Upgrading headlight bulbs - LED Vs Halogen

[Beaver Dam]

Want new headlight bulbs for my '12 Street Triple (the weird shape lights) - anyone had experience with LED plug & play bulbs Vs decent halogen ones such as OSRAM or Philips?

Is there a danger that a high performance halogen could generate tons of heat and melt the headlight lens?

I presume the LEDs run at a lower temp but they look quite big - tricky to fit?

Thanks in advance

[bogie]

I tried 5 different models of LED bulbs that *looked* like they might fit in my 2013 Triumph, however after much swearing and fiddling none fit. I ended up with some Philips superwhite halogen and they are an improvement, and good VFM for £25, but nowhere near HID or LED for extra brightness/distance.

The issue with LED is the drivers/fans are quite bulky and if you do find some with off board modules, you still have to find somewhere to mount the extra module, with no guarantee the actual bulb is suited to the headlight reflector, so potentially no real benefit.

LED still require some development before they are "plug n play" at least in my experience.

[Reffro]

If you want to stay with Halogen, then use Philips Racing Vision GT200. By far the best for performance, though they don't look as cool as others, I like as much light as possible on the road.

[bsidethecside]

I did a load of nerdy research on this when isolating with COVID for my KTM... The high performance bulbs like Osram Night Breaker etc use shorter filaments to concentrate their output into a smaller area, so giving more light in the bit you want it - out front in the focus spot. The bulb's output is sometimes a little higher, but not much - it's that concentration that throws more where you want it. The bulb type H7, H11 etc. has a CE max output in lumens, so you're limited by that. On the plus side, it won't fry the wiring as the current draw is a product of wattage defined by bulb type.

The cost for shorter filaments burning hotter is reduced life. If you look at the glass of a high performance bulb that's seen a bit of service it greys out: time to replace. On my cars it was an annual thing. They were better than stock, but realistically an incremental difference.

Going over to LEDs, this is research, not practical experience... The LED will typically draw less power and so may want a CANBUS module to fool the bike into thinking it has a regular filament bulb. The issue is getting a unit with the LED emitter in exactly the focus spot that the filament would occupy. If its even a little out, then the light scatters in the wrong place and you dazzle others and don't see much as it's not going where it should. The Cyclops ones for ADV bikes were well regarded with careful design, but the output of c. 4000 lumens in an enclosure designed for 1350 put me off - I thought the scatter would be too much. My advice is avoid Chinese specials from eBay / Amazon and go for a reputable brand.

As for legalities, if it doesn't dazzle, an LED is no longer an automatic MOT fail (recent change), but still falls foul of Construction and Use regs. Interestingly a bike's main beam isn't covered by Construction and Use, so as long as your insurer's cool with light mods, you're good to go. It would be a bored copper did you for a light not causing nuisance.

In the end for legality I went Osram NightBreaker (55w) in the dip (so perfectly legal and a little brighter) but supplemented by LED aux lights (much better and still legal). The main then looked poor by then, so as only occasional on main use I modified a 65w H9 bulb which can sit in a H11 enclosure with the filament in the same place; you just need to "modify" a couple of tabs out of existence to fit it in. The H9's output of 2100 lumens was very noticeable and underlined that the fact that the +150% on the upgrade bulbs is largely bollx (apparently it's up to 150% over the legal minimum for that bulb type; your old one was likely a lot better than the minimum). It does draw more juice, but being main, doesn't get used a whole lot. What I did notice was more scatter from the additional output - reinforced my decision to avoid a 4000 lumen in dip.

[S2r]

I put an Osram night breakers in the teenager's moped, I bought 2 so I had a spare just in case but after a couple of rides both had blown due to 'vibration' so I went back to a normal one.

That lasted until we sold the bike, which was a lot more than just a couple of rides...

[Birky_41]

My 16 and 19 Tuono ran H7s and had quite possibly the worst modern lights I've ever experienced

I fitted LED, first one with the ballast or whatever that resister box thing is called and second one integrated

Much much much better than the candle yellow light, no heat and a really nice white/blue colour

I would look at the dimensions compare to what you have in there and find something as closely matched as you can. That's what I did and was well worth it

[black-k1]

If you can find somewhere for the ballast then HID is by far the best option. Check the cut off is reasonable on the dip beam so as not to dazzle. Will pass an MoT if it doesn’t dazzle.

[FatboyKim]

bsidethecside said:

As for legalities, if it doesn't dazzle, an LED is no longer an automatic MOT fail (recent change), but still falls foul of Construction and Use regs. Interestingly a bike's main beam isn't covered by Construction and Use, so as long as your insurer's cool with light mods, you're good to go. It would be a bored copper did you for a light not causing nuisance.

Curiously, LED units in halogen lamps are now a 'major' fail for cars, but the same legislation doesn't apply for bikes.

Just swap them back before the test obviously, but MOT manual for cars states as follows: Existing halogen headlamp units on vehicles first used on or after 1 April 1986 must not be converted to be used with high intensity discharge (HID) or light emitting diode (LED) bulbs. If such a conversion has been done, you must fail the headlamp for light source and lamp not compatible. And you'll get a fail such as, 'Nearside/offside Headlamp light source and lamp not compatible.

As I say, no such rules for bikes!

[RizzoTheRat]

I have H4 bulbs and put in an HID conversion kit, dunno if it's the same for other bulb types but the H4's you can get a version that has a blanking strip along one side of the bulb to put part of the beam pattern and not dazzle.

Bear in mind with HID's though that take a little time to come up to full power, so not much use for main beam. No such problem with LEDs though.

[TimmyMallett]

Beaver Dam said:

Want new headlight bulbs for my '12 Street Triple (the weird shape lights) - anyone had experience with LED plug & play bulbs Vs decent halogen ones such as OSRAM or Philips?

Is there a danger that a high performance halogen could generate tons of heat and melt the headlight lens?

I presume the LEDs run at a lower temp but they look quite big - tricky to fit?

Thanks in advance

Do you find that you're are super hot after running for a while? If it's the bug eyed one like mine, one of mine appears to actually have a small spot in the centre that seems to be distorted by the heat they run so hot.