’s easy to think they actually throw useable light that far.
For a couple hundred you can get the whiter color and pretend you spent big bucks on led housings or HIDs.
They are so abundant that everyone is sick of flashing vehicles with unacceptable uplight, and apparently not getting flashed is proof that other drivers loooove your led bulbs in their face for some people