Has anyone upgraded their headlight bulbs?

Deleted orange glass, makes huge different to the car and it does not look so dated.

Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

First, I really don't get what the turn signal lens mod has to do with low beam upgrade?

Anyway, I don't think you will get any better light with a LED bulb instead of the standard Xenon D1S.
You will just risk causing glare to oncoming traffic when messing with the headlights and non-standard bulbs...
Have you replaced your Xenon bulbs lately? A new set of bulbs could improve a bit.
If you want to remove the Xenon bulb and change it for a LED; you have to remove the Xenon ballast aswell.

 

I have looked extensively into this as well as I too would like to upgrade from HID to LED.

Another former member here that designs electronics and LED bulbs for our cars has also looked extensively into this quest.

Summary, no LED replacement bulb currently exists. I understand the issue is the projector housing was designed for HID bulbs thus installing an LED bulb won't provide much benefit.

I upgraded my HID bulbs to 5,000K instead for whiter light. Stock HID Kelvin rating I believe is 2600K (yellowish but provides the most light output.)

Hope that helps.

Dan

 

I tried this as well. No HID to LED conversion kit for low beam exist as plug and play. Standard halogen is easy to swap though. I only changed the bulb and played between 5k and 6k. 5k illuminates better to me compared to the 6k. The difference between the stock hid and 5k is marginally better, the beam color throws out nicely though!

 

I recently ordered and installed headlight bulbs for my F430. One of my headlights kept doing this weird flicker. Anyway, I replaced the bulb with D1s - Osram Xenarc 66140CBI (Cool Blue Intense) HID bulbs, pack of two for $129.98, rated 6k. When I swapped one and turned them on, it seems to be the exact same as the stock one (assuming they hadn't been replaced before).

 

I did some extensive research on projector headlights and LED upgrades.

The conclusion:
projector units are designed for HID/halogen bulb designs.
The HID/halogen projector design is not compatible with the LED bulb design, hence light distribution within the projector unit is optimal and produces less light output especially at the headlight hotspot (for far away objects)

The reasons why your headlight light output decreased over time (even with new bulbs) are for example:
1. Most of the time the (protection coating) of the mirror in the projector unit is burned away, this mirror should be 'mirror' shiny and not mat.
2. Polycarbonate headlight glass wear/aging which blocks more light.
I tested this with my 2008 audi A8 headlight glass, the old polycarbonate glass blocked 28% of the light output from the projector unit, a new glass only 13%.
3. The HID projector lens is typicaly made from glass should be no problem. Other materials wear and block light overtime.
4. Dust on the projector lens and mirror can block some minor light.

As a starter I recommend to check the mirror of your projector unit.

FYI;
I upgraded my ferrari 348 (55W halogen projector unit) with 55W Xenon bulbs and fast-bright ballasts that provide 53 Watt measured power to the 55W xenon bulb.

I achieved 4100 Lux light output at 5 meter distance. A four times headlight light output increase with a perfect low beam light image.
For the high beam 21000 Lux or 7 times increase of light output.

 

sorry for the typo:
The HID/halogen projector design is not compatible with the LED bulb design, hence light distribution within the projector unit is NOT optimal and produces less light output especially at the headlight hotspot (for far away objects)

 

Its important to know what lamps ( lightbulbs) do.
In conventional sealed beam headlights a filament puts out light in a 360 globe. That amount of light is focused by the mirrored reflector portion of the bulb and refined by the glass lens.
Clever designers can direct that output to place light where it needs to be (On the road) and keep it where it shoulnt be: in the eyes of oncoming traffic.
LEDs have completely different sources of output from a halogen: a "screen" vs a filament.
Unless the entire headlamp assembly is designed for one or the other "swapping out bulbs" isnt going to cut it.

 

Just watched a YouTube video review of newer LED designs out there so I did some search and it led me to this thread.

Believe the video is by GTR LED but is very thorough.

Isn’t the stock color for the F430 closer to 4500K?

Don’t think it’s 2600K as Dan have guessed because those super yellow “fog light” colors is only 3K and I think that is as low as it’ll ever go.

 

I'm a headlight junky. Ive split cases and installed high performance projectors in many of my cars. I obviously put it what's best for beam pattern and output.

Having said all that, in every scenario, HIDs are still far superior than any LEDs. The one exception is factory applications such as my Mercedes which uses 84 individual LEDs per light. (Far stretch from your one or two chip eBay LED bulb)

HIDs is always king, installing LEDs would be a huge downgrade. On top of this, most LEDs have the most pathetic excuse for a beam pattern.

The simplest upgrade you can do the 430 is just to put some high performance bulbs in there such as the osram night breaker lasers
Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login

Stock bulbs vs osram NBL Image Unavailable, Please Login





Led vs hid beam pattern Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Awesome! What sizes for 360s?


Sent from my iPad using FerrariChat

 

Not sure for the 360, the oem bulb for the 430 is an osram 66142 D1s bulb. So essentially any D1s bulb will work. Phillips V2 and Osram Nightbreakerlaser are some of the brightest replacements. Note, virtually all ones sold on ebay/amazon are thought to be counterfeits, buy from a well know supllier like theretrofitsource or lightwerks.

 

Hi Ken! Thanks for sharing this bud. Appreciate it. All these are your photos? I am sold with this photo:

https://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/attachments/screenshot_20211210-084540_youtube-2-jpg.3455211/

Is it a pain to replace? Just the bulb right, ballast will kept as OEM?

Appears to only have this but a slightly different model number? https://www.theretrofitsource.com/d1s-osram-xenarc-66144-nightbreaker-laser-B-66144XNL?quantity=1

Happy Holidays!

 

Those are all my photos. I have not swapped my bulbs yet in the 430, but life it would just do the night breakers

 

Ahhh. I see. Would this be your first goto choice? https://www.theretrofitsource.com/d1s-osram-xenarc-66144-nightbreaker-laser-B-66144XNL?quantity=1

 

Yes, great bulb

 

Interesting. The sellers own testing seems to nod towards the Phillips XV2 as tops in their tests.
How much shorter life can one expect with these bulbs over stock?

In the halogen world, I have used HIRs, +30, +50 and even high watt bulbs and they all had less than half the life of a standard bulb.
For HID I have chosen to just use the stock rated bulbs, be they Phillips or Osram.

 

I've never had one go out, they are all 35 volt.
Now you can get 55 w ballast and bulbs, and they are definitely brighter, but they get pretty hot

 

Sent both my headlights in for reseal and mind as well do some upgrades.

Based on my research, I feel like the Osram NBL is the clear winner :