COMMENT My Purchase Of LED Tail/Brake 3156 Lights

[MEXICOWANDERER]

First of all, my toad has tail light housings that must be treated as being unique to the marque. A Dodge Ram or Chevrolet Silverado would be the color of a different horse as far as uniform light dispersion and angle coverage.

I sought one thing and one thing only - a brighter 0 angle emission. Straight to the rear.

Here is the link to the eBay site I purchased from...

http://www.ebay.com/itm/4PCS-White-3157-3156-3057-3056-4157-15SMD-5730-LED-Bulbs-for-Brake-Tail-Ligh...

Both tail lights were equally bright with conventional 3156 incandescent bulbs. Tail and stop/turn illumination equal.

One lamp was changed to LED. Since I trust NOT my eyesight, I gathered FIVE mechanics plus Alicia, to express their opinion regarding a comparison. First tail lighting was illuminated. Then the flashers were enabled for a minute.

All stared and all witnessed the test.

Bottom line: The difference between left and right lighting is indistinguishable as far as intensity or color. Both for tail lights and for flashers. Unanimous consensus. Without side comments.

They certainly look the same to me.

But....my focus is on reliability with the bulbs. Fewer failures.

I have RUDE plans to augment the 3rd brake light intensity to avoid rear ender's from idiots with cell phones growing out of their ears.

Plus 18mm LED amber and red side marker flashers announcing turn signal action.

As far as the LED tail lights are concerned, read the eBay ad and come to your own conclusions...

[happycamper002]

MEXICOWANDERER wrote:

As I noted above, I chose an expensive blowup-proof Sure Power electronic flasher to insure it will stay working - it is rated for a cycle life of millions of flashes perhaps ten million. It is DOT approved.

My sources say that Sure Power flashers do indeed meet OEM and SAE strict quality control. However when you go to their website nothing mentions about DOT approval. All it say is OEM and SAE
They may be made like meeting specs meant for military application: heavy duty,hermetic type safe from environmental effects that are suited for off-road use and harsh environment.

The website does say it is meant for off-road.

SAE or OEM do their own testing but DOT make sure that equipment meets safety standard for highway and surface road driving.

Sounds like a case of "what's good for the goose is NOT good for the gander".

[happycamper002]

Double post

[happycamper002]

MEXICOWANDERER wrote:


Sin Embargo (nevertheless) the LED lamps I purchased turned out to be no brighter than incandescent 3156 bulbs.

I agree, those 3156s are no brighter than those generic filament jobs.

Unnoticeable... especially if you drive into a severe Santa Ana wind condition... stirring up sand in the Sonora Desert.

Perhaps Mexican drivers (no racism implied) need to keep their prescription glasses in the UP and UP.

[MEXICOWANDERER]

My objective is rather simple - Do whatever I can to avoid getting nailed by an uninsured (99.9%) Mexican motorist. I choose to dump a lot of money into a 22 year old car because it isn't a seething nightmare of computer regulated systems. You should see the percentage of new vehicles down here: Won't start, can't run, malfunction junction, dangers to public safety. Made in Mexico nightmares with no source of replacement parts.

As I noted above, I chose an expensive blowup-proof Sure Power electronic flasher to insure it will stay working - it is rated for a cycle life of millions of flashes perhaps ten million. It is DOT approved.

All to avoid fender-benders and worse. I hear tourists laugh and say "Mexicans ignore signal and brake lights". They do not ignore them. They may not use their own turn signals and they may prefer to ignore a pair of their own burned out brake lights but they do see and react to my turn and brake signal lights.

I see new cars with factory fancy designs brake and tail lights so bright they hurt the eye. So when I install those Eagle Eye 15-watt (hyperbole) red lights I will not feel a bit self conscious.

Sin Embargo (nevertheless) the LED lamps I purchased turned out to be no brighter than incandescent 3156 bulbs.

[happycamper002]

Your struggles seem insurmountable which shouldn't be. You asked for reliability, brightness, visibility and overall ease of use and superior quality.

If you are not keen (which sounds like you are) on having spitwads, mud or whatever,you can use an adapter so you can use bulbs made for European Cars.

The 3156 or 3157 socket can be adapted to the European bulb sockets. Available on eBay--most distributors are here in CA.

Since most of this feature comes in luxury cars, perhaps one can trust its longevity/reliability IMO.

If your vehicle is over two years old, chances are the electronics, whether the software or hardware have been superseded in one way or another...in other words trailing along the footprints of T-Rex.

Turnover for this stuff is eighteen months at least. . . . . well as an automotive aficionado I'm sure you know.

The CAN (controller area network) Bus is a standard for most modern cars, as one poster had said.

The CAN Bus LEDs are special bulbs with a built-in IC chip to simulate the characteristics of a filament bulb. This IC will eliminate the 50W 6 ohm resistor. A bit pricey but not too much to break the bank.

Since these are made to work with the car's ECU, the built-in IC will eliminate the need for an on-board computer---it fools your flasher mechanism to make it look like a filament bulb is intact and functional.

There are electronic flashers on the market but I doubt they are DOT approved.

[MEXICOWANDERER]

With the toad I am augmenting the 3rd brake light with eight 10mm 160000 mcd red LEDs. Into the trunk panel goes 22mm Red Eagle Eye LEDs. Diffused amber and red side marker lights. I see drivers look unseeing right at me. I can only hope all this works. There is fog here that can get as dense as any California tule fog I have ever seen.

[CharlesinGA]

On newer vehicles resistors are a necessity, because the CANBUS system needs to see the circuit and LED's don't have enough resistance for the CANBUS. Install LED tailights on a Sprinter Van for example without resistors, and suddenly the cruise control and the ABS, and several other seemingly unrelated things, don't work, because the CANBUS doesn't see the taillights.

Charles

[landyacht318]

Mexican washboard is hard on filaments.

Practically Parked in a traffic jam is hard on LED brake lights.

Not much air circulation inside the housing or behind it and it still seems that bright LEDs equal hot LEDS = short lived LEDs.
Perhaps more dielectric grease in receptacle can help draw more heat from LED bulb base, and sticker the backside with mini heatsinks

I keep 3196 2057 and 1157 incandescent spares on hand, but my 1157 red LEDs are still Ok at about 2 years. I do not even have to leave vehicle to replace them.

[MEXICOWANDERER]

I'm backed into a corner. Too many failures with incandescent 3156 bulbs. Wagner, GE, it does not matter and operating voltages are in the low thirteens.

I can only hope.

[burningman]

I know LEDs are the way of the future and I like them for their brightness and low power draw.... BUT, in my many years of real world experience with them on trucks, the reliability is often WORSE!
It's not so much inherent with LED technology, I think it's more a cheap Chinese junk issue.
Really, an old style 1157 bulb lasts a long time, is super easy to change, and is dirt cheap.
I've got LED tail lights that only half the LEDs still light up, and LED turn signals that work sometimes.
I never had this kind of trouble with incandescents. I like LEDs, but the forever reliability isn't there like it's suooosed to be.

[happycamper002]

Don't they serve fried SCORPIONS in high end restaurants in SOHO in Manhattan?

As far as I know, those who partook are still hobnobbing with celebs here in LA.

If I ever find a place that serve them I'd prefer to have them smoked with Fava beans and Don Pedro tequila.

[MEXICOWANDERER]

Read this...

Scorpions versus the most toxic chemical in my arsenal.
Trichloroethylene.

Scorpion on concrete floor.

Doused with trichloroethylene.

No other insect lives a millisecond after being dosed. Spiders, centipedes, moths, hornets, wasps, you name it...

Scorpions WILL CONTINUE TO CRAWL leaving a trail of trichloroethylene.

Isnsecticides" Surely you jest. I laugh as I remember seeing a violent movie where the heroine sprays red pepper all over the face of the arch evil villain. He grabs the cartridge out of the woman's hand, opens his mouth and hoses inside like it was breath spray.

This is just like a scorpion versus raid, or commercial sprays.

[happycamper002]

MEXICOWANDERER wrote:
What fun today. I stepped on a scorpion in the bathroom at 6:40 PM. He jabbed me four times in under a second. The clinic administered scorpion anti venom and four other drugs via IV. Poor scorpion he now has the abilty to crawl through the pages of a closed book. Now? Insole feels like I stepped on a hot coal. Life in the tropics...

Now, it looks like you need to change your priorities. You need a topnotch exterminator...those spitwads that sometimes work on insect bites ain't gonna work on this one.

Hope you feel better.

Cheers

[MEXICOWANDERER]

My flasher is atop the steering column. After the first one blew, I tried a NAPA flasher. 3 years and it quit. So I went with OEM MoPar. About 13 months later it too quit. So I got ahold of one of Lisle Bruney's ultimate flasher from sure power. It's gone six years flawlessly. It flashes LED without using mud, tinfoil, and a spitwad. I made the 3rd light bars myself. I can trust my work. Eight 160,000 mcd 10 mm units. What fun today. I stepped on a scorpion in the bathroom at 6:40 PM. He jabbed me four times in under a second. The clinic administered scorpion anti venom and four other drugs via IV. Poor scorpion he now has the abilty to crawl through the pages of a closed book. Now? Insole feels like I stepped on a hot coal. Life in the tropics...