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Camaro third gen LED head lights

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Old Sep 29, 2015 | 12:26 AM
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Camaro third gen LED head lights

I have found the final solution for putting LED head lights in a Camaro and didn't even realize it.
I put them in my suburban and forgot that my old suburban and the 3rd gen Camaro use the same lights until I was reading on here tonight and saw the LED headlight post on here.

LED low beams do require some fabrication, testing and refinement.
LED high beams are drop in, plug and play. Just buy them, put them in and thank me later. Do it now.

Here is the original posting that started the quest:
https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/fabr...igh-beams.html

Three years ago I picked up some 4x6 inch projector H4656 replacements with the appropriate H4 bulbs for around $40. I wanted to try to turn these into LED low beam head lights but I found the H4 LED selection to be lacking and got side tracked, shelved the project then forgot about it. I recently restarted the project after I realized there were a lot more LEDs on the market now compared to even a couple years ago.

I finely found some H4 LEDs I liked. They are 30 watt head lights with a built in heat sink with fan, made with cree LEDs. $70 got them delivered to my door.

So a I installed them per the instructions and powered them up with my little battery (inside pointed at the celling). The beam and glare they gave off was a disaster.
With too much money already spend and my refusal to give up or be like every other gaping d hole driver out there who blinds everyone with their cheap aftermarket lights I press on.

I quickly discovered that if I turn the emitter assembly about 45 degrees to the left, then if I backed the H4 LED out of the housing about 4mm it tightened up the beam pattern. Then if I tilted the back of the LED down slightly it removed most of the top side glare. It took some work.

The OE style halogen H4656 low beam by comparison uses 58 watts, or 4.5 amps at 13 volts, versus the H4 LEDs 1.25 amps at 12.5 volts low beam and 2.1 amp high beam. These are not ratings that were stamped on the side of the box, I took these off my fluke325 amp meter.
I didn't bother to check the H4656 high beam amp draw.

Other modifications, I will paint the back heat sink portion black with flat black engine paint to further aid cooling.

Lots of pics and very detailed instruction on how to make LED low beams that have street manors:
http://www.dieselplace.com/forum/63-...low-beams.html

LED high beams:
(do not use these as low beams)
I got on good old evil bay and searched "4x6 LED head light" finely some companies picked up H4656 LED head light production.
3 years ago when I last tried this there was nothing for 4x6 inch lights.
http://www.dieselplace.com/forum/63-...igh-beams.html

The closest thing I could find 3 years ago was 5x7 inch head lights and they were $243 per lamp and only one company was making them.
The picture I attached is with the halogen/high beam on one side and the LED/high beam on the other.

The auto motive LED ecomodder wiki, the dumping ground for useful bits of info:
http://ecomodder.com/wiki/index.php/L.E.D_conversion
Attached Thumbnails Camaro third gen LED head lights-img_0758.jpg  

Last edited by oil pan 4; Oct 6, 2015 at 11:51 AM.
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Old Oct 2, 2015 | 04:05 PM
  #2  
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Re: Camaro third gen LED head lights

The housing in the link you provided is not a projector housing, it is just a lens inside.

I bought a good quality H4 LED lamp and I am putting it in a 7" round Hella DOT compliant housing that I took out of my 73 Camaro and putting it in my 69 Suburban. I hooked it up and it is very bright but it comes with a shroud so you're not blinding the on-coming traffic
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Old Oct 6, 2015 | 11:56 AM
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oil pan 4's Avatar
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Car: 89 Firebird
Engine: L98
Transmission: T-56
Axle/Gears: 3.73
Re: Camaro third gen LED head lights

Yes round/parabolic is naturally an excellent shape to make a head light reflector out of.
I have read about other conversions using round reflectors that take H4 or HB3, H7 and so on halogens where people simply install an replacement LED and it usually works quite well.
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