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Headlight upgrade


cecome

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5 hours ago, Zero Knievel said:

Have LEDs reached the place where they can perform as well as halogens (night time performance)?  I've not heard encouraging things.

They surpassed halogen a long time ago.  Issues are similar to HID kits; cheapo China shit, choosing the right color, and beam patterns.  A drop-in that works well in one housing may suck in another.  Some of the car replacements I've seen are adjustable so you can focus them.

 

LED headlights and off-road style light bars have always sucked for my eyes, then I got to see the expensive ones Carlos put on his Jeep.  I'd say it would be kinda like upping the voltage on a set of halogens, or comparable to good HIDs.

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1 hour ago, superhawk996 said:

the expensive ones Carlos put on his Jeep

 

Well, mid-price.  Some, like the JW Speakers, are over $500.  I paid half that, and had tried a set for $110 that was garbage.

 

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Oh, and although this vendor clearly lied about the specs on this light, there will still be a lot of heat output.  Make sure that heat sink has good airflow.  It's on the small side, so it's not going to be very efficient.  I drilled holes in the headlight bucket on my bike.

 

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Little question on the heat output of the LED bulbs. 

 

Seen them with the built in heat sink and even small fans to keep them cool. Is this to protect the electronics or the diodes themselves from heat exposure? 

 

Do HID bulbs produce this much heat as well or do the ballasts? 

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55 minutes ago, The Krypt Keeper said:

Is this to protect the electronics or the diodes themselves from heat exposure? 

 

Yes.  Heat is the enemy of semiconductors of all types.

 

55 minutes ago, The Krypt Keeper said:

Do HID bulbs produce this much heat as well or do the ballasts? 

 

They produce more heat than LEDs of a given output.

 

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Thanks.

 

Had thought about running these on my F150 next to try out. Takes about an hour to change the bulbs.

 

Crappy design that uses 10 bolts, screws and pins to just reach them. Also lack a lot of ventilation as they have them rubber back seals to keep mud and rain out of the other part of a crappy design. 

 

 

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My bike had the rubber seal, and I think all vehicles do.  You can mod it, I chose to discard it.  The headlight fits into another plastic cover, and that's behind the windshield and instruments.  I drilled a bunch of holes, and figured that was going to be safe enough.  It was the procedure recommended by the importer of these bikes.

 

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Oh, also, I'd recommend the one I used, because the original ones posted in this thread have shady specs that can't really be true.  They might be great, but any time someone fudges specs I assume they can't be trusted.

 

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  • 4 weeks later...
8 hours ago, SwampNut said:

So are you supposed to mount these inside a stock housing, or somehow fab your own fit?

 

 

You can remove the front lens of the headlamp, fit the projctor units in the sockets for the H7 bulbs, and reseal. There are a couple of Youtube tutorials on this process and they seem to be effective (altho the ones I watched were for HID projectors I doubt there is any functional difference in the process) and you use the normal lamp adjustment wheels to direct the beams where you need them.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I haven't used their LED headlight, but other products I've sourced from these folks have been solid.

 

https://www.superbrightleds.com/vehicle/2000-honda-cbr1100xx-super-blackbird-vehicle-led-lights?make=32&model=2273&year=2000

 

In any case, they offer dimensional drawings to help decide if the bulb will fit the application, plug compatibility being only one requirement.

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One question about LED lights and circuit issues - is it true that putting LED's on a Bird results in significant drop in load of the circuit, making rectifier work hard to dissipate the excess and leading to faster failure? 

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On 11/27/2018 at 5:02 PM, SwampNut said:

So are you supposed to mount these inside a stock housing, or somehow fab your own fit?

 

It is pretty easy.  Preheat your oven to about 200F.  Turn the oven off.  Place the headlight housing inside.  Wait 10 mins or so.  Pry the headlight housing apart from the back.  

The heat softens the buytl that holds it together.  I've done about 6 housings this way.  It's not bad.

Any mistakes you make (drilling a hole for projector) get covered with a chrome plastic bezel that fits around the projector.

 

If you want to tackle...I'll walk you through it.  After you see the results...you'll want to do every motorsport you have.

Edited by TuffguyF4i
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On 12/9/2018 at 8:04 AM, blackhawkxx said:

You can always add more lights.

Or get an R/R that is capable of handling the power the stator puts out.

 

It is seriously annoying to me that a product as well-designed and manufactured as the BB has such a crappy  charging system.

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27 minutes ago, SwampNut said:

Uh-oh, anyone want to tell him about the CCT?

 

I forgot about that one!

 

However, I have 2 cb1000's ('94 and '95) 2 xr650l's, an xr650r and an 81 cb750K. (My old shovelheads don't have cam chains) I visit forums for all of them and it seems like they all bitch about cam chains and tensioners. I have yet to read about a catastrophic cam chain failure due to the cct.

 

Maybe I'm looking in all the wrong places?

 

On the other hand, I hear about catastrophic failures of the charging systems pretty frequently. And no wonder when the harness ground to the frame is a brass disc bolted to an aluminum frame with a steel bolt! And there's a current running through it... Reminds me of folks who would ground their boat's electrical system through a metal thruhull fitting and wonder why their boat sank.

 

It doesn't take a very bad ground connection to cause the R/R to boil a battery.

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I had to replace both on my XX, and one stator.  I'd prefer not to, but call those minor things on an otherwise great bike.  I mean, compare it to Hayabusas catching fire, and you'll have a new perspective...

 

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On 12/14/2018 at 7:43 AM, sluggo49 said:

On the other hand, I hear about catastrophic failures of the charging systems pretty frequently.

Having a stator or R/R stop working isn't what I'd call catastrophic failure.  If they burned up the whole electrical system upon failure, that would be catastrophic.  Much like the CCT stops working properly, but the chain doesn't skip and put valves into pistons; that would be catastrophic.

 

If you want a better charging system look into a series regulator.  They take the load off the stator instead of consuming the excess power like the standard one.  It acts similarly to a car alternator's regulator, it just gets there a different way.

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