Lighting upgrades

[Heavysteven]

I have lED all around, came from GL installed. I like the look, hoping I can get the headlights.

Tried driving with the blackout light yet?

 

[Westex]

I have lED all around, came from GL installed. I like the look, hoping I can get the headlights.

Tried driving with the blackout light yet?

Check out the Grote Industries website at Grote.com

So far as I can tell, they have the real stuff; not a foreign knockoff. Found the site through some military websites I peruse now and then. But be advised I have not purchased the Trilliant light I referred to in a previous post, but I may do so pretty soon.

 

[M813A1]

Bryan70596 You can run your parking light with the headlights if you but a jumper wire on the back of your 3 lever switch !! If I remember right you need to put the jumper on wire "N" and "L" that way you will have front running lights !! Just do a search and look fro front running lights it will come up and will give you the correct wire letters and wiring diagram to do that mod !! Good Luck

 

[cessnatwin]

Nice, great looking truck too

 

[Mark2X2]

Anybody that lives where it snows, LED tail lights are a poor investment. They don't get warm enough to melt the snow off them to keep them clear.

 

[Unforgiven]

I'm both stupid and cheap-why in the **** do they cost so much?

LED's are actually crystals that have to be grown from a seed process.

It's not just automotive LED's that are expensive. Household LED lighting is also very expensive.

It's simply an expensive process to grow the crystals, at least high quality crystals. Of course given the amount of interest and money involved in LED lighting there is quite a bit of active research being done at universities and various labs worldwide. Undoubtedly prices will drop when someone finally figures out a way to grow the crystals cheaply. But that might be years down the road.

 

[PsycoBob]

$/Lumen is the magic number. Hot-wire lamps do really well (250w halogen worklight bulb costs $2, and cranks out 5k Lumens.) and LED's really suck. This BEAST is almost $70, and cranks out roughly the same light output.

Of course, you can just buy 24v halogens- a LED needs electronics to run safely- cheap lamps use a resistor to limit current, while bigger/better ones use a switch-mode driver. That Bridgelux LED array uses only 50w, but very few driver circuits can handle that. Then you have to keep the LED under it's safe temperature, usually in the neighborhood of 140F. That Bridgelux would need to be stuck to a huge heatsink, OUTSIDE the engine compartment, to be safe. Lots more engineering than a Hot-wire that'll handle 4-500F, and voltage from 20-30v.

Replace your front bumper with an aluminum I-beam, stick a few of those huge LED's on it with an optic, and there you go!