LED VS HID

[87elco]

Idk I'm still probably going to get the 2stroke 2.0s I'm too lazy take off the bumper again,bake the headlights, change the projector put it all together and then wire the hids

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[NoHonor937]

Ah but that it would be as easy as that! Try the basil noodle dish instead of the tarragon one. Not so simple with installing headlamps.

In any case, I'd love to see a more definitive source posted here by pro's who are paid to do the comparison for us. There must be some good article somewhere about LED vs HID performance under various parameters and conditions that is a little more objective than us enthusiasts slapping them in on a Sunday afternoon and falling in love with either because frankly anything is better than those OEM halogens. In any case, I went with the Morimoto H11 5500 HID retrokit and so far I'm very impressed. But after hitting the learning curve and installing - a combined effort that took most of my afternoon - I'm certainly not going to sink another chunk of change and time into installing LEDs to see how they compare.

Lol it took you more than an hour to install hids? It took me 10 mins to install my LEDs because it uses same connector and projector housing. Mine put the light right where the old headlights used to shine so I didn’t have to anything. Whatever you wanna spend money on I guess.

 

[86salmon]

Lol it took you more than an hour to install hids? It took me 10 mins to install my LEDs because it uses same connector and projector housing. Mine put the light right where the old headlights used to shine so I didn’t have to anything. Whatever you wanna spend money on I guess.

It took ten minutes to switch out led to a drop in hid set up at the same price point for considerably better output.

The pics I've seen of a five minute h9 mod have better throw than led with similar output at a better price.

Not all bulbs are built the same especially with led. The hierarchy of bulbs established in this thread is pretty spot on.

In all with led, ymmv

 

[dallasjhawk]

Lol it took you more than an hour to install hids? It took me 10 mins to install my LEDs because it uses same connector and projector housing. Mine put the light right where the old headlights used to shine so I didn’t have to anything. Whatever you wanna spend money on I guess.

HE DID A RETROFIT. That involves removing the headlight, baking the headlight, taking it apart, changing the projector and putting it all back together and installing the headlight back in the car. Secondly LED drops are trash, there is no way around it. They all suck, they all scatter light and they all dump it right in front of the car.

That is incorrect. They work in the rain. I don’t know who keeps saying that but it is downright wrong. I just installed mine on Sunday and used them in the rain on monday and they worked great. If they didn’t work in the rain then car manufactures WOULDNT put them on their cars and they wouldn’t sell. Stop listening to them and just try it for yourself. They work in fog too.

Have you tried HID? If not then you need stop spouting crap. LED drop ins suck, and you will see why when you try an HID in the rain. And factory LEDs are different than the crap you dropped in your headlight. They have specific housings for the led to make the beam spread correctly Manufacturers aren't putting $30 drop in leds in there cars. Show me an LED beam that is that bright, with that throw and that width

 

[NoHonor937]

HE DID A RETROFIT. That involves removing the headlight, baking the headlight, taking it apart, changing the projector and putting it all back together and installing the headlight back in the car. Secondly LED drops are trash, there is no way around it. They all suck, they all scatter light and they all dump it right in front of the car.

Have you tried HID? If not then you need stop spouting crap. LED drop ins suck, and you will see why when you try an HID in the rain. And factory LEDs are different than the crap you dropped in your headlight. They have specific housings for the led to make the beam spread correctly Manufacturers aren't putting $30 drop in leds in there cars. Show me an LED beam that is that bright, with that throw and that width

Kinda hard to compare when you have pitch black area. I live in a civilized area with street lamps so I can’t compare my LEDs to yours. And your correct manufactures are not putting in $30 LEDs. Their using $5 LEDs instead because manufacture use the lowest cost materials to produce something. Basic economics. Third let’s compare the marginal benefits of LEDs vs. HIDS
When replacing halogens.

LEDs: cheaper, more competitive market options, plug and play, lower power use, simple install, work in all weather types including rain and snow, brighter, last 50x longer, light up street signs without blinding traffic. No glare. and they don’t throw light like you claim.

Now HIDS: further throw.
That’s is literally it. In every other category the LEDs won.

 

[dallasjhawk]

Kinda hard to compare when you have pitch black area. I live in a civilized area with street lamps so I can’t compare my LEDs to yours. And your correct manufactures are not putting in $30 LEDs. Their using $5 LEDs instead because manufacture use the lowest cost materials to produce something. Basic economics. Third let’s compare the marginal benefits of LEDs vs. HIDS
When replacing halogens.

LEDs: cheaper, more competitive market options, plug and play, lower power use, simple install, work in all weather types including rain and snow, brighter, last 50x longer, light up street signs without blinding traffic. No glare. and they don’t throw light like you claim.

Now HIDS: further throw.
That’s is literally it. In every other category the LEDs won.

wrong. HIDs drop ins take literally 10 minutes to install as well. And in a pitch black place this is exactly what you want, I dont even need high beams so its the perfect example but Ill put more below. I had an led set that burnt out in 45 days, 2nd set lasted 6 months. Im 2 years in on my HIDs on my civic and my TSX is on its original HIDs 15 years later. HID do not glare, did you not see the cutoff in my picture. I dont blind anyone and never get flashed. oh and you what LED drop ins cant do? melt the ice on your headlights. Also here, in the city. Dont be mad. The facts are and even TRS will tell you that HIDs are still the superior light in automotive headlights.

 

[Leef]

Lol it took you more than an hour to install hids? It took me 10 mins

I am duly impressed and rightly humbled. That said, I will admit that had I only popped in xenon bulbs like that and not bothered wiring the ballasts, AMP lighter, relays and harness - not to mentioned the time I took to study the install before doing it - I'm fairly certain it would have taken me ten minutes as well. Okay - maybe fifteen since I admit you're probably more under-the-hood proficient than I. But it begs the question - and I'm not being rhetorical - that if you only popped in the LED bulbs but did not upgrade the OEM wiring or address cooling issues with that wiring, is that not inviting an issue of overheating the electronics behind the bulbs? From what I understand, while the LED bulbs are generally much cooler than halogen or xenon, they produce a lot of heat on the wiring.

You sound like the expert on LED vs HID, but frankly I question the facts you are throwing around that seem to hard-sell LEDs. And that's fine - I don't expect to come into the forums and get much more than a general consensus of impressions and opinions. A link to a safety study is even better. But what I read from you seem to be in the realm of opinion, while Dallasjhawk has provided some objective data (images) that I frankly find more compelling. Could you, NoHonor, provide more objective evidence regarding your claims of LED performance in various types and intensities of precipitation?

Dallasjhawk's observations make sense to me. I have a headlamp I wear when camping and it has mixed LED and halogen lighting which can be operated separately (which is roughly equivalent to the xenon in lighting type.) The LED lighting is fine on a clear night and saves me a lot of battery juice, so that's my default. But in the rain, the LED is essentially useless. It's the halogen light that cuts best through the weather. The LED just seems to light up the rain drops in front of me in a vague, bright fog of light, while the halogen lamp, albeit at a warmer temperature, seems to have much more targeted and deep throw, penetrating through the drizzle much more effectively than the LEDs. Again, I'm not saying these are equivalent to automotive headlamps, nor will I presume to extrapolate this to car headlights. But it is this basis of experience I have observed that resonate with Dallas' well-posted observations - and that ultimately informed my choice. I have noticed similar while mountain biking trails at night, and the biking forums have a lot more comments on how LEDs just don't cut it like halogens in precipitation.

Adding to that is my prior experience with the bi-xenon adaptive headlamps on my 2013 Mini Cooper S. They created a sunny day for up to 500 feet in front of my car and never iced up. My Civic SI won't come close to that, but after my first night of driving (and it was raining at that!), I must admit that the xenon H11's are a vast improvement over the stock halogens.

Highly recommended: https://www.theretrofitsource.com/h11-morimoto-elite.html. I called for tech guidance twice and both times TRS was top-notch with short hold times and enthusiastic technicians. Use the following online drop-down options: Ballast 35 watt, Harness HD Relay, Bulbs H11B (not A!) ...and I upped to 5500K (vs the 4500K) to better match the LED DRLs, and no optional capacitor link required.

 

[Snoopyslr]

Kinda hard to compare when you have pitch black area. I live in a civilized area with street lamps so I can’t compare my LEDs to yours. And your correct manufactures are not putting in $30 LEDs. Their using $5 LEDs instead because manufacture use the lowest cost materials to produce something. Basic economics. Third let’s compare the marginal benefits of LEDs vs. HIDS
When replacing halogens.

LEDs: cheaper, more competitive market options, plug and play, lower power use, simple install, work in all weather types including rain and snow, brighter, last 50x longer, light up street signs without blinding traffic. No glare. and they don’t throw light like you claim.

Now HIDS: further throw.
That’s is literally it. In every other category the LEDs won.

You have no idea what you're talking about. Your $30 drop in LEDs have $0.41 SMD diodes in them that the manufacture is paying $0.013 for.

In no situation does LED ever beat HID right now. In another 5-8 years, LED will probably be better than HID, but it still will require a lamp designed for the bulb output. A bulb replacement is never the correct way to upgrade your headlights.

Again, your LEDs can't do this. My Civic and my WRX, both HID retrofit.

 

[Snoopyslr]

Kinda hard to compare when you have pitch black area. I live in a civilized area with street lamps so I can’t compare my LEDs to yours. And your correct manufactures are not putting in $30 LEDs. Their using $5 LEDs instead because manufacture use the lowest cost materials to produce something. Basic economics. Third let’s compare the marginal benefits of LEDs vs. HIDS
When replacing halogens.

LEDs: cheaper, more competitive market options, plug and play, lower power use, simple install, work in all weather types including rain and snow, brighter, last 50x longer, light up street signs without blinding traffic. No glare. and they don’t throw light like you claim.

Now HIDS: further throw.
That’s is literally it. In every other category the LEDs won.

I feel like I need to pick this appart a bit more because so much is wrong here.

more competitive market options
- There are only a few reputable companies making LEDs and OPT7 is not one of them, sorry.

lower power use
- HID use less power than Halogen after initial start up. Roughly 30% less draw after inrush.

work in all weather types including rain and snow
- So does a flashlight. How effective the light is is dependent on throw, foreground casting, and color temp.

brighter
-No, they are not. Again, this is lamp dependent too. Some LED hotspots are brighter than HID, but an average LUX reading across the beam will always be higher in HID.

last 50x longer
-You get what you pay for. Because LED requires cooling, your bulb is only as good as the cooling solution on it. I've had the same Morimoto HID kit on my WRX for 6 years now.

light up street signs without blinding traffic
-Nothing to do with LED bulbs. Has everything to do with lamps. 95% of all drop in LED do not cast light out of the lamp correctly, causing glare.

no glare.
- 100% wrong.

and they don’t throw light like you claim
-Isn't the point of a headlight to output light?

 

[dallasjhawk]

In the examples below you can clearly see the LED dumps all the light right in front of the car. This is a direct comparison from the same car.

 

[NoHonor937]

In the examples below you can clearly see the LED dumps all the light right in front of the car. This is a direct comparison from the same

Is that retrofit? What LEDs are those? Those from a civic headlights?

 

[Leef]

Is that retrofit? What LEDs are those?

I think it is. I was following dallas' posts on this. It's pretty much precisely the way I went with my mine (I posted a link in my previous post to the exact retrofit I bought).

 

[dallasjhawk]

Is that retrofit? What LEDs are those?

that was just the Morimoto HID Elite kit, not the retrofit. The retro has a more crisp cut off and beam pattern like @Snoopyslr (this is his pic)

 

[NoHonor937]

that was just the Morimoto HID Elite kit, not the retrofit. The retro has a more crisp cut off and beam pattern like @Snoopyslr (this is his pic)

What are the LEDs.

 

[Leef]

that was just the Morimoto HID Elite kit, not the retrofit.

I stand corrected. Mine was the elite, which I guess is different than the retrofit. Question for Dallas - are you still using the stock hi-beam halogen bulbs? Is there a simple bulb upgrade to better match the color of the 5500K HIDs?

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