Thread: Head light globe upgrades D2a ??

I used these

2X H7 COB CREE Car LED Headlight Kit 6500K High/Low Beam 200W 20000LM DC 9-30V | eBay

Originally Posted by Bohica

I used these

2X H7 COB CREE Car LED Headlight Kit 6500K High/Low Beam 200W 20000LM DC 9-30V | eBay

I wonder in the real world how these will cope with the high speed turbo fan. they certainly are cheap.

Have you taken another car like a sedan out for a drive yet and had some one else drive your disco towards you from the other directon or follow you close behind to see how they affect the eyes of the other drivers.

Can you do a real road test and honestly let us know if there are ok for the other road users with you as the other driver? I'd be interested to now be cause what Ive experienced, they are not good for other road users so I never fitted them

Originally Posted by Bohica

I used these

2X H7 COB CREE Car LED Headlight Kit 6500K High/Low Beam 200W 20000LM DC 9-30V | eBay

That fan won’t last long if you go offroad.

Love the claims - 200w, 20,000 lumen, Phillips chips. Rubbish! (Aimed at seller)

That’s not even close! If it was they are nearly 10x above the legal output for road use...

Originally Posted by Tombie

That fan won’t last long if you go offroad.

Love the claims - 200w, 20,000 lumen, Phillips chips. Rubbish! (Aimed at seller)

That’s not even close! If it was they are nearly 10x above the legal output for road use...

I've had similar units in the main beam for 3 years or so. Been offroad, fans are fine.
Of course the out put claims are rubbish. The new high beams are nice and bright.

I just want to share my own personal experience in using and selling HID LED parts as professional trade over the last 10 years.

- On the D2 1999-2002 pre-facelift, there is very limited option to fit new and high quality globes into the socket without cutting at the back wall. There is only halogen or LED short base globes could go in its very limited space behind the headlight. There is no HID option to fit straight into the headlight unless you cut a hole on the back wall.

To stick with halogen, I recommend you stay at 55w or maximum 60w level.

Going to 90/100w H4 Hi/low halogen (which I believe they were produced for some big spot lights) will not be a good solution because the whole wiring loom in any car would be rated for 55w-60w halogen headlight only. Although you found only the melt socket in front, in fact the whole loom and wiring behind already had a high stress of heat and they could make trouble any where in the line at any time. Also the globe will heat up and burn the headlight casing.

Upgrading the loom and use 90/100w globe is fine in term of power because the new loom will take main power from battery and only has signal control from headlight. However, all stress now will be pushed into the headlight casing which would toast or crack your headlight casing at no time. Better is looking for an alternative options with maximum power level of 55W - 60W.

- Upgrading to HID will be the best in term of focusing light and distance light.

At this moment, LED performance in the headlight industry still is a bit behind the HID (it was very far behind HID if we count back about 3 years ago or more) and I do not think it could fill the gap in the next few years no matter whatever numbers they could claim.

- HID has more flexible choices than LED in term of colors for different purposes: 3000K (yellow for folight), 3700k (real halogen look HID, super rare), 4300K (Sunlight white) - kind of halogen look and classic look, 5000k (Pure white) - this is standard white from manufacture in Europe between 2003 - 2015 (roughly), 6000k (Diamond White - modern white with almost only 1-2% of blueish light), 8000k (Crystal White - modern white with about 5% of blueish light), 10000k, 12000k, 15000k...

- LED has its own advantage that it will instantly light up 100% power (but eventually will need about the same time as HID to stabilise its color and performance). But LED has less flexible color options.

Also LED will have much less focusing point IF you fit into a car headlight casing without a projector glass, you then will see the light more blurry on the front rather than focusing like a HID in the same case. If you buy a very cheap LED kit then the result will be no question.

If fitting LED in the cars with projector glass, then LED would be equal or even better than HID in some cases.

For example, we normally could use both HID and LED to fix and fit replacement and upgrade kits on European cars such as Mercedes AMG, ML series, Maserati, Porsche, BMW, Range Rover, Discovery 3, 4.

- In a D2 and D2A, neither low beam or high beam with HID or LED is legal in Aus or Germany (or in the world) if we fit directly the HID or LED into the headlight because the D2 did not come with PROJECTOR GLASS as the next model D3, D4, D5.

However, in a real life situation, we can see that many people fitting directly a HID kit of 4300K (Sunlight White) with Super Fast ballasts HID 35W / or maximum 55W with a proper professional adjustment in both low beam and high beam would result in a very happy driver (he will quickly see what he needs to see, and not badly reflecting road signs like other colors with higher Kevin number like 5000k or 6000k) and all happy front coming drivers including police men (they will see the car just like using a normal bright halogen globe without glaring into their eyes).

Just for reference, in the past we had the 3700K real halogen look in super HID performance kits. It was a perfect option on any Classic cars or motors who want to remain classic look halogen of the light but with a lot stronger performance of HID. Unfortunately, the market was just going for more modern look, so we could not convince the manufacture to keep sending us the 3700K for longer (we sold to some classic motor groups). So the 3700K real halogen HID was gone on the Earth by about 2014-2015. Currently, only 4300K is available as commercial option with the closest look to the halogen.

I fitted LED globes in my high beams 3 years and about 140,000 ago, Plenty of rough tracks as well.
I have had to replace 2x low beam H7 globes but the LED's are still going strong.
As far as being a hazard to other road users having LED or H7 globes is irrelevant because I ALWAYS dip my lights early (Unlike Many other road users) So No dramas in that area.

- On the D2 1999-2002 pre-facelift, there is very limited option to fit new and high quality globes into the socket without cutting at the back wall. There is only halogen or LED short base globes could go in its very limited space behind the headlight. There is no HID option to fit straight into the headlight unless you cut a hole on the back wall.

I have had LED with passive cooling in my D2.

I currently have 55W HID which fit without any mods or hole cutting.

They are cheapo Ebay ones but work well .
Regards PhilipA

Hey PhilipA, did you upgrade your wiring with this mod or just leave it standard?