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Brighter Brake Lights LED?

2K views 9 replies 6 participants last post by  SamIam 
#1 ·
The time to on between incandescents and LEDs is pretty substantial, increasing time to brake for people behind you, especially on the freeway. I haven't seen LED brakes on anything but motorcycles and ambulances around here, but has anyone done this or have any information regarding installing bright LEDS in the brake housings?
 
#2 ·
hey i have seen some really nice leds that are made for a 12 volt system. I installed them on my uncle's 56 ford panel truck and WOW did they make a difference. the factory lights were invisible and the leds made a HUGE difference. that and I think they react faster than standard bulbs. as in when you hit the break they really hit. it's nice looking too. i went throught superbrightleds.com and they had them there. don't get the 24 volt ones though. they won't work. I'm an idiot not to read the voltage before ordering. but to tell you the truth this is something that I WILL do sometime.
 
#3 ·
Sorry to raise a dead thread and all, but i was thinking to wire up a strip of LED lights along my A Piller for blinkers. So i Googled the heck out of the idea and found these.
Flexible LED Lights and a review of them HERE . All i could do was think of great ways to use these!

You can get them in 3 inch up to 1.5 feet! Im not saying to go nuts with them, but having them flexable is sweet. You could have a blinker that runs around the top rear corner, or a brake light that runs along the top middle of the hatch!
Or as i originaly thought, blinkers on your A Pillers.
The three inch ones would be awesome blinkers in the hinges of the side doors facing back!
 
#4 ·
LED "bulb equivalents" work very, very poorly in the Element. If you'll notice, the lens assemblies have the red safety reflector in the center of the bulb location, partially blocking the bulb. Most of the light that you see from behind is via the faceted parabolic reflector, and comes from the sides of the bulbs. Most LED replacement "bulbs" shine straight back and would lose most of their light in the safety reflector, and the LED replacements that have some side lighting aren't going to do much, either.

LED replacements for standard bulb specs are nearly always disappointments. If you will closely examine vehicles that have LED taillights from the factory, you will notice that the LEDs are nearly embedded in the plastic lens and have no reflector, with the illumination pattern determined by direct LED projection.

OTOH, you are certainly welcome to not believe any of this and throw your money at superbrightleds.com like I have for "bulbs" that are in no way acceptable as a retrofit. And they warn you about that, too.

>The time to on between incandescents and LEDs is pretty substantial...

Are you being sarcastic? We're talking a difference of maybe 100-150 milliseconds. The difference is barely enough to be perceived when compared side-by-side.
 
#5 ·
MikeQBF said:
LED "bulb equivalents" work very, very poorly in the Element. If you'll notice, the lens assemblies have the red safety reflector in the center of the bulb location, partially blocking the bulb. Most of the light that you see from behind is via the faceted parabolic reflector, and comes from the sides of the bulbs. Most LED replacement "bulbs" shine straight back and would lose most of their light in the safety reflector, and the LED replacements that have some side lighting aren't going to do much, either.
i'm sorry you've had such a terrible experience with led bulbs. i've actually had no problems with them at all. i researched them first and picked the ones that i thought would work best for the application. the ones in my tail lamps have 15 leds in each bulb. 9 facing straight back and 6 around the side pointing outward. they are very bright and the reflection looks pretty cool to me.
 

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#7 · (Edited)
M1 1I 1K 1E said:
any info on those bulbs? type and where to buy fendray? thanks
i got them off ebay from velocity leds. http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/2-RE...mZ8004029259QQrdZ1QQsspagenameZWDVWQQtcZphoto

here is their website
http://www.vleds.com/

these seem to be the same bulbs~~~~>http://cgi.ebay.com/7443-7440-Super...tcZphotoQQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

this site has some cool leds as well
http://www.superbrightleds.com/led_prods.htm

i put red bulbs in my tail lamps but i'm assuming if you put clear ones in them they'd be even brighter.
 
#8 ·
fendray26 said:
i got them off ebay from velocity leds. http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/2-RE...mZ8004029259QQrdZ1QQsspagenameZWDVWQQtcZphoto

here is their website
http://www.vleds.com/

these seem to be the same bulbs~~~~>http://cgi.ebay.com/7443-7440-Super...tcZphotoQQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

this site has some cool leds as well
http://www.superbrightleds.com/led_prods.htm

i put red bulbs in my tail lamps but i'm assuming if you put clear ones in them they'd be even brighter.
sweet, thanks for the info!
 
#9 · (Edited)
MikeQBF said:
>The time to on between incandescents and LEDs is pretty substantial...

Are you being sarcastic? We're talking a difference of maybe 100-150 milliseconds. The difference is barely enough to be perceived when compared side-by-side.
Thanks for responding, and to answer your question, no I wasn't being sarcastic, I making a statement based on scientific fact. There is a lot of data out there that I would quote regarding this, but maybe a refresher in relativity would help. :|

My personal experience with LEDs in general is substantial. I wasn't going to retrofit my E with LEDs unless they provided a SAFE alternative. Seeing the little 15 LED 7443's for me weren't an option as they weren't even flux, let alone luxeon, which simply put means dim. I did see a new alternative using flux leds in a tower config. and decided to try them out just for fun. As you know the 3rd brake light uses a 7440 and before I ordered that up I wanted to do my own test.

I got the led's (pictured) and right off the bat started having problems, first of all, the base does not fit into the rounded triangle opening of the E, making them stick out about 1 cm. A real problem since you can't get the housing back in.

On the other hand, when I "rested" the housings in their opening in and did a brake test, the difference between on times was very evident. A standard halogen bulb has a ramp up time to full brightness of around .5 second, whereas the led was ON. The difference between the two made the third brake light look slow in comparison.

The other thing which I noticed was the clarity of color. It wasn't a orange red, it was spot on bang red and very beautiful.

Brightness is the main issue. There was a major difference in brightness by a factor (in my armchair engineering estimate) of a factor of 6. They just aren't bright enough.

It was fun to mess around with tho. I can't recommend led brake lights at their current brightness. An led option is on the horizon tho. 168's are a different story altogether....tbc
 

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#10 · (Edited)
Gautch said:
Sorry to raise a dead thread and all, but i was thinking to wire up a strip of LED lights along my A Piller for blinkers. So i Googled the heck out of the idea and found these.
I love it, but you are talking about tiny leds and their true signal power is minimal at best. But their cool factor would be off the charts. I want to get some led clearance markers (the last thing I need according to my boss, aka wife) as they have the proper housing and are bright enough. Check out the http://www.ledmuseum.org for some real hard facts on this subject.
 
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