The LED SAE J583 Fog Pod & Fog Light Review

@crashnburn80 , Have you tested the Rigid SAE SR Series 6" fogs (906703 in white or 906704 in yellow) yet?

They fit perfectly in the lower grill and should be a solid competitor (or addition to) to all of the options listed in this thread.

I'm thinking they should have a decent amount more output than the 360s and D series because they have a more LEDs each.

 

For rock lights, here is the rock light thread. Baja does have the smallest light of all the lights tested in the thread. It is worth noting that the Rigid rock lights are actually more expensive, though larger and higher output.
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/the-led-rock-light-showdown.612253/

I have not. See my posts below, they do package nicely in the lower grill for 3rd Gen.

And the quote missing from within my quote:

 

Got my pro C2 fogs mounted. Looking forward to getting them wired up.

 

They didn't say it was more expensive. They said "small costs money". So they will be cheaper than larger lights with the same construction, but price and size do not scale at the same rate.

 

Thanks. I may have misinterpreted what DD was saying, although in this context, saying “small costs money” seems irrelevant as any size costs money and the original question was about “small” being more expensive.

Hopefully DD will respond to clear up the confusion.

 

I'm sorry for any confusion. A rock light is obviously not more expensive to make than a pod. As @mynameistory said, it is a question of scale. Even if a quality rock light is 25% the output of a 3-inch pod, it cannot be 25% of the price. It is "expensive" in the context of dollars per lumen.

 

Understood and completely agree. Thanks for the clarification.

 

Anyone else's fogs flicker? Never noticed it when I had Pro's on but certainly on my Max's - not sure if it was the intensity of the light that made it more apparent or not.

Usually happens when I first turn it on - it's a very faint/subtle flickering and it only lasts a second or two. The only other time I can replicate it is when I put it either in reverse or drive, let the truck roll a little, then hit the brakes: it'll flicker after the stop. I checked the mounts and resistance on the screw holding it, everything is good - no shaking there.

As far as setup, I have a '20 pro with 7k miles, just checked battery and it's still good. Max replaced the Rigid Pros, direct swap. Also have Pros as ditch lights and DD30 light bar, but no flickering from any of the lights when I turn them on/off.

 

We do a lot of testing on vehicles before we roll anything out, Max included. However, on certain Tacos, there is a faint flicker. As you said, it is hit-or-miss but it can be noticeable. We resolved this already in production with a tweak to the circuit, but if you are experiencing it, please contact us and we can provide an inline adapter to completely eliminate it, at no cost. Thanks!

 

I've noticed the same thing in my 4Runner. Like you said, it's only upon startup or when the engine is off. I suspect there's some sort of voltage stabilization in the fog light circuit that's not apparent with halogen bulbs. It goes away after a few seconds. Don't think it's anything to worry about.

 

@Diode Dynamics I did want to ask, do you use programmable logic for your control circuits? If not, have you considered it? Perhaps it’s too expensive or makes waterproofing more difficult?

 

For controlling what exactly? The circuits are "programmed" in a sense manually through the circuit design, but they do not have any firmware. We write plenty of firmware for other products when it's needed here though. Curious as to what would be controlled.

 

Thermal regulation? Voltage regulation? Startup?

I guess I’m trying to understand three different things:

1. What are the specific challenges of miniaturization of a pod circuit board? What takes up the space or is hard to work around when attempting to shrink?

2. The flicker thing. You solve with an inline module? Could that be potentially solved with firmware?

3. If you used programmable logic on all boards would you get any economy of scale across the product line and the only difference between sport, pro and max other than badging would be emitters and firmware?

I’m sure most of the above is hyper naive and might be touching on IP boundaries, it’s all just curiosity from an EE major who never got to do anything with hardware.

 

Anyone looking to upgrade their DD SS3 Yellow Pros to Maxs? I know a guy that will buy your Pros

Anyway, are we all waiting for the Yellow Max data review?


Im definitely no electronics expert but i think firmware and programming logic to the boards is unnecessary. Pretty sure they're keeping it simple with resistors and diodes to keep the power clean so it doesn't flicker.

 

Thanks to modern integrated circuits, those items are all handled in a manner that doesn't require firmware - either within the chips themselves or with manual control circuitry.

The flicker has to do with saturation of the inductor in certain scenarios, and was resolved with a slight change in inductor value.

Miniaturizing a circuit board isn't too difficult, to an extent- as long as all the chips you need can fit. Adding anything that uses firmware would require more space, especially if you need room to connect a programming header for example. The backlight feature of the SSC2 made tings more tricky, but manageable. For our designs, we always decide on the optic size first, then build the lamp around that, then see how much room we have to work with on the circuit.

Now, miniaturizing the actual electronic components is a different story. There are usually smaller chips that do the same thing as bigger ones, but they're a lot more expensive (like that inductor I mentioned). Since you're an EE: a certain size diode may only handle 3 amps. Another supplier makes one in the same size that handles 4 amps. It just costs twice as much. So if we run out of room, we would just have to pay more to do the same thing. This is a concern with designing a rocklight vs a larger pod, but usually a rocklight uses less power too. So this really only comes into play when you want to increase the power level in the same size product. And if the design is good, you'll be limited in thermal capacity way before any electronic component in the product maxes out.

The power level of each circuit is not set with firmware, it is set with the control components in the circuit itself. (You "set" the circuit using a specific value chip next to the driver circuit.) There are many shared components between Sport/Pro/Max, but higher power levels require larger and more expensive components, so it wouldn't be ideal to fully share a circuit. Since we have to place different LEDs, we also place different components. Careful engineering in this respect is one of the reasons we can price our products so aggressively.

I hope that all makes sense, I may have gotten a bit wordy.

Paul

 

We appreciate the "wordy" explanations.

Two questions. I get the light flicker on my 4Runner when starting with the lights on only and was wondering what needs to be said in the message to inquire about the solution, albeit it's not a huge deal for me. Also, I was looking up the specs on the amp rating on the Pro's I recently put on for ditch lights and would like to know if the rating is for a single or pair of lights.

Thanks again for the knowledge good sir!

 

I measured the stable Pro output at 2.6A per lamp. Spec states 2.7A, so the rating is per lamp.

 

Subbed for more info. In the market for fog lights.

-B

 

Might want to read at least the first few pages of this thread. The OP keeps it up to date and everything you probably need to know is there. If you don't find what you need in this thread, words fail me. It's probably the most exhaustive discussion of LED pod fog lights on the planet. Trust me, you'll find it. If you don't, post your specific question after you've read it.

 

five words

di ode dy nam ics

english is hard