Hella Daytime Running Light LED's....

[RedRobin]

WHY:

When I first saw pics of a new Audi with Daylight Running Lights my first thought was how uber-cool they looked. But it wasn't until I was cruising at around 120 mph on a German autobahn and saw them in my rear-view mirror that I then realised also what an excellent safety feature they were. It's good practice and sensible when travelling at high speeds to maximise other road users' awareness of your presence and approach by having lights on. Regardless of the brightness of daylight, headlamps tend to flare and make it more difficult to assess the size of vehicle and therefore its distance, and hence to quickly compute how soon that fast moving vehicle will be on your tail. When you are continually driving at around 120 mph and needing to watch the traffic ahead, you want to achieve a smooth flow which doesn't result in interfering unnecessarily with faster traffic behind which is doing 160-180 mph - Quite common on unrestricted sections of the autobahns. Zap > Zap > Zap....Audi RS6 > Mercedes AMG > Porsche, all at around 180 mph.

As LED Daylight Running Lights, known as DRL's, deliver a passive signal light and not a light which illuminates, they don't strongly flare and consequently they allow you to instantly assess the size, distance, and speed of approach in your rear view mirrors, and so you are far more easily enabled to flow into an appropriate lane without any drama or increased risk to safety.

That's just one added safety benefit. When we move back to boring old British roads which are restricted to 70 (actually they're not all boring at all, but the 70 limit is sometimes when it's clearly safe for the road / conditions / traffic / car), there are plenty of visibility circumstances where a road is intermittently and randomly cast in deep shadow contrasting with bright sunlight on a two-way road. An oncoming vehicle is often invisible as it passes through the deeply shadowed areas, but is clearly visible if it has DRL's. By the same token, you can be better seen if you have DRL's and potential head-on incidents reduced. So, DRL's have more than an autobahn-only advantage.

I also became aware that after a certain date (2010?) all new cars will be obliged by law to be DRL equipped. In the UK, this has resulted in a certain amount of debate and resistance (surprise! surprise!).
 

SOURCING:

As soon as I had experienced their use in Europe, I decided I was going to get some on my Mk5 GTI. Initial research found that they were difficult to get unless you spent upwards of £30,000 for the rest of the Audi. Audi seem to have a monopoly on their pretty rows of LED's. The TTshop helped me out in sourcing some Audi strips but their fitment would have involved cutting into the crash fender and there was no way I was willing to do that, although someone in America has done so.





^ Photoshop mock-up ^  

My initial aim was for an Audi-style LED strip style. It would have been possible but would be difficult to make look as if OEM.

I knew that Hella were a major vehicle lights manufacturer and that they had been developing LED solutions, so I contacted Hella UK. However, they didn't know what I was talking about and I had to politely bully them into giving me a more senior contact. He wasn't very helpful either but I made a polite nuisance of myself and persuaded him to give me the email address of someone at Hella in Germany - I think he was glad to be rid of me. Hella in Germany were immediately helpful and understood what I was seeking. They put me in touch with an ex-Hella employee who was a specialist distributor for them and he sent me samples of both strip and round LED DRL units! The strip units were the same as the ones the TTshop had sourced and the round ones were a generic design for the Golf Mk5 and other cars but not the GTI. However, this was only because of a difference in oem fog grills and fixing methods. Their round design is intended for location where foglights usually are.







Not only were Hella Germany very helpful indeed, but they offered me a substantial discount.


INSTALLATION:

As soon as I knew that this might be practical with the Hella round LED units, I had a meeting with my VW dealer and their affiliated body workshop business and a 'dry run' to see what obstacles we might have to overcome so that workshop time on the actual installation could be more efficient. It soon became clear that we would have to adapt the bracket and couldn't use all the same screw holes that the oem foglights use. They are a very tight fit with the stock honeycombed fog panels but we succeeded. We used stainless steel bolts and nylon washers.



We followed Hella's wiring instructions so that the DRL's would automatically switch on with ignition and switch themselves off each time any other light was switched on, including via the Auto Lights feature. Also, in VCDS (VAGOS?) my VW dealer disabled the oem foglights so that their 'no bulb' warnings wouldn't keep appearing.





^ If you look closely you can see that the upper part of the black plastic panel bulges very slightly. The light unit itself though is a very snug fit. You can shave the rear rim of the aperture with a dremmel and this will cure any slight bulging.



Since first writing this review I have changed my oem foglight panels for carbonfibre ones and after dremmelling the backs they fit extremely well - Appearing as if the whole panel and DRL are designed as one unit.





Most of the workshop time was spent on the wiring and sorting out the switching instructions on VAS/VAGCOM. Finding the wiring route was very tricky and also bypassing error codes on the now absent fogs. Job took 4 hours. The standard (Euro legal) wiring is such that the DRL's automatically come on with the ignition and automatically go off whenever any of the other lights are switched on. The DRL's will remain on while you flash your headlights though because that's on a separate circuit.

I'm sure you could wire it up independently with a separate aftermarket switch. Also, I could have wired it up as if they were foglights but I didn't want to always have my rear lights on, or sidelights, when running these Hellas. Also, in case of getting police attention for percieved illegal use of foglights, I wanted to be totally legal. I want to be legal in Europe too, hence I decided to go the standard European legal route - On with ignition permanently until such time that other lights are switched on, either automatically (Auto lights feature) or manually.





The emitted light is of course entirely different from a foglight, being LED and crystal white. Also the DRL's are not a projected beam like a fog light and are a passive signal light which doesn't glare.






ALTERNATIVE CHOICES:



^ There is an aftermarket non-Xenon headlamp unit available for the Mk5 Golf which has integrated LED DRL strips but I would not wish to sacrifice having Xenons. I don't know how they are wired and if they are Euro-legal. The European rules about switching are very strict.



^ You could change the 'fog grilles' but there would still be a lot of cutting work etc to fit these Audi S6 LED's.
[That GTI needs lowering!!]


MINUS POINTS:

None for me personally but quite a few people don't grasp the safety advantage and can't think beyond seeing them as foglights which shouldn't be on except in fog. Others think that all LED's are chavvy.

I was apprehensive about losing my fogs. I live in an area where we get thick fog and sea-mists on higher ground, though not for half the year! I purposely assessed what driving in fog would be like by switching off my front fogs and I decided that dipped Xenons were totally adequate and the standard fogs are of very lttle benefit if at all.


PLUS POINTS:

I very much enjoy the fact that whenever I switch on the ignition to go out and drive, the LED DRL's are automatically switched on without me having to think about it. They also switch off with the ignition being switched off.

I enjoy the feeling that I may be more easily seen on the road in a great variety of circumstances. Also, because I am very bike-friendly, I like the fact that they are fitted at lower height and cannot be confused.

I think they look cool but by far the biggest plus is the increased safety from being more easily seen without dazzling everyone.


SUMMARY:

I have currently driven about 12,000 miles with these DRL's and have only once had Police attention when a passing marked car in high street traffic indicated by hand that I should switch off my lights. I just smiled at him and he didn't turn around to stop me.

The units are a standard size 90 mm diameter and that seems to be a fairly universal size.

The European approval is for the lamp and nothing to do with which car they are fitted to. They have to be fixed more than 600 mm apart, above ground 250 mm minimum and 400 mm (IIRC) maximum.

The polycarbonate front glazing carries the EC approval refs embossed and includes the "DRL" letters - This conclusively proves to anyone carrying out a roadside inspection that they are NOT fog lights! I also carry the manual in the car to produce to any authority.

The EC rules include how they should be wired to work - On/Off with ignition etc.

I almost want the police to stop me so I can test what happens!

[john_o]

as usual RR awesome writeup.  In terms of cost whats the rough price for the units?

[RedRobin]

^^^^
I was afraid someone would ask that! It was 9 months ago and I've forgotten but I could look it up (but not tonight - I'm now feeling sleepy).

[Greeners]

Ahhhh, Robin's little monkeys have their own thread 

[Toptrump]

Excellent write up there Robin!

I must admit I drive pretty much 99% of the time with my head lights on as it is waiting the excuse "but I didn't see you" from the lame muppet one day who will pull out on me someday in the future.

Interesting to see the bit about the UK not liking change. :)  I wonder what it is about change we complain about so much. :) :)

How come you say your lights have to go off when you switch on your main headlights?  I am sure just about every Audi I see still has them lit during the night.

[RedRobin]

^^^^
Thanks for the compliment, buddy

Human beings generally tend to resist change but there's something more stubborn in the average Englischer! I'm generalising of course.

"The European Union plans to make daytime running lamps mandatory on new cars from 2011, and on trucks and buses one and a half years later, according to a report from a German newspaper. The British government is also supporting the move as a way to help increase road safety.

British road safety minister Jim Fitzpatrick has been quoted as saying “the UK has been successful in arguing against the introduction of mandatory use of dipped headlamps during daylight hours by drivers of existing vehicles. However, from early 2011 all new types of passenger cars and light vans will have to be fitted with dedicated daytime running lamps in accordance with the relevant European directive. By summer 2012, all new vehicles will have to be so fitted.”

The use of daytime running lights can lead to fuel efficiency losses but this is being reduced greatly by the increasing number of cars using LEDs for this function. Still, it’s expected that their use contributes to an increase in fuel consumption of 0.5%-1%.

Around 50% of member nations in the EU already require daytime lights, but the EU eventually wants this type of legislation rolled out in every country."

Source: http://www.motorauthority.com/eu-to-mandate-daytime-running-lights.html

I think it's because my Hella DRL's are the type which either substitute (or go alongside) fogs, or their low position which dictates the automatic-switching rule - European Hedgehog Rights perhaps? We're not allowed to dazzle them at night. I don't know the reason for certain, but it is clearly written.

The Audi DRL's are integrated in the headlamps and may be switchable - I don't know. Also some cars have lights which are called DRL's but actually they aren't because they are stronger than x-number of candellas (or whatever the correct measurement is). You could say that your dipped headlights are DRL's but they aren't - You are just using them as if they were.

I've read that the UK authority are going to allow the use of fogs in non-foggy conditions as a transition while the DRL law is first introduced here - How ridiculous! How many people get stopped for inappropriate use of fogs NOW FFS!? I read numerous studies and info from various EC member countries and organisations on the subject of DRL's.

As with anything to do with European bureaucracy, the rulings are very complex and EC member countries and car manufacturers are constantly arguing about them. Hella are a major force in the automobile lights industry and also being German, they tend to know what they're doing. Pity I can't say the same about Hella UK though!

I sent a pic to Germany attached to an email thanking them for all their help. This was the reply I recieved : -

"Wow, this is great. This pleases me for you that we could help. Your car looks really first-class."

AFAIK mine is the only GTI in the whole of the UK with these Hella DRL's. It doesn't seem to be a mod which people go for! Hurdy has the integrated type but he didn't have Xenons originally.

All I know is that I'm really pleased I did this mod and I believe in it's road safety advantages.

[RedRobin]

....

I forgot to add that when my car went for its first MOT, the 'inspector' was going to refuse it because of the DRL's!! I had anticipated this possibility (nothing surprises me!) and read him the riot act via my VW dealer (his boss). He was still arguing so we showed him the documentation I keep in the car - He promptly shutup and passed it!

[stealthwolf]

I've liked the DRLs RR but wasn't a fan because they replaced the fogs. Not that I've ever used the fogs except when making sure all the lights work (before long journeys etc).

I've also thought about adding in DRLs next to the fogs, so no one gets confused about whether they're foglights or not. Will have to look into the headlight DRLs thing.

As for change, as I recall, it was stated that we should leave our headlights on all the time, 24-7 (no mention of DRLs) like the more northern countries such as Norway, Finland, Sweden where it's darker so you need lights on during the day anyway. One of the issues was the futulity of leaving on headlights on a bright and sunny day. Another was that motorcyclists use headlight permanently as a way of helping boost their visibility so they're not missed. Having lights on all the time would therefore reduce the how visible motorcyclists were back to square one!

As for me, I tend to run headlights when it's raining or looks particularly overcast in order to boost my visibility to other drivers.

[RedRobin]

^^^^

Some of the tastefully converted/modded cars by Hamann (I think Rob works for them?) fit double side by side but our vent panels are limited what we can do without making it looked hacked or amateur.



^ Hella DRLs inner and fogs outer ^ - Same monkey-face units as mine.

Yes, using headlights as 'DRLs' would be counter productive regarding motorcyclists - Hence another reason I prefer mine which are low level and non-glare and non-illuminating LEDs.

Using (dipped) headlights to boost your visibility is obviously a good practice but not as good as LED DRLs imo.

All these countries bogged down in writing legislation have got it wrong by not thinking beyond the headlight unit - They totally miss the fundamentals! Hella and Audi with their pretty strips have both got it right imo. Volvo, surprisingly, haven't.

[stealthwolf]

Nice pic. That's the kinda look I was thinking about (with the fogs and DRLs side-by-side). Not sure about the rest of it and I don't have the vented fog grilles.

[cal tdi]

the 32 front looks the business with S6 DRLs

[RedRobin]

the 32 front looks the business with S6 DRLs

^^^^
It sure does but the amount of work involved ain't for the faint-hearted. There's a long thread somewhere in German.

[Toptrump]

Excellent info cheers for that Red.  I can understand the frustration behind the fog lamp thing there.  I am fed up of what can only be complete idiots driving down dark country lanes with side lamps and fog lights on in the pitch black. 

I think in all my cars over the years I have used my very rarely as I find they do pish all.  I do wish people would use any form of lights during rain, dark and overcast days and even fog.  The amount of people I see with no lights on in these situations and even worse hard driving rain with tons of spray so I think DRL is a very good thing and certainly long overdue.

[stealthwolf]

I do wish people would use any form of lights during rain, dark and overcast days and even fog.

Same here. In fact, on Monday, when it was snowing, it was dim and overcast, less than half had their lights on! I sometimes override the autolight if I feel the conditions determine it.

[RedRobin]

....

The only time I use Autolight is when going into my garage, but it's because I have proper LED DRL's that I don't have to think about it - I simply check that they are working and that the lenses are clean before I drive anywhere.

I've come to the conclusion that many people only switch on their lights when they can't see ahead, and never consider whether others can see them!