Thread: H7 Halogen to LED bulb upgrade

Before jumping ship to a white light produced by LED or HID lights here is something to think about.
A few years ago I won a set of FRYLYT spotties, they are a halogen globe and I already had HID which I was happy with.
I was told the FRYLYT would be better and check them out so I did and they are.
Its all to do with the way your eyes see different colour light spectrum and how that makes it harder to see different colors with a white light.
The whiter the light the less you see brown and red tones in the distance , what colour are most Australian native animals?
I have spoken to a few guys that go hunting and they all confirm that animals are much easier to spot with halogen lights rather than led or hid lights.
When I swopped over the lights I did some research on light spectrums and found this to be true according to all the latest resaech

The 4000K versions should be more useful than the 6200K versions away from the suburbs.

it also depends on each person. different people see colours differently. its not a one size fits all.

I'd need to check the latest, but up until recently at least anything above 4300K wasn't legal for on road use. I'm seeing some newer vehicles that appear to have a higher colour temp as OE so I wonder if that's now been changed with the emerging prevalence of factory-fit LEDs? Personally I think that anything much over ~4500K is too blue and both washes out and glares with high fatigue. I'd rather have good quality lighting than bulk brightness lighting.

Maybe I'm missing something here. I've got early D2 factory headlights in my D1a (plug and play) and good quality, ADR legal Philips incandescent bulbs (std wattage, +130%) and I really don't feel like I need aux lights or anything upgraded. I actually prefer them to the HIDs in my RRS. Maybe it's a personal preference thing?

Like everything it does come down to personal preference but in my experience good quality halogen lights are less tiring on the long hauls, the white light does seem to be better when just comparing different lights for a short period but in my opinion that changes after spending more than half an hour scanning the side of the road for skippy. 3 hours into a night drive and the difference is significant

Originally Posted by DiscoClax

I'd need to check the latest, but up until recently at least anything above 4300K wasn't legal for on road use. .....

That would have been because halogens natively produce a lot of UV, and you don't want UV light blaring directly into your eyes over a long period of time.
So the halogen globe has to have the UV component attenuated in some way.
Kelvin rating can roughly be translated into the various light specra, where a colder K value equated to more blue light emitted from the globe.
With filtration, you get leakage(unless cost is unlimited!) and with halogen globes cost is a major factor. So the filtration(ie, the product that we see as the glass section of the globe) has to be cheap enough to buy.
So the regulations would have been set up in that manner because for a halogen globe to produce colder than 4300K almost certainly meant that it was also emitting a lot of UV.

All that changed when LEDs became a viable option for vehicle headlights too.
LEDs don't really need 'filtration' as such. They produce LED chips that emit light specrum with quite high accuracy. So the overall cost benefit is easier to implement.

Cheapo Chinese LED manufacturers just produce copies of what LED chip makers design and may not produce exact copies of those LED chips.
So you can set an LED chip to produce higher Kelvin values(ie. more blue) but still produce little to no UV emissions.

I've always found that warmer light fatigues my eyes .. in a sense makes me drowsier.
Whiter/bluer/greener light lets me see more detail, keeps me awake much easier .. so on 12+ hour drive I feel even less 'fatigued' then I used to before I started using LEDs.

I do the same at home too. All my house lights are basically white light. Only the bedrooms have warm lights(still using CFLs).
Best change I have done to my living room has been to switch to white(6000K+) globes, which helps me read now.
The reactions from my family are interesting tho:
Dad(84), brother, and kids like them. But my sister can't stand them. She reckons too harsh.

Why choose FYRLYT? - Light quality beyond LED & HID!
Some good reading regarding how different lights work and how color ranges affect what you see

Thanks everyone for the informative, robust conversation. I did some research beforehand and for me, the brand, design and rating was what i was looking for. I have tested how much heat they emit, both from a lens and heatsink perspective, as i had been driving for almost an hour when we got home. The LED's are definitely cooler temperature wise and the type of heatsink works well and is not as warm as i was anticipating or had planned for.

The reason i chose a screw on heatsink block at the base of the bulb, against the strap type, was that it is a fixed unit and not floating. Any mods i install, I like to have fastened safely, with minimal chance of movement (call it a personal choice).

I ha thinking of installing similar bulbs into the high beam, as they are H7 as well, but not in any rush. I'm really happy with the result and they suit my needs.

cheers
Geoff