Life expectancy for Halogen headlight bulbs

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Originally Posted by BradC

The laws of physics disagree. A filament provides a 360 degree light source of a specific length in a specific location and the manufacturer of the housing and reflector has designed around that. It is impossible for a LED to provide the same light in the same location. At best they can provide one LED element with up to 180 degree of emission in approximately the same location, however any LED placed to emit the rear half of that 180 degrees is going to be necessarily displaced by the thickness of the LED, PCB and heatsink. That offsets the light source and its reflected output is going to move vs the approved filament. Also, while it is theoretically possible for a LED to emit 180 degrees of light in practice the light is often weaker toward the extremes due to the encapsulation.

The Narva bulb I just looked at has part of the heatsink as a "shade" to try and provide some shaping of the beam, which is great for they reflectors they designed around but will be different for others.

They are not ADR approved because they can't be. I guarantee if someone could produce a drop in LED upgrade that could be made to comply they'd have them tested and approved because they'd clean up the market. They are illegal for a very good reason.

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They tried really hard to shape the light. From outside the car the shape of the beam looks identical to the old globes.

From their product website. This has been my experience. I'm not being flashed by oncoming cars. I did try and link a photo but alas...

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PRECISION BEAM CONTROL

Unlike other L.E.D globes, Narva's range feature a halogenlike low beam cut off projection. Oncoming road users won't be dazzled by stray light

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Originally Posted by shack

I'm not sure all LED bulbs are illegal in Australia, but it might be hard or expensive to get ones that are.

Often requiring a completely different reflector assembly, self leveling suspension or self leveling lights.

This is not the ADR website but gives a reasonable overview:

LED Headlights Conversions is Legal in Australia?


And expensive ish:

https://ebay.us/m/RJjsba

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LED bulbs are not illegal per se, but they are when used as replacement in a reflector designed for halogen bulbs.

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Originally Posted by shack

I'm not sure all LED bulbs are illegal in Australia, but it might be hard or expensive to get ones that are.

Often requiring a completely different reflector assembly, self leveling suspension or self leveling lights.

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As you say....an ADR approved LED globe is fine in a reflector designed for LED's.
Fitting an LED in a reflector designed for an incandescent globe isn't legal.

The auto shops don't care "didn't you read the instructions, it states that they don't meet ADR mate". A bit like the high wattage globes 'For competition use only' clearly marked on the box.


Colin

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Originally Posted by gromit

As you say....an ADR approved LED globe is fine in a reflector designed for LED's.
Fitting an LED in a reflector designed for an incandescent globe isn't legal.

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I had a bit of time today so I went through both :
- Vehicle Standard (Australian Design Rule 46/00 - Headlamps) 2006; and
- VEHICLE STANDARD (AUSTRALIAN DESIGN RULE 46/00 - HEADLAMPS) 2006 VOLUME 2.

I wanted to do this because in a round about way a link to this was posted : LED headlights globes adr compliant h1 h3 h4 h7 h11 9005 toyota hilux, landcruiser commodore ranger

Those lamps are *apparently* ADR compliant (whatever that means) because they are stamped with ECE R112. They may even be tested to comply with ECE R112. In this instance it doesn't matter.

Light sources (globes, leds, whatever) are not ADR approved. The headlight is ADR approved. The headlight is the entire assembly from the light source to the reflector and through the lens fitted in the vehicle with a specific configuration.

You can not fit an alternative light source to a fitting designed for a different source and be compliant. Full stop.

Now, can you fit a led to the headlight and have it tested? Sure, the conditions are in Vehicle Standard (Australian Design Rule 46/00 - Headlamps) 2006 section 2. Unless the entire assembly has been tested and passed with the alternative light source, no matter what is stamped on the lamp your headlight does not comply.

This is an interesting quote from : Developing ECE R112 Street-Legal LED Headlight Bulbs: V23 LED Performance
? CN360 LED

Bold emphasis mine.

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Creating Road-Legal LED Bulbs

How should we create a road-legal LED bulb? Let's take a cue from Philips and Osram. On their official websites, we can easily find statements like this regarding their bulbs: The LED bulbs can be used on roads in countries that have given approval, but only on certain vehicle models and with specific types of lighting.

So, the "approved" bulbs are certified only for certain countries and specific lists of compatible vehicles.

Certification involves photometric testing by third-party labs. Philips and Osram collaborate with T?V-S'd, which assesses each headlamp according to their procedures. The main test verifies if the beam patterns meet UNECE R112 standards. If the photometric requirements are satisfied, the headlamp is likely to be included in the "approved" list. Some headlamps will pass, while others may not, largely depending on the optics.


The vehicle compatibility lists provided by Philips and Osram cover over 450 vehicle models. This implies conducting tests on headlights for hundreds of vehicle models, resulting in significant and costly testing expenses. This is a cost that only large companies can afford. If your company has the capability, you can also proceed in this manner.

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Now Australian compliance works the same way, so if your LED vendor runs the testing process with your specific headlamp and it passes then it could be deemed compliant. It may not however, depending on the optics. Narva aren't going to do that because they'd have to test each vehicle separately.

There are no LEDs that you can retrofit into a headlamp designed for an incandescent lamp and remain compliant with the ADRs.

Edit : Oh look. I did that back in 2018 as well : H7 Halogen to LED bulb upgrade
How time flies.

That's all very interesting, but there may or may not be several other things that might not be strictly adr legal that many of us have done. 🤔

Things like engine maps, egr deletes, cat deletes, lifts etc etc. 🫣

in the scheme these mods I feel as though it's fairly minor. I think if you aligned them well there would be no issues.

I can't see the cops taking a dim view of it. 😂

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Originally Posted by Captain_Rightfoot

That's all very interesting, but there may or may not be several other things that might not be strictly adr legal that many of us have done. 🤔

Things like engine maps, egr deletes, cat deletes, lifts etc etc. 🫣

in the scheme these mods I feel as though it's fairly minor. I think if you aligned them well there would be no issues.

I can't see the cops taking a dim view of it. 😂

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That depends which side of the light you are looking from.

The after-market LED's are so annoying I'm tempted to say Qld should have annual road worthiness checks to get them off the roads.

I think headlight globe life is inversely proportional to the difficulty of replacing them. If they're easy to replace, they last a lifetime. [biggrin]

Some cars are easy-peasy, some cars are a downright nightmare!

Peugeot 307 is one of the hardest I've had to do. Retaining clips are far too deep in the rear section of the assembly to get a hand in there and manipulate it.
On the pug, I think I left it until only had 1 low beam remaining working(out of the 4 bulbs in the system) where I switched all to LEDs.
I also remember the old Ford Explorer was a nightmare too. Pretty much entire front body plastics have to come off.

D2/D2 easy-peasy to do. No tools needed. Only reason I switched to LEDs there, they are so much better than halogens.

D2a is a bit more fiddly than D1/D2, but reasonable. I relented and just got LEDs for it ... coz I could! [biggrin]

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Originally Posted by RANDLOVER

The after-market LED's are so annoying I'm tempted to say Qld should have annual road worthiness checks to get them off the roads.

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I had major problems with 2 vehicles in 2 days recently, one approaching and one following. I wasn't driving the RRC.

I suspect they were using low beam but the adjustment was out. The light was blinding.

Re: lamps........... Had hid inserts in the RRC for quite a few years and they were great, had them aimed low and never got flashed.

I learned back then that the K colour rating claimed was largely meaningless.

One of the ballasts failed, I wasn't needing to travel widely at night any more so I got a pair of Wipac (OEM) lamps and fitted normal wattage halogen globes.

The quality of the glass lenses and the reflectors in these things is outstanding and from memory they were $36 each from an oz supplier.

Hi and lo are on relays to suit and the light is fine.

I also still have narva spots modded with hid inserts for the supernova effect for someone approaching who hasn't dipped their lights.

David L

I finally had to replace one of the 250w bulbs in one of my fyrlyts after 14 years and hundreds of hours of use.

Expect to change the HIDs in the next few months as colour is changing notably now.