LED headlight upgrade bulbs that work properly?

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Yukon2000xl

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I have been trying research LED bulbs to upgrade to in my 01 YUKON, and looking at the reviews on Amazon I can't find any that don't have disastrous reviews! I am looking for upgrade bulbs that focus properly with minimal refraction to oncomming drivers, but also provide a decent amount of light! All the reviews have good but some really bad statements ( dark spots, bulb failure, etc) I know Amazon reviews are a mess and regularly are for variation of the same product eg 9005, 9006, 880 etc this is a major flaw In Amazons review system. I just want bulbs for my high and low and also a decent upgrade for the fog lights high out put LED 880's! I see some have fans some have a braided heatsink, what works for you guys? I don't mind paying $50- $60 a pair but they need to be reliable at least to there claimed life expectancy, they have different controllers, led types, 360° bulbs, there are so many cheep knock offs it's hard to know who's selling the good stuff and whose selling cheap Chinese garbage sold with fake or similar brand names. Any one found a decent brand and type that works with the factory headlight assembly? Thanks
I'm running opt7 low beams in projector housings and I never had such great lightings.Properly adjusted I do not annoy any oncoming traffic either .Im also running the same brand in my fog lights with equally good results ,both over a year in ,no problems (and I run on country roads that aren't nice and smooth).


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tRidiot

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I have OPT7 high and low beams in projectors. I think I am getting some condensation inside the housings. Also not as bright as I want, not by a mile. But, they are black housings, so maybe that is cutting it down some. I just ordered the new housings from Amazon from earlier in the thread - projectors without the halos, so maybe they will be brighter.
 

PNWMuseumman

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Amazon is a great resource for a lot of things but I'm not so sure I'd go there for the better-quality LED bulbs that will perform well in factory reflector housings.

Check out headlightrevolution.com and see many of their very informative videos on YouTube. They convinced me to try one of the LED brands that they market: Supernova v3. Good build quality, very good beam pattern performance in a reflector housing, easy to install and not crazy expensive. If I receive them this weekend, I plan to install by Sunday. Will post pics including before & after.

What's the word on the Supernova V3's?
 

08HoeCD

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What's the word on the Supernova V3's?


I love them. See my notes and photos:


You guys know way more about this than I do, but so far I'm happy with these LEDs.

Here are two unedited images from about 7am this morning. One image shows the headlight beam pattern on my garage door from about 15 ft away (driveway slants a bit), and other image is when I parked at work. I gotta find a clear, white wall sometime....

I'm no expert on headlights or lighting technology but I like these LEDs. Beam cutoff is good, spread is good-----both significantly better than with halogen bulbs. No glare towards pedestrians or other drivers. Much longer & brighter throw.

As good as HID? No. Better than halogen bulbs? Yes, and are 100% plug-n-play.

I know there are projector retrofit kits out there for around $1K, but I'm not spending that on headlights when I can get maybe 80% (??) of that performance for under $150 simply by adding good-quality LED bulbs with integrated drivers. Simple, easy, and not expensive.

View attachment 185820 View attachment 185821
 

BlueCollarTahoe

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i got some cougar motor LEDs that i love! perfect amount of brightness. i had to take apart the housing to make them fit with the heatsink. was simple, had to buy the small bit open the housing put the bulb in then close it up. plug and play. was 45 dollars on amazon.
 

Watt52

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Here is a quick comparison between our lights next to the opt7.
You can tell that the opt7 is the brightest one is the picture where you are looking in front of the car. This is done in purpose to make it look that way.


View attachment 184399

For the cutoff beam pattern you can see the opt7 is unexistent. All you see is the brightness and cutoff of our light and the unnecessary glare produced by the opt7.

View attachment 184400

We did a lux test on each of the bulbs at just 10-15 ft away and the opt7 was putting only 229 lux, the halogen was 338 and our light did 1059.
 

petethepug

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The posts that LEDs are mounted to spray light like water from a leaky hose. EVERY LED bulb configuration on the post is different depending on the manufacturer. Ironically it’s all those leaks that scatter unwanted light into all the uninitiated areas that make the suck as retrofit units.

Unlike the LED, which are not actually bulbs, conventional DS2 HID bulbs or incandescent bulbs are standardized and regulated to the industry. The conventional upgrade for stock bulbs like Siverstar provide another 20-25% more usable light, but last half as long.

HID provide the cleanest, closest to daylight color currently available but require a (high voltage) ballast. In spite of this, their service life can exceed a decade or more. They don’t scatter excessive light to oncoming drivers and can mimic the light dispersion of a conventional bulb.

Pair a reputable HID set up with a known high performance projection unit like morimoto and you’re set for life with lighting that exceeds industry standards. Morimoto seems to have perfected and LED projection unit. I do hope this helps those looking to improve what came standard on their trucks and steer them away from installing the embarrassing Ricky racer led retrofit kits. Just do it right the first time knowing you can sell a set of custom HID projection headlight units for what you paid for them when selling your vehicle.


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