Did anyone change their high beam light bulb to LED unit?
the reason for the H11 LED light is I would like to change the yellowish DRL.
thank you,

 

I saw those too and was wondering just that few days ago. As I practically never use my high beams, doubt very much that I would miss them.....

 

I doubt an LED will work because of how the high beams are dimmed for DRL. But even if it did work, no LED direct replacement bulb is even remotely bright enough when you'll want to actually use high beams. For less yellow, you can use a bulb that shines whiter light or one with a blue coating.

BTW, isn't the bulb H7 not H11?

 

the 2006 mcs with HID light is with H11 on high beam. I was thinking to disable the DRL or just replace with LED light for DRL (it wont be bright enough for the high beam). I know high beam is still more useful than just a cool looking DRL.

 

I also have an '06 with HID and I'm pretty sure the high beam is H7. The fogs are H11.

 

I believe the DRL works based on reducing the voltage to the bulb. If you reduce the voltage to the LED it will not work.

I see that this post is in the Gen2 section but the title references R53 (Gen1) maybe that is causing confusion of the bulb type. I also thought the R53 (Gen1) with HID used a H7 bulb for the high beam. I know for sure that my current R53 without HID uses H7 bulb. Is the car in question an R53 (Gen1) and R56 (Gen2)?

 

Actually LED's work well on low voltage. Chances are really good it may work nicely.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/2-x-C...Q5fAccessories

That one is "buy it now" for 6.99, 18 and change for shipping so the price for trying it out is not that bad. Who will be the guinea pig?

 

I agree that LEDs work very well at low voltages, such as 5 to 7V. But I was guessing that the LEDs that would be used in the headlight would be setup to use 12 to 14V with limiting resistors so they would not work so well when the very low DRL voltage is applied with resistors alreay in the circuit.

 

In most cars, dimming of the high beams for DRL is achieved using pulse wave modulation (PWM) -- rapid on/off cycling of the full power. PWM is common in car electronics. The fade-in, fade-out of the interior lights... that's also done with PWM electronics.

PWM actually works very well for dimming LEDs. I just question whether they'd be bright enough. I think a direct replacement LED bulb even at full intensity will be barely adequate as a DRL, and when further dimmed in the headlight's DRL mode will be very faint. The problem is putting LEDs into a halogen reflector housing. The lighting pattern just won't work as it was designed to. DRLs actually designed to use LEDs can work well.

BTW, I've confirmed the R53 high beam is H7 not H11.

 

OK But you already made the decision for them to only be DRL. Seems pretty easy to bypass the pwm and feed it with 12 volts.

I use a 26 element H3 LED in a Blinglights.com foglight fixture as a DRL in my Armada and it looks good in broad daylight as a DRL. I would assume you could easily do better than that in this application. You have way more room to fit a much bigger bulb in place and the highbeam pattern should be perfect for this application

It appears easy to completely bypass the system and make this a 100% removable mod for under 20.00. If I get the nerve up to mod the wifes car I'll take some pics.

 

High beams are def h7's. I've also seen all the H7 LED's on ebay and the likes. Agreed, they would clearly only be used as DRL's or looks. No function as highbeams. But at 5$ shipped for a pair, i might try a pair just for fun.

 

The wife's R53 grenaded before I could do this mod. I'm curious if anyone tried it.

 

Right now I was only able to locate one source for a LED version of my HB bulb. (H9)

A bit "pricy" for a bulb IMO so have not tried this.

 

any pictures of MINI with DRL led bulbs? I have a 06 MINI without HID and i am trying to change it to LED. I saw this in a acura and I think it will look good in a MINI.