[tsk1979]

Originally Posted by mercedised

Those LED's surely are better buy than halogens. What is the approx. file of these LED's. Normal halogens might conk-off anytime, if this happens with the LED's then it is a expensive affair. One more thing I noticed is that in snowy environment as in your video the glare (from snow) is too much, is it so while driving too? OT: which place was it?

LEDs usually conk out quickly. If they last a few days, they will go 20-30000 hours.
However, the biggest killer is using a light bar caked with mud. With the heat sink obstructed, it will damage the light. thats the only think you have to take care.
As for glare, yes the brighter the light, the more the reflective glare. But camera usually sees more.

P.S: Flood means lesser distance, wider through and spot means long distance and narrow through. Is it?

Yes. Spot also means precise aiming possible with less light spill.

P.P.S: So, are these better buy than HID's for that cost? Can these lights serve as replacements for stock lights, as per you?

They match HID cost when you look at HID bulb kit.
But to get most out of a 8000 INR HID kit(cheapest quality kit you can get), you need to have very very good focusing.
Good quality Aux headlights with projectors and HID fitted cost around 12K a pair.
2 60W LED light bars will also cost the same.
But LED light bars have longer life.
HID has the advantage if bulb goes bad, you can buy the bulbs for 2500 odd rupees

So there are tradeoffs. However with a light bar in combo, you can get a combination of precise focus and spot beam. Even the spot LED bar with 6 LEDs is enough if you use two at each end of the vehicle, eg below each headlight.

As for replacing headlights, well these are self contained units. So its like aux lights. Just like you can drive on good quality lightforce lights without using headlights, you can use these for driving.
But I would recommend using high power lights only where there is no oncoming traffic.
Same is true for lightforce/Hella etc.,
Refrain from using them when there is oncoming traffic.

One area these shine is off road use. The light spread and throw is more than enough to do any night OTR without any issues of visibility.
Many offroaders get the 20W flood bar and fit on undercarriage to illuminate under the vehicle.

[zzzehar]

You can buy them here :

http://www.banggood.com/13_5-Inch-60...0-p-84552.html

To newcomers, BG ships for free. You pay by Paypal and the ones without a credit card like me, can link your ICICI Bank Debit card to your Paypal - the only bank whose debit card is supported by Paypal.

[vishwaschettri]

What better time for this thread when my pair of 27W LED AUX lamps has arrived this morning from China.

tskji I am also a budding flashlight-ohlic and have a few high end (Maglite), Chinese and Indian ones. I understand your predicament, not to share price here but kindly do share what all to look for when selecting a LED lamp. I will try to fill in from my limited exposure

Main component of a LED lamp
1. LED - A good manufacturer is utmost priority. CREE, Samsung & Epistar are some I would put my money on


2. Heat Sink - Equally important. LED's are a tough cookie but heating shortens their life. A well designed & ventilated heatsink is a must. Look for aluminium casings with fins. Below is a well designed heat sink



3. Driver - Since here we would be using 12V supply a driver is not required. For household use a driver is required which is basically a step down transformer. In household LED lamps drivers are the first to conkoff.


4. Housing - Check IP rating for the housing which rates it for ingress against dust and water. IP rated drivers are available as well. Below is a nice graphic IP rating chart I refer. For car/outdoor use at-least IP66 is desired, preferably IP67 for complete peace of mind.



Below are some quick snaps of the LED AUX lamps that arrived today. There are 3W LED each total of 9 in each lamp with flood pattern. Spot beam is also available.



I have hooked them to my inverter battery and will run them continuously for next 12 hrs outside to stress test them.

cheers
Vishwas

[swiftnfurious]

Thank you so much for the review. Frankly, after seeing the pics with the light bar, high beam looks like NO beam!

Is there a way you could show how the light bar is mounted on the Safari? Wanna see how it looks and where exactly is it mounted.

[tsk1979]

Originally Posted by swiftnfurious

Thank you so much for the review. Frankly, after seeing the pics with the light bar, high beam looks like NO beam!

Is there a way you could show how the light bar is mounted on the Safari? Wanna see how it looks and where exactly is it mounted.

Yes, if you look at the video review, there is a picture.
BTW, I found a seller who sells 60W light bars and has good reputation
http://www.ebay.com/itm/60W-6Led-Spo...5baffc&vxp=mtr

100$ + 6$ shipping. Comes to around 7000 INR.
You can buy from there.

I got some pics from him(detailed), and it seems he is sourcing from the same manufacturer(placing of mounts, color of couplings, combo beam config etc.,)

If you want to buy from India I think carledindia sells 80W for 16K and 60W for aorund 13K with bill and one year warranty.

Originally Posted by vishwaschettri

Below are some quick snaps of the LED AUX lamps that arrived today. There are 3W LED each total of 9 in each lamp with flood pattern. Spot beam is also available.
Attachment 1189019
Attachment 1189020
Attachment 1189021
I have hooked them to my inverter battery and will run them continuously for next 12 hrs outside to stress test them.

cheers
Vishwas

I also had one of these. I even drove them to 8W each LED. I think they went "poof!".
Frankly speaking, I was not impressed. The light is good for flood beam, but for range its totally useless.
I would go with minimum 10W LED. Ideally 15-20W LED with a good quality focusing lens would be awesome, but heat dissipation is an issue.
A 10W LED will give light output similar to the nitecore EA4 in high mode(actually little more than that at 700 lumens)

I am trying to get hold of 12W/LED rectangular light 60W which looks like a normal light. Lets see how it goes..

Will be testing that one out too.
Also am exploring in modding the cheap fandyfire kind of flashlights into a 12V driving light. But heat sinking is inadequate for such lights.

Anyways, with the light bar, and 2 spot lights which I can aim/swivel as required, my off road requirements are totally met.

[apachelongbow]

IMO a LED light bar, spot light or auxiliary lamps, are all illegal as per current motor vehicle act. So there is no way we can justify them, even if they are off, when confronted by a police official.
As is, we cant use the LED with oncoming traffic, simply because it becomes very dangerous, completely blinding the opposite driver, and in panic if he switches on his high beam and fog lights, we will be blinded too.

Not sure if LED lights have any scattering, visibility issues in pouring rain, fog, or mist. I am not sure if they are better in foggy conditions compared to a yellow halogen fog light.
Only place when LED can be used is when the road is empty, where in the vehicle's own lights are more than sufficient unless one is driving a Bajaj scooter. Other place may be an offroading trip, but I still question needing very high powered lights for what is essentially a crawling activity.

I also question the effectiveness of the LED, because if they were so good, then they should have been certified and used, primarily by aviation companies, for industrial lighting, railways, ship work etc, where in high powered lighting is needed for safety.

[tsk1979]

Originally Posted by apachelongbow

IMO a LED light bar, spot light or auxiliary lamps, are all illegal as per current motor vehicle act. So there is no way we can justify them, even if they are off, when confronted by a police official.
As is, we cant use the LED with oncoming traffic, simply because it becomes very dangerous, completely blinding the opposite driver, and in panic if he switches on his high beam and fog lights, we will be blinded too.

Not sure if LED lights have any scattering, visibility issues in pouring rain, fog, or mist. I am not sure if they are better in foggy conditions compared to a yellow halogen fog light.
Only place when LED can be used is when the road is empty, where in the vehicle's own lights are more than sufficient unless one is driving a Bajaj scooter. Other place may be an offroading trip, but I still question needing very high powered lights for what is essentially a crawling activity.

I also question the effectiveness of the LED, because if they were so good, then they should have been certified and used, primarily by aviation companies, for industrial lighting, railways, ship work etc, where in high powered lighting is needed for safety.

Well, that way all aux lights are illegal right?
Well actually not. The BIS standard allows for use of Auxillary lights if mounted below a certain height on the vehicle and not used on public roads.
The lights should be kept covered.
And there are lots of very remote terrains where you can do high speed driving, and stock lights are not enough. I have myself done night drives on some desert trails at speed, and the stock lights were very very wanting.
Offroading is not all about rock crawling. Every done a sprint on a salt flat in the night?

Speaking of scatter etc., it all depends on what sort of light you have. LEDs can be precisely focused. I have flashlights which cast out 3000 lumen, in a tiny circle. Move outside the circle and its completely dark.

Last but not the least, I have never seen police guys stopping buses on the highways with 4-6 auxillary lights.

As for aviation, many landing lights nowadays(newer models) are high power LED.
Problem with LED light bars is that you need airflow. So you cannot plonk them inside a vehicle. They have to sit outside like your regular aux lamps.

[apachelongbow]

^^ Still are LED needed in the first place. Especially this talk of replacing projector headlights or OEM ones, with after market LED units. Where will this race to illuminate the night/turn it into day stop?
LED don't have high/low beam, they constantly give a standard beam. At best they can be used as an additional source of light, at present they cannot replace the OEM lights.
In my personal opinion light pollution is as bad as noise pollution. We all condemn pressure horns and multi tone horns, why do we encourage this need for light? Also remember LED throw out pure white light, and over a certain threshold pure white light is known to burn retinas and cause permanent damage to eyes!!!

I speak from personal experience of facing a low slung car, i believe it was a old honda city or a baleno which had a light bar similar to the one in discussion, blazing away on a narrow lane in Mumbai. Me being high up in my Safari was still blinded, all I could see was a white beam, all this on a narrow road where there is barely space for me and the car to cross each other. Not knowing what else to do, I switched on my fog lights + high beams, and I could see the car driver's face light up, his spectacles glowing away, I knew he was as blind as a bat now. In this classic Mexican standoff, the car driver lost his nerve, made a slight left turn, and put his wheel into the gutter, with a sickening crunch his left front wheel was into the gutter, the under body scrapping away and the car hanging with the right rear in the air!! Now that his LED was not blinding me, I could move my car ahead and cross the stricken car. So what was the use of the LED? How did it help either me or him? Didn't it cause an accident?
Imagine the same thing happening on a narrow 2 lane road, with a truck? What if the truck driver being blinded drives right onto you? Who is to blame?

Its easy to say LED should be used for high speed off road use, but we all know how we Indians are, we will use LED on brightly lit streets, to show off how we can spend big money on big lights.
Slightly OT: There is this particular set of glitzy men who use (wait for it) LED strobe lights on the extremities of their cars and bikes!!! Now we have blinding, low moving aircraft on our highways.

[tsk1979]

Originally Posted by apachelongbow

^^ Still are LED needed in the first place. Especially this talk of replacing projector headlights or OEM ones, with after market LED units. Where will this race to illuminate the night/turn it into day stop?

when manufacturers come with LED, they will take care about all this. This review was about an aux light, not replacement for stock

LED don't have high/low beam, they constantly give a standard beam. At best they can be used as an additional source of light, at present they cannot replace the OEM lights.

Of course not. But Mercedes has stock LEDs. Other cars are also coming with this

In my personal opinion light pollution is as bad as noise pollution. We all condemn pressure horns and multi tone horns, why do we encourage this need for light? Also remember LED throw out pure white light, and over a certain threshold pure white light is known to burn retinas and cause permanent damage to eyes!!!

Again, these are aux lights.

I speak from personal experience of facing a low slung car, i believe it was a old honda city or a baleno which had a light bar similar to the one in discussion, blazing away on a narrow lane in Mumbai. Me being high up in my Safari was still blinded, all I could see was a white beam, all this on a narrow road where there is barely space for me and the car to cross each other. Not knowing what else to do, I switched on my fog lights + high beams, and I could see the car driver's face light up, his spectacles glowing away, I knew he was as blind as a bat now. In this classic Mexican standoff, the car driver lost his nerve, made a slight left turn, and put his wheel into the gutter, with a sickening crunch his left front wheel was into the gutter, the under body scrapping away and the car hanging with the right rear in the air!! Now that his LED was not blinding me, I could move my car ahead and cross the stricken car. So what was the use of the LED? How did it help either me or him? Didn't it cause an accident?

Its about responsibility. Just because many SUVs have aux lights on the vehicle, does not mean we should use them on crowded roads.

Imagine the same thing happening on a narrow 2 lane road, with a truck? What if the truck driver being blinded drives right onto you? Who is to blame?

Its easy to say LED should be used for high speed off road use, but we all know how we Indians are, we will use LED on brightly lit streets, to show off how we can spend big money on big lights.
Slightly OT: There is this particular set of glitzy men who use (wait for it) LED strobe lights on the extremities of their cars and bikes!!! Now we have blinding, low moving aircraft on our highways.

The same is the case with Aux lights too. Hella ralleye can dazzle you to blindness quickly, and lighforce, even more so.
So the responsibility lies with the user.

I agree with all your points, however, these are just an alternative to hella or Lightforce. Not replacement for your stock lamps.

[shayne]

hi guys take a look at this website: www.carledindia.com
its indian, based in Noida.

[drpullockaran]

Till the end of October last year the HID was ruling the roost. The day air crafts and ships shift over to LED that is the time when LED's would have over taken HID in actual usable visible light. Please note that CRI index is very very important in night vision and filament less plasma lights are the ones that is going to rule the roost in the next decade.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTGsM9pplUs

[tsk1979]

While looking at various setups, I also discovered one thing. Most lights, including my current light bar uses diffused glass, for the flood beam.

So they just go ahead, and put a diffused glass in front, and call it flood beam. In flashlight world, we do not call it flood. We call it Diffusion. Flood and spot are done by moving the lens. For example, zoomer torches have movable front lens which can be moved backwards or forwards to get flood or spot.

In light bars, you can have a manufacturing process wherein you vary the distance of the lens from the LED to get spot or flood. However, it means, you need to design light bar in a way that it can accommodate this. But the diffusion method gives a cheaper way of doing the same, but at the cost of illumination.

Below is an example of true combo. The corner lenses are flood. If you look closely, the appearance of the corner two is different from the center ones because of the lens distance.


To see beam pattern, a good way is to use a foggy place. Its not very evident in this pic due to shot angle , but if you look carefully, the beam divergence of the side corner LEDs is more than the thin pencil like beam of the center ones.


Diffused floods do not usually show such well defined beam patterns, since its not being achieved by optics.
To read more about diffusion vs optics, you can take a look at flashlight reviews. Nitecore etc., make diffusion covers, but light loss is there due to that. Any frosted glass will lead to light loss.

[apachelongbow]

Is there a way to ensure that these LED bars give out useful light 'without' glaring/blinding the person on the other side? Is there any combination of lenses which can provide for a dipped beam effect? If something like that is possible, then these LED lights can effectively replace traditional headlamps.

[tsk1979]

Originally Posted by apachelongbow

Is there a way to ensure that these LED bars give out useful light 'without' glaring/blinding the person on the other side? Is there any combination of lenses which can provide for a dipped beam effect? If something like that is possible, then these LED lights can effectively replace traditional headlamps.

Its all about where you aim. If you do not go for diffused or flood beam, and go for spot beam only, you can aim in such a way that it does not go towards the oncoming traffic side.
I will give you an example
See the beam from this light bar


Can you see how narrow it can be.
Now look at the throw. How dark it is beyond the borders.

Now this is very powerful, 200W, but a 40W light bar in spot only without diffusers is not going to blind any oncoming traffic provided its not aimed at that.

Even HID spotlights(ones from good companies) cast out narrow beam, and it all depends where you aim. Poorly aimed 50W halogens can completely dazzle you.

That said, there is no point using these on single lane roads with oncoming traffic.
In Finland, I saw big rigs using 4-8 HID spots on narrow mountain roads. You can see them approaching from very very far. But the moment they see your headlights they switch them off.

See this truck. On the top are very high power HIDs.


But you will never see these guys blinding anybody.
Just because you have a tool, you do not assume its for blinding people. Its your responsibility not to do so.

[narendra.vw]

LED's are the future. Right time the thread has come up. Inputs were very informative. Thanks.