Front Sidelights LEDs?

andrew muir

Club Member
Hi had the joy of having my front park/sidelights go on my car yesterday!
Which created a short so took out fuses leaving me with no rear lights as well.:(

Removed the offending lamps which resolved issue with tail lights.
I was wondering if LED T4 bulbs would be suitable (more reliable & safer alternative)?
Has anyone tried to use LEDs and anyone have recomendations and links to suppliers?

Cheers Andrew :thumbs:
 

Aceman

Well-Known Forum User
I run LED side lights and they're fine.

Also run LED indicators, but they needed a resistor in the setup to fool the flasher unit.

Don't know much about the setup as an auto electrician fitted it all, but the bulbs were just normal LED bulbs from a motorfactors..

Works a charm really, and drains nothing (the main beams feel like there is improvement, and also the windscreen wipers seem to work better when running with the lights on now. I was told this may be the case as they run through the same fuse or something? Anyhow, nothing to substantiate that, just that to me the seem/feel like they work better!)..
 

andrew muir

Club Member
OK replaced my sidelights all ok, nice and bright good enough for daytime running lights and only 1 wat of power.
Also replaced the rear taillights with 2 watt red led and red led Cree tail/stop lights and all working great. The brake lights light up about 0.5 sec quicker than regular bulbs and also have a good difference in intensity between tail and brake.
They look totally standard just tail 20% brighter and stop 10% brighter but only 5 watts max..
 

AliK

Vehicle Dating Officer
Staff member
Club Member
Andrew, I've been reading about the Cree LEDs being the best on the market. Do you have a link / details of which one you ordered?

BTW, have you tried your hazard lights since changing the indicator bulbs? When I put LEDs in mine, they were fine for indicating but the hazards were incredibly slow in flashing. Or did you use LEDs with built in parallel resistors?

To get it's timing, the circuit discharges a capacitor through the bulbs as it's load / resistance which affects the timing of the flash I.e Flash "on" Time = Resistance x Capacitance. [Or in the case of LEDs think of it as T= ((battery volts - 1.7) squared) / watts) x C]
 

andrew muir

Club Member
I have left the signal lights alone as I am aware of issues and putting in resistors seem daft when you are trying to reduce current etc.
I bought my LEDs from http://www.bettercarlighting.co.uk/index.php?act=viewCat&catId=48

Speak to Gill he advised me on what to get and I did have a faulty LED he replaced next day and included a spare, really good service but they are fairly expensive.
I am pleased as they look really standard just brighter!!:thumbs:
 

AliK

Vehicle Dating Officer
Staff member
Club Member
Thanks Andrew, this is great!

Agree re. adding resistors !

Glad you got a good result! :thumbs:
 

AliK

Vehicle Dating Officer
Staff member
Club Member
Always go for the colour of the lens, mine were the red ones and work really well.


Let me echo that!

To make white light, the LED is producing / mixing red blue and green with quite narrow bandwidths of each. The red lens absorbs anything but red (hence looks red) so a lot of the light output of the LED is being lost. By contrast, a red LED will have all it's red wavelengths pass through your lens.

I have yellow LEDs that aren't as bright as the white ones. But when I tested them in my indicators, the yellows appeared as bright (totally subjective of course) and a lot warmer yellow. The white ones have a cool tint once behind the lens and make your lights look very non stock when lit.
 

toopy

Club Member
Let me echo that!

To make white light, the LED is producing / mixing red blue and green with quite narrow bandwidths of each. The red lens absorbs anything but red (hence looks red) so a lot of the light output of the LED is being lost. By contrast, a red LED will have all it's red wavelengths pass through your lens.

I have yellow LEDs that aren't as bright as the white ones. But when I tested them in my indicators, the yellows appeared as bright (totally subjective of course) and a lot warmer yellow. The white ones have a cool tint once behind the lens and make your lights look very non stock when lit.

:thumbs: nice explanation, cheers
 
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