LED Side light Bulbs from DamoP
WHYThe standard incandescant 501 sidle light bulb give off a dull yellow light which is quite noticeable against the crisp white light of the xenons.
I have tried several different LED bulbs over the past two years, from cheap ebay ones to more expensive ones from places usch as HIDS Direct.
Eventually they always seem to fail giving a bulb warning on the dash. They sometimes work for 6 months but eventually fail.
Most LED 'CANUS compatible' bulbs have built in resistors designed to stop the bulb error.
As the built in resistors are small, I think they eventually burn out.
When this happens, the lights may come on for 5 seconds, the bulb error will show and the car will think there's a fault and shut off the sidelights.
To get around this, you could fit inline, larger resistors, but I was trying to get away without them.
@DamoP sells LED bulbs which are reasonably priced, so I thought I would give them a go.
Although i'm fitting them to xenon headlights, they can also be used in halogen lights.
SOURCING@DamoP The bulbs you need are W5W / T10 fitment to replace the 501 incandescent bulb.
FITTINGThere are various posts on fitting side light bulbs to xenon headlights, its tricky but can be done without removing the headlights, and when you've done it once, its quite easy there after.
Remember, LEDs are diodes and will only work one way, if the bulb does not light up once fitted, remove and rotate it 180 degrees and re install.
OTHER VERSIONS- There's loads of options. A search on Google / eBay will reveal lots of different suppliers / types.
- Some have different amounts of SMDs (surface Mounted Diodes).
PLUS POINTS- Direct replacement (some LED bulbs are different dimensions and may not fit into the light housing)
- Pure white light
- No bulb error (so far...)
- 8SMDs
- Good price.
MINUS POINTS- Although perfectly fine, they're not as bright as I expected them to be, I've tried others in the past which have been brighter (but failed).
- The appearance of the light does depend on the surrounding lighting too. They seem less visible in bright day light, but I guess they're not meant to be DRLs.
- SMDs mounted on PCB. Some don't like this type of setup, opting for those using a plastic housing instead, although I have no issues with them.
SUMMARYDamo was great to deal with and the LEDs arrived quickly in the post.
Fitting may take some practice, but no need to remove bumper and headlights etc.
Nice white light giving an improvement over the old yellow bulbs and they compliment the xenon bulb nicely.
Not as bright as I thought they would be in the daytime, but nice and bright at night.
If you're after a cheap set that so far is known to work well, you can't go far wrong with these.
I'll update the review in the future once they've been fitted for a while.PHOTOSBulbs (Old Vs New)
BEFORE
AFTER
Night shot
Thanks
Jas
