New headlights and bulbs

[Arnold]

Im going to be upgrading the headlights on my 98 z soon. Is there a particular brand I should stick with for good quality? Looking at these but I'll be keeping the oem Amber corners. Also wanting to upgrade the bulbs , I haven't had luck with HIDs in the past and now looking at some LED bulbs. Any input on those?

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[someotherguy]

The LED bulbs you linked are 9005's for the high beam position. They probably (maybe) fit the 9006 low beam position as well since they tend to be kind of "loose" with the keyways on the bulb, but you should be sure, or order the appropriate ones. LED headlights are a hit or miss situation, more likely miss; the advertised lumens can be generous to say the least and the pattern you get from them may not be anywhere close to optimal for the given housing. The housing has a lot to do with that as well but just remember none of those housings were made for LED's (or HID's for that matter.) Another thing is many of the LED headlights are made with small fans in the back to help keep them cool, and to me that seems like the most likely failure point of them as those fans aren't likely intended for outdoor use where they'll be submitted to a lot more temperature, humidity, and dust extremes than in other applications. They look like heat sink fans from a PC.

My guess is that the end result of what you're looking at will probably be marginally bright enough to use as full time low beam headlights and have a decent white color to them, but the output pattern and cutoff will probably suck bigtime, glaring in everyone's face, and then at some point the fans will crap out resulting in LED's crapping out.

Richard

 

[someotherguy]

You may also need to do a small amount of "opening up" on the back of the headlight brackets, and your core support, for those to fit in the low beam position. I had to do this but in fairness the heat sinks were larger on my LED headlights because they were designed to run without fans; it's all heat sink.

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Light output and pattern was "OK" not great, but mind you this is in a set of TYC Elegante housings which have the "glare cap" over the low beam, which did seem to cut down a little on the glare towards other drivers. Pattern will have a ton to do with the design of the LED's in where the device is positioned within the housing so this will vary from brand to brand. The LED's I used were TorchStar. (They're now in our Dodge Magnum and doing OK there as well.)

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Richard

 

[Arnold]

You may also need to do a small amount of "opening up" on the back of the headlight brackets, and your core support, for those to fit in the low beam position. I had to do this but in fairness the heat sinks were larger on my LED headlights because they were designed to run without fans; it's all heat sink.

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Light output and pattern was "OK" not great, but mind you this is in a set of TYC Elegante housings which have the "glare cap" over the low beam, which did seem to cut down a little on the glare towards other drivers. Pattern will have a ton to do with the design of the LED's in where the device is positioned within the housing so this will vary from brand to brand. The LED's I used were TorchStar. (They're now in our Dodge Magnum and doing OK there as well.)

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Richard

Ok cool thanks man, similar issues I had with HIDs before in pervious cars. They are bright but not foucused and burn out quick or fade in color. I know they are meant to be in projectors just didn't know if these leds were a little better to use in regualr housings. Thanks for all the input!

 

[someotherguy]

I've actually had pretty good luck with HID's at least in terms of reliability; I've bought 4 sets of 35W/5000K regular style from DDM. Had one relay go bad and lock on, burning up the relay harness, but that's because it was in a location that let the relay get wet so it corroded internally. Had one ballast go bad but they replaced it no questions asked. The capsules themselves have all held up fine over the years. Currently running a set of them in my '06 SS that have already been in 2 previous trucks.

Richard