The LED SAE J583 Fog Pod & Fog Light Review

Hello, late to the party on this thread. Quick auestion are the KC G4 Ambers still a solid option, looks like this thread was from 7 years ago. If so, it looks like KC might have discontinued these? I can't find them anywhere, just the clear #500. Thanks for the time.

 

I think you will find that although they were a solid option 7 years ago, they don't really hold a candle to the latest stuff - particularly From Diode Dynamics. I used to run the KC's but am much happier with the DD's.

 

I'd second what @Too Stroked said, and yes, they are discontinued.

 

Kapton tape finally showed up.

I applied a single layer to each light, keeping it as smooth as I could. Unfortunately the kapton doesn't have very much stretch, and the lenses are slightly convex. I considered Lamin-X instead, but I couldn't find a max temp rating, and I'm running 100W Osrams in these, so I figured I'd play it safe.


Powered off, lit by a 6000k Harbor Freight work lamp.


Powered on. The headlight bulbs are uncoated, high performance, standard wattage halogens. The color temp in this picture is shifted higher than it is in real life.


Truck's lighting is the same as the previous picture, the 4Runner has stock 5000k headlights, 3000k DD SS3 fogs. This picture is pretty close to the actual color temp.


Same setup, camera pointed the other way. The color temp here is also shifted up slightly.

I haven't driven with them since applying the kapton tape. The color temp shift with the kapton appears to make the output similar to the Hella Comets tested earlier in this thread.

Overall I'm very happy with them, and I'd be very interested in how they compare to the Hella 500 fogs.

 

I think you'll really like them with the kapton tape. I had a set of halogen cibie super oscars (for a short time, smashed them in a wreck) with kapton sheeting over the lenses on my first vehicle years and years ago.

The nice thing is that it's cheap to replace when/if it starts to get nicked up from road debris.

 

This thread is amazing, I feel the most recent comparison I am working on is relevant and want to share some preliminary pictures here.
The lights are:
Diode Dynamics SS3 pro (2021 version)
Morimoto 4banger HXB SAE
Auxbeam Color Play SAE
Baja Designs SAE

I will be uploading the video this weekend, so for those of you are interested, please stay tuned. (light sources are around 7 ft away from the garage door).

 

The fog lights comparison video is live now.
https://youtu.be/pAiXLx3VJuw

 

Lots of work went into that video. Props for all the work!

However, lots of mistakes too though.
1) 6-7' is horrifically insufficient measuring distance and produces terribly inaccurate results. All that does is cover up poor focus and give better output numbers to poor performing lights. There is a reason professionals measure at extended distances and all you are doing is demonstrating that you are not a serious light reviewer. Those numbers don't mean much at that distance as they will not be very accurate.
2) You are using a cheap

$29 Light Meter Digital Illuminance Meter Handheld Ambient Temperature Measurer, Range up to 200000 Lux, Luxmeter with 4 Digit Color LCD Screen

$28 light meter designed for halogen lights to measure very specific selective yellow LED output. It is wildly inaccurate and specifically unable to measure LED output accurately, so the results mean nothing. If you want to be a serious light reviewer, get the right tools to measure your light source.
3) You didn't cover stable operating output. Some brands have very high initial output and rapidly drop off due to poor thermal dynamic management while others might start lower but maintain higher output overall without substantial dropoff due to better thermaldynamic design. I can easily tell you which is which, but you completely missed it.

 

thanks for the helpful and insightful criticism, I just wanted to provide a bit of the “reasoning” behind the three points.
Normally I measure lux at around 20-25ft away from the garage door surface, due to the limited space and the wider beam of the fog lights, at 20ft the wall won’t cover the whole beam pattern. The main goal is to visually show the difference between each lights while still showing the numbers measured. The field test in the later part of the video also does serve as an open field no distance limited setting to show the beam difference in real world. I will definitely keep that in mind tho, as to measure at a larger distance to allow the real distance filter out the good and bad fog lights. That leads to second point, measuring device, yes my device is not the professional device and like you said will be inaccurate, but I still tend to think the difference between the four lights here are still meaningful in terms of delta. As a lighting enthusiast, I am definitely no professional at this, but willing to continually improve my technique, would you be willing to share which portable measuring device you would recommend for more serious professionals? I really appreciate it. For the stable operating output concern, I did allow each light to be on for a good 5-10 minutes before measuring lux on the garage door, and taking the picture on the field was also done that way, it was just not edited to shown or stated in the video to save some time, I can do a better job stating that in the future tests.
I really appreciate your criticism and feedback of the video and always willing to improve my contents quality and level of seriousness. Will be sure to start with getting a more professional light meter, Looking forward to hearing from your recommendation of a light meter that’s more suited for LEDs. Again, I really appreciate all the great suggestion and criticism.