5 replies to this topic

[hanra]

Has anyone sourced some effective LED bulbs for the stop/tail/Indicator lamps in an LH/LX? 

 

I tried some many years ago in a different car and beam spread was terrible so changed back to incandescent lamp. Thought perhaps the tech may have improved? 

[76lxhatch]

Beam spread? Tail light lenses are diffused, there shouldn't be a beam as such.

 

I have some cheapies which work OK, the biggest thing is getting a distinct difference between brake and tail brightness, often they just use an internal resistor which doesn't work great with LEDs. Having a separate high stop helps make it obvious, but in my case that also required some additional diodes to avoid running the high stop when the lights are on...

[hanra]

I had some in my other car years ago and they only seemed to have LED's facing in the rearward direction. So the light was concentrated in that direction but didnt seem to illuminate the entire lens. 

[Heath]

The beam spread is absolutely still an issue in diffused tail light lenses. 
It's very often that you can see an LED globe in a tail light or indicator of an old car from a mile away because of the way they don't "fill" the housing with evenly distributed light. They look like a bright circle in a dull housing.

I personally detest the "digital" on-off behaviour of LED lights so wouldn't want them for any exterior lighting on an old car (and then there's the colour issue). But to each their own.

[hanra]

Might just stick with incandescent.

[76lxhatch]

Oh, I see. I think the problem is that so many LED setups attempt to aim the light directly out of the lens, instead of back at the reflector like they should. Conversion "bulbs" are usually not so bad in that respect as they have individual LEDs pointing in all directions, make sure they're not uni-directional.

 

 

edit: actually it just occurred to me also that I bought coloured LEDs for both brake/tail and indicators. The idea was to help with vivid colour even through somewhat faded lenses.

Edited by 76lxhatch, 09 April 2024 - 06:45 PM.