Headlight upgrade

[Howmanygoes]

Following a very dim lit drive home from Lincomb I think I need to upgrade my headlight/lamps (dipped beam).

The lenses are clean no crazing of the glass.

After a bit of research my options appear to be a HID upgrade £££ or LED lamps.

Seems that the LEDs could be illegal due to beam patterns and colour.

Anyone shed light on this and or alternatives.

Thanks

 

[nick_the_fish]

My MOT tester, who failed my LED bulbs last year, told me that LED are legal as long as the bulb and housing have been designed for each other. So you can't just put LED bulbs into your old headlights, even if you do adjust the beam pattern. But if you buy a modern headlight that was designed for an LED it'll be legal. Thats why all the new cars get away with having them.

This apparently also applies to HID and Halogen. New regs etc. Its the only place i have heard this so ask around. Personally I went back to the original bulbs for now, although I might look at this again at some point in the future.

 

[chadr]

Is this a new rule this year (2019)?

I'm asking because I've been using LED headlight bulbs in my Collie's standard lamps for the last 4-5 years and never had any issues with the MOT (they weren't all done at the same station either).

 

[Steve Wright]

I cannot see the problem, as the 100 does not have any patterns on the front glass, it is all done by the reflector at the back, so should not have a issue with changing to either LED or HID, plus if the pattern is within speck on the light tester then I don't know why they should fail.
I have owned my 100 since 2004 and after 12 months with poor lighting so looked for better lighting and went
down the HID route as LED's was not available in them days, and have had the HID's in since and never had a problem with MOT's in all them years and had a MOT yesterday with a Pass.
If I had any problem with the HID's I would like to go down the LRD route as have them in our other car and they are incredible(admitting they are a factory fit)

 

[chapel gate]

No problem with LEDs here at mot time.

As mentioned, if all the testing criteria is achieved it wouldn't matter if you ran a cinnamon scented yankee candle..

 

[nick_the_fish]

hummmm, don't know what to say. maybe just an overly enthusiastic tester. Like I say i've only heard it from that one guy so maybe he's just wrong.

 

[Towpack]

Mine passed the MOT this year under the new regs with no mention of LED bulbs, missing EGR bits, 3” side exhaust etc although they did stick a probe up there to measure the emmissions which I can’t recall ever seeing them do before.
It doesn’t matter wether it’s the lens or rear reflector which aims the beam. The ‘problem’ is the the light source in HID and many LED bulbs is in a slightly different position, compared to standard filament bulbs, relative to the reflector or lens, hence the light beam gets aimed incorrectly and sometimes even scattered. Having said that I now have LED’s in all the headlamps and the light beam is pretty close to OEM. I once tried H4 HID replacements in the outer headlamps and the beam was so bad bordering on dangerous to oncoming traffic so I couldn’t use them. I’ve kept the HID’s in the Hella Luminator driving lamps which do throw I good, almost pencil, beam.

 

[StarCruiser]

It’s a grey area is what my MOT tester had to say. The Phillips Ultinon are not cheap, there’s no doubting that, but they have the best pattern of any my tester has seen.
The problem with HIDs is that they cannot mimic a wire filament because they aren’t able to be in the correct position or orientation. LEDs can. I fitted two Chinese sets from Woodypeck that both failed and caused interference on my radio before going with the Phillips which are the right colour and beam. I’d buy them again in a heartbeat, even at £160.00, they are that good.

This said, I do keep the old filament H4s in the back in case of any problems roadside or at MOT time but so far have not needed them.

 

[Towpack]

Yes, the RFI problem is certainly another issue to consider with some of the cheap HID/LED kits. In some poor reception areas the noise from the HID drive units can drown out commercial FM broadcast stations on my Sony system. I also get quite a bit of noise from the replacement internal LED bulbs on 10m on the SW radio.

 

[Howmanygoes]

Cheers all. Going to take a punt on the Phillips units and keep my old lamps J.I.C.

I will post up pre and post images, I know you all like a piccy.

 

[jibberjabber]

Following a very dim lit drive home from Lincomb I think I need to upgrade my headlight/lamps (dipped beam).

The lenses are clean no crazing of the glass.

After a bit of research my options appear to be a HID upgrade £££ or LED lamps.

Seems that the LEDs could be illegal due to beam patterns and colour.

Anyone shed light on this and or alternatives.

Thanks

Slightly off subject.

I upgraded from second facelift 2003-2005 (mine is a 2004) front and rear lights to third (last facelift I think) 2005-2007, the later headlights have a much better light pattern, alough I didn't do the upgrade for any other reason than, I wanted to, as my 100 is my hobby, unlike many Land Cruisers it's not been abused and still only has 88 thousand on the clock, and will probably be my last car.

Rear upgrade was just (almost) a straight swap, so was very easy.

The front upgrade on the other hand, is a bit more involved, not just a simple swap, as the later headlights are a little bigger, but this is another story.

Again, some would say "why bother" I would say "if you have to ask then it's not worth explaining"

 

[ADD]

I have been looking at these guys for a while. www.lightwerkz.net

 

[StarCruiser]

Cheers all. Going to take a punt on the Phillips units and keep my old lamps J.I.C.

I will post up pre and post images, I know you all like a piccy.

As a certain chappie from Peckham once said, ‘you know it makes sense’.
Joking apart, you’ll love them. The difference is, really, night and day!

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

I experimented with various LED and HID bulbs in my 100 and whilst they were brighter there was quite a lot of light where there shouldn't be. The best compromise I found was using a relay kit and Osram night breaker halogen bulbs which do a decent job.

I'll be interested to see what you think of the Philips led's though.

 

[Howmanygoes]

After 2 failure to deliver (Hermes) I changed and bought from China. After 3.5weeks they arrived this morning.

I plan to get out tonight for some before photos and I will hopefully fit this week and give some after photos for the weekend.

 

[Tractionman]

After 2 failure to deliver (Hermes) I changed and bought from China. After 3.5weeks they arrived this morning.

I plan to get out tonight for some before photos and I will hopefully fit this week and give some after photos for the weekend.

That was bloody quick !

 

[Tractionman]

It’s a grey area is what my MOT tester had to say. The Phillips Ultinon are not cheap, there’s no doubting that, but they have the best pattern of any my tester has seen.
The problem with HIDs is that they cannot mimic a wire filament because they aren’t able to be in the correct position or orientation. LEDs can. I fitted two Chinese sets from Woodypeck that both failed and caused interference on my radio before going with the Phillips which are the right colour and beam. I’d buy them again in a heartbeat, even at £160.00, they are that good.

This said, I do keep the old filament H4s in the back in case of any problems roadside or at MOT time but so far have not needed them.

There's a lot of 'grey' areas with MOT testers, they dont all sing off the same hymn sheet, many having their own agenda as well as VOSA, so what may fail at one test station will pass at another.

 

[IvanD]

Don't put bulbs with different shapes and sizes than the stock ones in the original reflectors! The glare will be unavoidable.
There are two ways to improve things.

Upgrade the bulbs from the halogen 9005/9006 to HIR 9011/9012. Same physical shape and size, increased light output and life. Requires a minor trim (literally 2mm) on the bulb.

Second is to properly retrofit projectors and then adjust the beam pattern.

I did the first and there was a definite improvement which I was happy with for several months. Eventually I filled the headlights with mud and had to open them anyway, so...

Toyota has a very specific instructions on how to aim the headlights on the 100

It's an irreversible modification - you have to do some grinding on the headlight housing. But then you will never want to go back.

I used Morimoto Mini 2.5 projectors, which are fairly popular projectors to retrofit.

 

[StarCruiser]

Don't put bulbs with different shapes and sizes than the stock ones in the original reflectors! The glare will be unavoidable.

…Except where the retrofit lamps are designed to do the job by a major manufacturer, inspected at an MOT station on their beam inspection system and quoted as being ‘the best beam pattern of any LEDS I’ve ever seen’.
It’s true HIDs as retrofits on existing headlights is pretty much going to give wonky patterns and glare all over the place because the point the light comes from is different. HIDs need new headlights specifically designed for them. Many LEDS also have poor beam patterns too: but not all.

 

[StarCruiser]

After 2 failure to deliver (Hermes) I changed and bought from China. After 3.5weeks they arrived this morning.

I plan to get out tonight for some before photos and I will hopefully fit this week and give some after photos for the weekend.

From the picture on the box, they’ve changed design on the heatsink. Looks even neater.