Ebay LED Headlight kit arrived

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Since LED headlights aren't at the Hot Topic store and being discussed on this forum, figured I pickup a cheap ebay kit and try it out on my truck. I am not going to mention any ebay vendors or online stores but I was able to find the same product that a popular LED online store was selling on an ebay chinese vendor for half the price.

Sent via China Post then through USPS.
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In the box. The braided part is what allows it to be installed in tight spots while providing heat sink cooling for the LED's.
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I originally bought these but there was not enough clearance between the headlight bracket and headlight housing.
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I removed the bracket since it was still tight to fit the bulb through and pushed the heatsink braid to the top of the headlight housing to help with cooling.
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I'll upload nighttime and cut-off pics later.
 
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I won't go into the discussion, but seriously will wait for the beam patter pictures.
 
I truly hope you don't melt your headlight housing or catch your engine bay on fire. I also hope that you don't blind other drivers on the road.

It looks as if that copper piece may be attached to the heat sink, so the braided wire should be in complete contact with it, not away from it. The difference, you might ask? Conductance will dissipate much more heat than convection, for such a small surface area.

Personally, I upgraded my VERY poor OEM bulbs with retrofit HIR bulbs. They're noticeably brighter, but maintain the same pattern and have no affect on other drivers.
 
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Is this serious or just for fun? You should take a shot of the LED vs the old bulb you had in there against a wall or garage door.
 
Well after trying them out at night...I'm ripping them off. Light direction and beam pattern is so bad I'm illuminating every road sign on the freeway and I'm lucky I didn't get cursed at or pulled over.

I'm trying HIR2 9012 bulbs next.
 
Originally Posted By: wirelessF
Well after trying them out at night...I'm ripping them off.


Thank you!
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I'd love to see pictures of the beam against a wall before you remove them. Just to see how wonky they are.
 
Consumer Reports latest issue discussed lighting technology and concluded that the good old halogen bulb was not bested by HID and LED options. In my own case I have found that my switch from H11 to H9 bulbs was far superior to the HID low beam in my Audi v Ford Edge, PT Cruiser and Z3.
 
9012 bulbs can be safely used in most 9006 low beam applications provided you have good condition oem housings with no clouding or haze. They must have a full cover over the bulb in the housing since 9012 doesn't have any cover over the end of the bulb.


If you need new housings, make sure you get oem housings. Pretty much all aftermarket housings are un safe junk.
 
Whoa...HIR bulbs are pricey but picked up a pair for $55 at NAPA which is similarly priced to Silverstars when I was looking around. What I received were in a big box with Wagner packaging but when I opened the box and hidden under the paper wrap were Made in Germany Philips 9012 bulbs. Did the mod, was able to install it before going to work and took some dark backroads home. I'm impressed, I should've done this mod a long time ago instead of fooling around with lame HID and LED kits. Nice beam throw, pattern goes slightly past the cutoff but not wildly excessive with HID or LED kits.
 
Originally Posted By: rfeir
Consumer Reports latest issue discussed lighting technology and concluded that the good old halogen bulb was not bested by HID and LED options. In my own case I have found that my switch from H11 to H9 bulbs was far superior to the HID low beam in my Audi v Ford Edge, PT Cruiser and Z3.

I switched H11 to H9(Osram and Philips) on my daughter 2014 Accord, it is a little brighter than original H11 but nowhere near the HID of my S2000.

I think the HID projector of S2000 is 1 of the best, at least it is on the top 3-5 projectors now and it was the best 10-15 years ago.
 
Just noticed while I was there Autozone finally carrying the 9011 and 9012 philips bulbs in store. Very hard to find these locally. If you buy the Wagner of Amazon it's cheaper re boxed Phillips.
 
For some reason auto parts stores will not put them on the rack with the rest of the gimmicky bulbs. Interesting why these bulbs have a narrow application use.

Interestingly despite Toshiba HIR's being discontinued, you can still get John Deere HIR's that have the Toshiba bulb design.
 
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Do some reading on the HIR bulbs before you jump into them. It's been a while, but iirc the old Toshiba bulbs were outclassed by more recent designs. However, the 9011 and 9012 designator IS HIR, so a bulb that says HIR may not actually be "HIR" in practice and just meets the minimum spec of 9011/9012.

I will say, the candlepower guys are turning into pundits who badmouth something based upon mantra rather than practical experience. I personally hate [censored] HID's, or the ricer crowd throwing 8k eBay kits into their 90's Honda with fogged lenses. There ARE hid kits retrofitted into factory housings with near factory beam control. Not every kit and not every car, but its possible.
 
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