Comparing 7" Aftermarket Headlights

[Hilldweller]

Truck-Lite was nice enough to send me and 2 other members of JEEPForum a set of their updated and improved LED headlights; I'll install mine tomorrow.

I've marked the exact location of the Jeep for reference. Please take note of what you can see off to the sides of the road as well as the FedEx boxes that I've used for markers on the road. Our peripheral vision and the ability to see to the sides is what keeps Bambi off our hoods.

Round one in the war will feature the set of 7" Round Cibie Z-Beams that I have now. They were purchased from Daniel Stern Lighting. The bulbs are H4 Osram Rallye 70/65 and they are harnessed/relayed/plugged by Rallylights.


Markers are at 25yards L/R, 50 yards L/R, 75 yards L/R
Jeep is on the right side of a 2-lane road; camera on hood in front of driver

Ambient temperature 35 degrees F; lens temperature 157 degrees F at 6"

Lux readings Lowbeam/Highbeam:

25Right-65/ 49 * 25Left-11/ 5

50Right-4/ 29 * 50Left-3/ 4

75Right-1/ 17 * 75Left-0/ 5

25 feet dead center 583/ 970

Z-beams, lowbeam, with Osram bulbs.

Z-beams, highbeam, with Osram bulbs.

 

[Hilldweller]

I've had the Cibie Z-Beams in my 2008 JK for several weeks; I started with Phillips Xtreme Power H4 bulbs but switched to the Osrams as the Phillips bulbs aged.

The Cibies are a marked improvement over the Hella E-Codes that I had previously. The Hellas had very little light off to the side of the road and much too much foreground lighting. They also produced an annoying hot-spot and a few artifacts.

The stock JK headlight wiring is over a fairly light gauge and power is pulse-width modulated. The stock vehicle comes with H13 Phillips bulbs --- a bulb design rooted in price-point economics, not lighting performance.

To get a definitive voltage drop figure for my Jeep and also come up with some nominal PWM figures for the JK in general, I recently scoped the headlight circuit on my Jeep (at break time) using an Agilent Technologies InfiniiVision MSO7104A that was loaned to me. Nominal pulse widths ran from 4.47 - 12.68v. The 12.68 looked like it was a spike though and it settled down lower to 12.5 or so.
It doesn't cycle off at all.
Using the harness and relay circuit from Rallylights, there is virtually no voltage drop and at least 14.2v is getting to the lights at all times.
That's 1.7 volts lost; that equals a massive amount of light.

 

[Hilldweller]

I graduated the pic to make it easier to know the distances.

All of my LUX readings were taken at the exact same height on the markers to mitigate any advantages in beam placement. It would be easy to move the sensor around to find the sweet spot ---- but I figured that if a dog ran out in front of you, he wouldn't jump around to find your headlights' sweet spot...

The high value at 25 feet was in the sweet spot though. I just wanted maximum LUX and datalogged for about 3 minutes at high and low.
The Cibie surprised me by having such a bias toward center; proves that subjective impressions are worth what you pay for them.

BTW, as a point of reference, it was totally black out there. You can't see a single marker with the lights off.

 

[Hilldweller]

The Truck-Lites are installed.

As I suspected, they flicker when run with the supplied H13-H4 adapter. The Jeep's PWM cycles quickly enough that you don't notice it with a halogen bulb due to the physics of burning filaments. But the ultra-rapid start/stop capabilities of an LED causes them to respond to the pulses by an obvious flicker. It is much more noticeable on highbeam.

I removed the pigtails and used an auxiliary harness to provide power. It uses the passenger side stock H13 plug to trip a pair of Bosch relays and draws power directly from the battery. The power is clean and steady.

The Truck-Lites appear very robust and fit in the cans perfectly. Install took about 15 minutes; aiming was completely painless as well due to their dramatically sharp cut-off.

We'll see how they perform tonight.

 

[greg mgm]

Good job...Thanks for posting the comparison.

How did you get Truck-lite to send you the led lights?

 

[Code Monkey]

subscribed

:lurk:

 

[Hilldweller]

How did you get Truck-lite to send you the led lights?

I have a reputation for scrutinizing headlights; I just asked them for a set and they were confident enough in their improvements to send them to me.

 

[Paladin]

The stock JK headlight wiring is over a fairly light gauge and power is pulse-width modulated. The stock vehicle comes with H13 Phillips bulbs --- a bulb design rooted in price-point economics, not lighting performance.

To get a definitive voltage drop figure for my Jeep and also come up with some nominal PWM figures for the JK in general, I recently scoped the headlight circuit on my Jeep (at break time) using an Agilent Technologies InfiniiVision MSO7104A that was loaned to me. Nominal pulse widths ran from 4.47 - 12.68v. The 12.68 looked like it was a spike though and it settled down lower to 12.5 or so.
It doesn't cycle off at all.
Using the harness and relay circuit from Rallylights, there is virtually no voltage drop and at least 14.2v is getting to the lights at all times.
That's 1.7 volts lost; that equals a massive amount of light.

Why does the OEM do that? Do they want to drop the nominal voltage going to the bulbs to 12.5 from the regulated 14V coming from the alternator? And then again, why? To make the bulbs last longer? I'm pretty surprised.

And maybe on a related note, I have swapped the bulbs in one of our cars from the OEM H11's to a much brighter H9 bulb. One of them, the right one, burnt out pretty early, so I replaced it again. It again burnt out early. The left one is still fine. Any ideas?

 

[Hilldweller]

Why does the OEM do that? Do they want to drop the nominal voltage going to the bulbs to 12.5 from the regulated 14V coming from the alternator? And then again, why? To make the bulbs last longer? I'm pretty surprised.

I believe it's an intelligent circuit and the PWM is largely for monitoring purposes.

And maybe on a related note, I have swapped the bulbs in one of our cars from the OEM H11's to a much brighter H9 bulb. One of them, the right one, burnt out pretty early, so I replaced it again. It again burnt out early. The left one is still fine. Any ideas?

Nobody says it like Scheinwerfermann.

It's basically a matter of different filament with different characteristics. The H9 has a 65w (nominal) filament optimized for maximum luminance and flux at the expense of shorter lifespan. The H11 has a 55w (nominal) filament optimized for long life at the expense of lower luminance and flux. Both bulbs have equal filament precision, etc.

Who knows what your wires are pumping; they were intended for a 55w bulb and you've got a 65w in there. What gauge is the wiring? Have you checked for resistance?

 

[Hilldweller]

They were underwhelming. A definite improvement over the first incarnation but hardly worth the fanfare. I feel let down; I really wanted them to work well.

Ambient temperature 36 degrees F; lens temperature 48 degrees F (might have been engine heat actually).

Lowbeam value in blue, high in red.

LUX at 25 feet, sensor moved to highest output spot. 353/885

25 yards Right: 15/42 * Left: 3/5

50 yards Right: 1/9 * Left: 0/4

75 yards Right: 0/4 * Left: 0/3

Truck-Lite Lowbeam:

Truck-Lite Highbeam:

Close-up

Not so close-up

After gathering the numbers, I took a little spin on some dark twisty roads.
Long story short, I'll be de-installing them tomorrow and putting the Z-Beams back in.
They don't behave like headlights; they behave like a handful of flashlights.

 

[greg mgm]

Didn't care for the pattern at all. Like you said, it's like a handful of flashlights.

Thanks for taking the time to put this evaluation together.

 

[Hilldweller]

The major flaws IMHO:
1) I don't see the "flicker" as a problem. I see it as an effect of what the technology is; I don't blame my dog for pissing in the back yard either. The lights flicker from the PWM; so what? Work around it with a harness and you'll have more/brighter/steadier light.
But others see this as an issue. Think of it as a symptom of the technology and just deal with it; it's not hard to do.

2) Limited reach. They dropped dead too soon. You need to reach at least 75 yards to the right on lowbeam to be considered for highway driving.

3) Even spread. Although vastly better than the previous incarnation, they still have gaps & hot-spots; these are distracting to the driver, especially on backroads where there are sharp curves, steep cambers, & altitude variation. I literally couldn't navigate one road on lowbeam.

4) Spread to the side of the road needs to be improved; the lights have virtually zero off to the sides.

Besides the obvious benefits of LED technology (robustness, longevity, power savings, ease of application), the single best characteristic that I noted while driving was that two of the "flashlights" seemed to be aimed directly at the lines on the road --- this is fantastic for driving in poor weather and obviates the need for foglights.

I can see them working for a city driver; they were fine in urban driving where streetlights did the lion's share of lighting the road. And they do have bling appeal in spades; people at Sam's Club, Wells Fargo, and in the neighborhood all took long looks at them.

Jerry seems like an open person and Truck-Lite seems to be diligent in their pursuit of refinement. I'd expect them to apply themselves and create a still better product.

I still feel that HIDs will fade from popularity and LEDs will become the standard for headlights. But, for replacement lamps like these, the question remains as to which company will make the best and offer it at an appealing price-point?

 

[d110pickup]

Thanks Bill, I've been wondering how they could be worth the price tag. . . . . Now I know they're not.
Mike

 

[Hilldweller]

Thanks Bill, I've been wondering how they could be worth the price tag. . . . . Now I know they're not.
Mike

"Worth the price tag" is always in the eye of the consumer.

BTW, JWSpeaker makes a 7" round LED light with H4 connector that would fit a JK (and Land Rover, I'd imagine) that does have better overall photometric properties. I haven't seen one in person (yet) but have been told by reputable sources that they work well. They don't have as much light to the sides as my Z-beams, but they are reported to work quite well.
Cost of admission is nearly a grand for a pair and they require some minor trimming to the headlight bucket to fit.

 

[ExpoMike]

Great testing and thanks for doing it. Very surprised the LED lights did not do very well at all. Sounds like the idea is there but the technology hasn't been refined. I agree, in time they will over.