the headlight bracket on my car is destroyed but before I go trying to replace it I was wondering has anyone ever done a set of LED head lights or have any insight on how to go about doing it?

thirdgens for cheap parts around here are scarce and if I don't have to replace the bracket I don't want to especialy if theres a better alternative like LEDs

my dad has LEDs were just not sure if theyre bright enough or how to arrange them the best way

 

I can't vouch for the quality, but rock auto has the light bar for like $50 if I recall. The best upgrade I have seen is a 90s BMW 3 series E36 headlight system Took a lot of modification, cutting into the core support behind, welding braces and trimming the bumper cover. There's a thread here on it somewhere. Good LEDs are very expensive. Best bet is just go stock, put in a quality set of sealed beams and upgrade the wiring.

 

Why not fab in a set of aftermarket LED lights? There are several brands out there now, and you could do one pair in a flood pattern for your lows, and another set of spot patterns for your highs.

http://www.amazon.com/Rigid-Industri.../dp/B00AMEN074

 

You would need proper headlight lenses and reflectors. You can't just put a bunch of LEDs behind a lens and expect it to work. High and low beam elements are positioned inside the light to use different lens and reflectors so they project different shaped beams onto the road. They're not just a spot or flood light.

The high intensity LEDs are not even really what people think of as LEDs. They're integrated circuit LEDs now. A little square pad on a circuit board.

It's highly unlikely you could fabricate a home made headlight to give similar results of a production light. You'll have better luck modifying the current light buckets to accept an OEM brand of LED headlight.

As nice as it looks, LED headlights are very expensive. The single square headlight has come down in price and it's still only $300 each. They used to be $800. I haven't seen the quad square ones yet. My bet would be that if you want to retrofit some other style of LED headlight, to get everything fabricated and working so it doesn't look like some junkyard contraption, you should have $1000 - $1500 invested.

Not saying it can't be done but it wouldn't be cheap to make it look like it came from the factory or a bolt on aftermarket system.

 

There is a thread in electronics I think about led headlights. One guy is advertising the kind he sells. In a YouTube video they look promising but no member here has them to give results on. The prices are high but not that high. I pmd him about a deal on them and haven't heard back. Makes me even more skeptical....

 

Couple of them have been done

 

E bay sells "Angel Eyes" which are halogen headlights surrounded by L E D's. They're made to mimic the headlights on the 2010-Present Camaros. I bought a set but have yet to hook them up. They come with a rubber seal on the back of the headlight which makes it a tight fit installing them with the stock headlight bezels. Have to figure that out yet. The L E D,s are wired separately so you can either wire them into the "Parking light Circuit" or run the wires separately to maybe a fog light switch. If you have a three position switch, you can control which L E D's come on. (Because you have 4 headlights). Having said all of that....…....I can't recall who exactly sells them, but if you search 82-92 camaro headlights on E bay there will a lot of options for you. Just thought I'd throw that out there.

 

Yep on ebay, couple types,

 

Those look good. For as simple as the 3rd gens are in the headlight area, it really makes sense to take advantage and come up with a cool custom job like that. The problem with the Ebay lights is that they look like you got them on Ebay.

 

get 4x6 led headlights there like 150 for 2 they do both high and low

 

If you want to spend all the money and time to do LED, go right ahead. You can do it right, it'll be expensive and take some time, or you can do it wrong and pay for it later.
LED is great for the lower powered things like brake lights and turn signals as they have such little draw on them and last so much longer, but, once you get to high output, LEDs will take up even more draw though.
I spent a good time helping my dad a few years ago because they needed lights on their 6 wheeler for work but even with LED they had so much draw that a second battery was needed.

As previously mentioned, they will need their own style of reflectors as a normal sealed halogen one wont work. then you need the proper glass for the housing as the wrong lens will either divert your lights to the wrong places and blind everyone and, or will over concentrate a beam and give you limited lighting.

Then you need to make sure your wiring is not overpowered and blowing out your lights, nothing would hurt more than to buy some nice LEDs and to burn them out instantly.

If you are going for the cheap route, buy a stock replacement setup online or make your own, it will be much cheaper than trying to retrofit something new. I have had too many people come to me for lighting and expecting it to be cheap to convert over to something. To have proper, legal, lighting, it takes time and money, simple as that.

 

[QUOTE=Dabesiv;5701310
LED is great for the lower powered things like brake lights and turn signals as they have such little draw on them and last so much longer, but, once you get to high output, LEDs will take up even more draw though.
I spent a good time helping my dad a few years ago because they needed lights on their 6 wheeler for work but even with LED they had so much draw that a second battery was needed.
[/QUOTE]

I think that comment is incorrect, at least for today's LEDs in use. LEDs take substantially less power than any filament style bulb. In this thread (https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/afte...eadlights.html) one member made a you tube video of him testing the draw of an LED headlight that he sells against a regular bulb and an HID bulb. LED was the smallest easily. A further example would be all of the homes at Christmas time that put up thousands of lights and have it plugged into one of their garage outlets because the draw is so low. Watch some of the YouTube interviews on the home owners or read some articles about them and they will list the draws of the thousands of LEDs that they use.

 

Sorry for any confusion here
Don't get me wrong, LED's are phenomenal technology for what they do and how well they work and they really do require the least amount of energy ( all but four bulbs in my car are LED).
I am not talking about headlights as being the "high output LED's". The vehicle needing two batteries was an off-road, emergency response ATV with multiple Hi intensity spot lights as well as strobe light bars those all being hi output so the visibility and brightness was extreme. It needed to be LED as all other options would be far too much power draw and LED did the least, but would still do its toll all the same after a few hours of running.

My big point of the initial response was that if OP wanted to stick to the cheaper route, I highly advice not going LED. As good quality, lasting, LED headlights will cost far more than the replacement parts would be.