Led Headlight Install - 5Th Gen

[KevCarver]

Stupid Springtime late sunset!

Gonna take forever to get dark!

Can't compare them directly as far as quality, but they are nicely put together units. Oddly no instruction sheet included. Just tried unscrewing from the end of the fan, and that's how I found out how it comes apart. Other than that I guess it doesn't really need any instructions. Pretty simple.

I didn't measure the drivers. The email I got back from them long ago when I first asked said "credit card" size, I believe. That's about right. Maybe 10-12mm thick? Looking at pics of the eBay stuff, those appeared thicker with similar dimensions otherwise... Hard to tell for sure, of course. Unfortunately the access is pretty time consuming on the ST, so I won't be measuring anytime soon!

edit:

Just re-looked at your original post and I'd say similar thickness, and the Lifetime may be tighter in the other dimensions.

P.S.

What are those hideous yellow blobs on the side fairings under the headlight?!?!

Kidding! I just de-dumboed mine.

[KevCarver]

Back from a quick dusk to dark ride. I gotta say they are on par with the filament bulbs as far as pattern. High and low beam. The ST has such excellent headlights already that it's hard to improve with only using the two bulbs inside the housing. You can go crazy with externally mounted fog and flood lights.

Definitely a white light! Love that. Glad it doesnt verge on blue. I get a lot of reflection off street signs facing me with high beams, and that was the case before hand too. Like I said, without having another one on hand to directly compare, I'd say the visual aspect is equal with the bonus of looking cool (can't underestimate that!) and drawing about half the power. A big deal on a VFR, for sure! Good alternator on the ST, so less of a concern there. I run a heated jacket liner, gloves, and grips without worry. Even with all the non-headlight bulbs switched to LED on the VFR, it was into discharge if I was stopped. Usually have a heated pants liner on really cold days on the VFR.

[KevCarver]

Finally a good dark ride to work this morning. Darn rain kept me off two wheels since Sat...
I would turn on the ST every time I went into the garage, and with it about 4 1/2 feet from a white wall it is very bright and white! Time to get it out on the road. Unfortunately my favorite route to work is a bit deer-y, but I decided to take a chance because its so dark for much of it. The ST1300 lights in stock form are really good, especially on high. With the Lifetime LEDs in place of the incandescent bulbs I felt like it was equal. I think the whiteness of the LEDs makes it look different enough that its hard to say for sure, but after a few miles I feel like it was illuminating things as well as before, just not yellow-y. I've read that some of the LEDs on high beam don't have an appreciably higher beam pattern, but these do and seem equal to the regular bulbs.
All that being said, I am not sure the price tag for equal performance is all that worth it. At least for the ST. As I mentioned earlier, the "cool factor" and power draw savings on the VFR are worth it. Just won't be getting another set for the ST. I think I said on my earlier post that if they were $100 a set I'd have probably got two straight away. And been happy with them. At over $160 (with S&H), not so much. I'm sure the prices will be coming down eventually. Not sure I really want to gamble on the eBay units. Sure, they generally offer and honor warranties, but some have failed pretty quickly. How many replacemts will be required and given? Just my opinion...

[zoomzoom]

Hey KevCarver

Thanks very much for the update and the general opinion on the LED's. This is exactly what I had hoped for when I originally started the thread. It's great to hear that a few others have tried the upgrade and that for the most part the opinions have been positive. I agree that the technology will no doubt improve over time and it's hard to say what the future will hold for the aftermarket suppliers. It appears that most of the problems that I have heard about have to do with failures with the power supply (ballasts for lack of a better term) so it will be interesting to see what you think of the Lifetime LED's and their longevity. Please keep us apprised of your thoughts and impressions.

I have been very impressed with the output of the LED's in my bike thus far, and would say that the LED's have made a great difference on my 5th gen. The beam pattern seems slightly improved over the stock lights, and the overall output of the LED's is a vast improvement over the stock lights IMO. The fact that I can also plug in my heated vest and maybe add some heated grips in the future for the cooler commutes is a definite bonus.

Thanks for sharing.

[Bassie]

Same here, I'm having them installed for a few weeks now and I love them.

Other road users see no difference as they don't flash towards me or anything.

They are bright and good.

[Skids]

Same here, I'm having them installed for a few weeks now and I love them.

Other road users see no difference as they don't flash towards me or anything.

They are bright and good.

I've been riding with mine a bit (riding the 6th Gen a bit too as I need to change tyres before our European holiday) on the 5th Gen and had no flashes at all from cars so I've raised the beam a little. Anecdotally, I think the LEDs are more visible/eye-catching and therefore cars see me earlier and move out of the way earlier too. No proof of that, just an opinion but I'm pleased with the set up so far.

[KevCarver]

What are the dimensions of the LED driver units the Lifetime Kit?? I would be interested to see if there is a difference in overall size of the part compared to the ones I used.

I just pulled them out of the ST to put in the VFR and measured the drivers for ya:

In mm- 64x44x9, there or thereabouts.

[Tman]

Kev,

I am curious about your feedback on installing the LED CREE lamps in your 99 VFR?

I have the 96 VFR750 and find the lighting poor.

Can you provide your results on the 99?

DOes the 99 VFR use basically the same lighting system as the 96?

thanks

Ed in Pgh PA

[Switchblade]

Kev,

I am curious about your feedback on installing the LED CREE lamps in your 99 VFR?

I have the 96 VFR750 and find the lighting poor.

Can you provide your results on the 99?

DOes the 99 VFR use basically the same lighting system as the 96?

thanks

Ed in Pgh PA

[zoomzoom]

Kev,

I am curious about your feedback on installing the LED CREE lamps in your 99 VFR?

I have the 96 VFR750 and find the lighting poor.

Can you provide your results on the 99?

DOes the 99 VFR use basically the same lighting system as the 96?

thanks

Ed in Pgh PA

Perhaps I can offer some feedback until Kev answers. I have installed the LED headlights in my 2000 VFR and thus far have found them to be an immense improvement in the lighting on my bike. Personally, I have noticed that the LED's provide a more bluish white light (like the HID headlights in my car) and the light color alone seems to make objects illuminated by the headlights easier to see. My thoughts on this are because the light produced is closer to natural daylight and provides better contrast between objects.

Another main reason for the use of the LED's was that their overall cost was less and the kits required no extra wiring to handle the excess voltage that HID's require at start up. The LED's are essentially plug and play and other than mounting the power supplies somewhere, required no additional modifications to the bike. It could be argued, and indeed throughout the thread there are those that have mentioned that the LED's produce a beam pattern that is much different and not as distinct as the halogen bulbs (mainly in reference to the upper cutoff line on the headlight beam pattern. It has been my experience in the last three months of riding that the LED headlights are indeed brighter than the stock halogens bulbs and do not appear to produce much if any excessive glare toward oncoming traffic. I say this because I have yet to receive a single high beam flash from any oncoming motorists like you get when your high beams are on. I have also followed my wife home on occasion with the bike and she has commented that the lights are indeed brighter than before but are not "glaring" bright. My parents also live down a dark country road with no street lights and have ridden toward them and followed them and my parents (both are in their 70's) commented that the lights were brighter than previous but they did not seem to produce any painful glare.

If there is a major difference between the 96 VFR and the 2000 VFR as far as headlights are concerned it would be that the 2000 VFR has a clear plastic headlight lens and the 96 VFR uses a fresnel style glass headlight lens. I would think the main difference would be that the 2000 uses a shaped reflector to focus the headlight beam, whereas the the 96 uses a reflector to project the light through the fresnel shaped glass headlight lens to focus the beam. Both headlights use an H4 style headlight bulb that has a different spacing on the retaining tabs than a traditional automotive style H4 headlight bulb. This means that on your 96 VFR you would need to either modify the headlight housing to accept the standard H4 bulb, purchase some headlight retainer rings designed to provide the proper aligning tab locations, or simply snip the two lower tabs off the H4 style bulb and install them.

Here is a link to a post that shows you how to modify the headlight housing to accept a standard style H4 bulb. I performed the mod on my last bike, a 97 VFR and it was not very hard with the use of a dremmel tool. The main benefit I see here is that the bulbs relative position is unchanged in the reference to the reflector.

http://webpages.charter.net/bpeloquin/H4mod.html

I have an LED H4 kit that I am going to install on my wife's 96 VFR but before I install it I wanted to modify the headlight housing first and she currently wants to take a motorcycle safety course before she starts riding again as it has been a number of years since she last rode on her own. Once I get the kit installed I will post up some photos and my impressions of the modification. There was another member (can't remember if it was here or on VFRW) that installed an LED kit form the same supplier I used and he mentioned that he was very impressed with the LED headlights and said they were also a vast improvement on his 94. He did suffer an LED power driver failure similar to what vfrcapn experienced though I'm not sure if these were more isolated incidences. vfrcapn purchased his kit from the same eBay seller that I purchased from but I have yet to see a problem with the LED kit in my bike. That being said, if I were to do it over again, I would choose the Lifetime LED's for two reasons, the warranty offered is far better and they are rated for a higher lumen output (2600 lumens versus 2000 lumens as I recall). I also might have chosen the Lifetime LED's instead of the eBay supplier but when I started looking I had not found the Lifetime supplier until after I had already purchased a kit. I have also thought about keeping my spare LED kit from the eBay seller just in case the unfortunate happens and I suffer a power driver failure. There is a link in the first post of this thread to a bunch of the sellers that were mentioned throughout the thread so you have some choices as far as suppliers are concerned.

Hope this answers a few of your questions. Once I get the install completed on my wife's 96, I'll post up about my impressions, but considering that she is not riding yet, it may be a little while before I get this done. Look forward to hearing about your results though should you get this done before I do.

[zoomzoom]

I was sent an interesting article about "GLARE" associated with automotive headlights, mainly between HID's and older drivers. It provides some interesting information as to WHAT glare is when related to headlights and it's overall effect on the human eye. It is a fairly long article, but it was interesting.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1771460/

[MBrane]

Interesting article. At nearly 50 I find that I'm more sensitive to light at night, but the only lights that really bother me are the HID conversions. Vehicles with factory HIDs are only mildly annoying, and not always. Most of them are actually no trouble at all. That's why it's so easy to spot the cheap conversions which unfortunately are quite popular around here.

[Mohawk]

Well I just did 2600 miles of European tour & everyone to a man commented on how bright my headlights are ;) At one point we went down the worlds most vibratory road, it was so bad that my left mirror vibrated loose on its stem , but the lights worked great. That's about 5000 miles so far always on & no issues.

[Switchblade]

Well I just did 2600 miles of European tour & everyone to a man commented on how bright my headlights are ;) At one point we went down the worlds most vibratory road, it was so bad that my left mirror vibrated loose on its stem , but the lights worked great. That's about 5000 miles so far always on & no issues.

No pic's ?

[Dutchy]

At one point we went down the worlds most vibratory road,

Yeah, the cobblestones in Amsterdam's red light district are terrible....

[Switchblade]

On the back area ?

[Guest]

I bought the same cree headlight kit from http://www.lightingnext.com/cree-cob-led-headlight-set.html last week. This kit comes with 2 bulbs, ballasts, etc. Installation was a breeze, all plug and play. Much better output than the OEM halogen. The high beam pattern is actually way more spread, the pic was only taken from about 20 ft away. The best part of LED's vs. HID is that you can flick the high-beam without having to worry about burning out the bulb and installation is a whole easier since you don't have to tap into the battery and use relays, etc. You also don't have to worry about heat since HID's are notorious for melting the reflective housings on some bikes/cars; LED's run much cooler. Instead of creating a neat bracket to mount the ballast like the OP, i simply used double sided tape and mounted it on the frame close to the left fork (basically, on the opposite side where you have the vin # sticker, it fits perfectly there and doesn't interfere with the fork at all). Quite happy with the mod.

[Mohawk]

well I have a few pics & will throw a thread up this week. My only complaint to the organiser/leader was that he is a riding machine & never stops except for fuel. I've been all through Europe. From eurotunnel, France, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, France, Italy, France, Andorra, Spain, then ferry home to Plymouth from Santander. Approx 300 miles per day, but all wiggly great roads apart from first day to get to the good roads. But no stops for pics, coffee, or wee breaks so mutiny was on the cards after a few days ! 9days riding, 1x24hr ferry. Phew, knackered :)

Bike worked a treat, never missed a beat except at the top of the high passes, the highest being Val'desere @ 2770m (9,087ft) where it would not idle, about half the bike conked out when we stopped at the top, but all fired up when asked !

[vfrcapn]

Bought the original $70 eBay kit in January, replaced a fan and bulb, 2x, since. So the right fan started acting noisy a few weeks ago, I let it go since it was still working and you can't hear it once the bike is started.

Today, the left light flickered on the way home and died before I got there. It was 105 degrees F on the freeway but I never got bogged down in traffic, 75 mph the whole way.

I think that's 2 bulb/power units now, 2-3 fans, in 8 months? I'm done, I'm emailing them to ask for a refund, going back to halo's until there's a proven plug'n'play LED solution.

[Switchblade]

Bought the original $70 eBay kit in January, replaced a fan and bulb, 2x, since. So the right fan started acting noisy a few weeks ago, I let it go since it was still working and you can't hear it once the bike is started.

Today, the left light flickered on the way home and died before I got there. It was 105 degrees F on the freeway but I never got bogged down in traffic, 75 mph the whole way.

I think that's 2 bulb/power units now, 2-3 fans, in 8 months? I'm done, I'm emailing them to ask for a refund, going back to halo's until there's a proven plug'n'play LED solution.

Any updates ?

About to pull the trigger on one of these kits.

Anybody else having problems ?

[yycviffer]

Problems? Yeap.... I would not do it. I also purchased the "CREE Kit". One bulb glows only very dimmly on low beam but both still work on high beam. Also the fans are now very noisy so I'm not expecting much life out of them either. I also will probably go back to halogen. :( It crapped out after only 1500 Km's of use so I am quite disappointed for the $ spent. I was into the kit for over a hundred. At least it was not a permanent mod to the bike.

[Switchblade]

Thanks for the feedback ...

[vfrcapn]

Yes, what YYC said. I got a full replacement kit for the original bad fan and just hung on to the kit, they didn't ask for it back. So now I'm on the second bulb from that kit and one of the fans. It's not worth the hassle, try a different brand.

Here's some links to other manufacturers, can't say they're any better but lots of info to read through.

http://vfrworld.com/forums/showthread.php/44225-LED-Headlight-Install-5th-Gen?p=450285&viewfull=1#post450285

[Skids]

No issues with my setup so far.

[JZH]

I'd say something here...but then I've got two CompuFire series reg/recs it now looks like I'm going to have to pull out and replace with either OEM or something else. Early adoption does carry some risks.

Ciao,