gchen said:

Has anyone else out there found that the high beam indicator light is too bright?
A mate here has had to resort to sticking a small patch of tinted plastic over it!

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Yes.

I stuck a bit of brown parcel tape over it. Dulls it down.

The overly-bright high-beam light is a pain, but it's nowhere near as distracting as the green light on the Cross's terrain control dial. I keep a scarf in the car to place over it after dark.

Oh, and reading back through this thread, I see that I described the headlights as pants. Slight correction - they are just about bearable on full beam, but utterly pants on dipped. On the B roads around here, many of which have no road markings or catseyes, I've even had to resort on occasion to driving on full beam, with the height adjuster set at -2 or -3 to avoid dazzling oncoming cars.

R1NGA said:

Simply put a small piece of black tape over the bright indicator light and solve the problem for good. You genuinely can't see the tape even in the daylight and although you don't get much of the 'hue' of the blue light in the background, if you need a tell-tale to know if you're running on full beam, then you need a slap anyway....



Two VERY hot filaments would overheat the bulb, simple as that I'm afraid. And in terms of aftermarket kits, maybe Italy has some, but the very open design of the current Panda lights might make it hard to design something that both looks good and works better. No, driving lights are the way to go for me.

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Ugh... my father does that (he's quite old, so I give him some lee-way on the matter but I'm actually relieved he'll be relinquishing his license next year) where he drives with high beams and fog lights, and only notices what he's been doing after every other car coming the other direction flashes and honks in desperate attempts at notifying him that he has now seared their corneas. As if that weren't enough, he tries to flash them back only to find he's run out of photons.

My issue with lights these days is that while I understand that H4 systems are cheaper, decent HID kits with ballasts, bulbs, lenses, wiring harnesses and voltage regulators are about 300 quid from a reputable brand. From an economies of scale standpoint, it would cost car manufacturers 100 per car to make them standard across the range. Sure, that would eat into the profit margins of top-spec mid-segment and up models with fancy LED headlights, but then again they'd be making more money from the bread and butter of lower end sales. Then we could finally put filament bulbs out of their misery like we've done at homes.

Hi, I totally agree about weak headlights. Especially when it's dark and rainy at the same time. I did with my Panda 4x4 TA as I use to do with my earlier cars, I changed the feeding cables to thicker ones. I had to put new relays and feed them directly from the battery. The wattage is falling with the square of the voltage fall!! So I will not accept any voltage fall at all (almost).
Thicker cables was better, but not enough. After that I tried Osrams Night-Breaker, but the light was too blue for me, even if I scratched the blue paint off the glass.
Then I found Philips Extreme Vision +130 H4. They are now good enough but the lifespan is too short. (A reason may be that the voltage loss is almost nothing now-days)

There is also an even better Philips Extreme Vision +150 available but it's lifespan is even more reduced also. Note that all bulbs I have told about are 55/60 Watts and fully legal.
I don't believe in x-non bulbs, they are a passed history. The future is spelled LED! So I have been looking around and found this: Philips Extreme Ultinon H4 http://www.xenondepot.com/h4-philips-12953BWX2-LED-Bulb-p/12953bwx2.htm
They are also to be found in Australia. They are said to bee also +150% and no glare. I should want to test them but they are a bit expensive if it shouldn't work all right. The design is said to be made in Germany.

I think it can also be hard to find a place for the ballast-boxes...

Anybody who has tried them? Note: there is also a lot of false copy's on the market!!! I am pleased to hear your opinion...

Edit: I also have a bit of tape over the hi-beam indicator lamp! (but not black - I still want to be able to notice it!)

I upgraded my headlight bulbs to Bosch (may even have been Half]ords own) 130% brighter (or something like that) and they are fine now. And used every day fro two years, still going strong. I also found that although the beam height was set correctly, the left/right adjustment was way off, with the beam from both lights converging a few meters away. Now set up correctly, with beams parallel to each other and its much better, especially on dipped beam. And yes, I too have a small square of black tape over the main beam warning - I can just see the symbol peaking round it and that's enough to know they are on. It passed the MoT like this too, so they clearly were happy with it.

[later: just realised I posted much the same message back in December: well, at least I was consistent!)

Now I have finally fitted a pair of Philips Ultinon H4 LED's in my Panda 4x4.

I bought them from ebay.UK! The light is GREAT!! If I park in front of the garage doors I can see that the lo-beam figure looks very good. Just precise the same figures as the original halogen-bulbs gave.

I have been out for a couple of drives in the traffic (when dark). no-one ever gives me a flash because of glaring. It seems fine.

Those LED's where unfortunately NOT easily fitted into the VERY small headlight housing. I had to put the cooling element in opposite direction to get it inside the housing. The only problem that still may remain is that the cooling elements might touch the inside housing a little when adjusting beam high (up-down). I will take a look at that another day.

Heat seems not to be a big problem. (But it is still rather cold in the air.)

On Philips.UK's own homepage they have written about those Ultinon-LED's. But they don't show any pictures of them yet.

R1NGA said:

Having come from cars with very bright and complex HIDs, I too had to go the +130% Phillips Extreme Vision route for the bulbs. Better than cooking 55/60W versions for sure, but let's not kid ourselves about being over 'twice as bright'....!

So a set of very bright but small LED driving lights seemed the sensible option and I cannot shout loud enough about the massive improvement in high-beam driving performance achieved. Decent lights are worth about 50bhp at night and as I've said before, these little 52mm diameter photon torpedoes are worth their weight in gold and dead easy to mount (as long as you're brave with a 2" hole saw and get the measurements right!).

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That's a great fitting job really neat! Did you just fix to the bumper cross beam?

petercresswell said:

That's a great fitting job really neat! Did you just fix to the bumper cross beam?

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If the 52mm hole sawing process is accurate, and the shaping of the polystyrene impact absorber behind the bumper is similarly done, then in fact the lights are an interference fit. As I pressed them into the mountings, the plastic around the holes deformed slightly and allowed the units to slide in. Once in place, they are held very firmly indeed - in fact I'm not too sure I could get them out again very easily at all. Fortunately I had sorted the wiring first, as getting to it afterwards is a little awkward.

Hello to everyone!

Here is what I did with my headlights!

I Used Led H4 Canbus

And here is the result








And led P21 5W Canbus also for the dayline lights





:worship::worship::worship::worship::worship::worship:

John Sheridan said:

I've had my Panda Trekking now for just over 2-years and still love it but the headlights are so poor . The amount of light they actually shine is just pathetic. It's so bad I'm considering trading-it-in next June when it has it's 3rd-birthday.

Does anyone else think their headlights are poor?

Has anyone had the lights changed for Xeons?

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Nope, no complains here.

svenb said:

Now I have finally fitted a pair of Philips Ultinon H4 LED's in my Panda 4x4.

I bought them from ebay.UK! The light is GREAT!! If I park in front of the garage doors I can see that the lo-beam figure looks very good. Just precise the same figures as the original halogen-bulbs gave.

I have been out for a couple of drives in the traffic (when dark). no-one ever gives me a flash because of glaring. It seems fine.

Those LED's where unfortunately NOT easily fitted into the VERY small headlight housing. I had to put the cooling element in opposite direction to get it inside the housing. The only problem that still may remain is that the cooling elements might touch the inside housing a little when adjusting beam high (up-down). I will take a look at that another day.

Heat seems not to be a big problem. (But it is still rather cold in the air.)

On Philips.UK's own homepage they have written about those Ultinon-LED's. But they don't show any pictures of them yet.

Click to expand...

Hi!

We also have a Panda 4x4 in orange.

Have ordered the same LED bulbs and waiting for them to be delivered. When I look at the back of the head lights there is a rubber seal disc that needs to be removed to access the bulb. I suspect since the wiring harness needs to connect directly to the back of the bulb the rubber seal will not be able to be fitted after installation.

What did you do, and if there is no seal in place have you had any issues with moisture / condensation building up inside the headlamp assembly ?

Also, have you managed to re-route the heat sink away from the headlamp / has it caused any problems?

Thanks.

Hi, I still have the rubber disc in place. (modified)

The new LED-lamp fits inside the headlight-house with rubber sealing on!!
But then comes the problems with all cables in and out.

From the first beginning I tried usual H4 lamps but with changed supply feed , to get rid of the voltage loss caused of too weak supply wiring. (usual problem on all cars)

So from one of the headlight power supply (3-pole contact to the H4 lamp) I took maneuver current to my new relays with power feed directly from the battery.

Because of this earlier test arrangement, I already had my power connection to the headlamps fed from a place outside the lamp-house. This was now used when I needed to connect the new power-boxes for the LED-Lamps.

I have made a little cut in the rubber-seal just enough for the cable to pass. (almost too little for it really) You can use some silicone-rubber or similar to protect it further more.

The cooling element of the LED is supposed to have the narrow part close to the LED. But I put it in the opposite direction with the cooling wings close to the LED. This is not enough however to get space, because the beam hight adjustment still causes the cooling wings to touch the inside of the headlight housing. I had to look where the problem occurred and remove a little bit of the cooling wing(s).

Be careful not to force the beam hight adjustment so it causes the mounting/fixing screw on the LED to get moved!!

Check that no cables are compressed by accident. I also have put a "systoflex" heat protection, in the headlight-housing, around the cables where I "stole" current to my headlight-relays.

svenb said:

Hi, I still have the rubber disc in place. (modified)

The new LED-lamp fits inside the headlight-house with rubber sealing on!!
But then comes the problems with all cables in and out.

From the first beginning I tried usual H4 lamps but with changed supply feed , to get rid of the voltage loss caused of too weak supply wiring. (usual problem on all cars)

So from one of the headlight power supply (3-pole contact to the H4 lamp) I took maneuver current to my new relays with power feed directly from the battery.

Because of this earlier test arrangement, I already had my power connection to the headlamps fed from a place outside the lamp-house. This was now used when I needed to connect the new power-boxes for the LED-Lamps.

I have made a little cut in the rubber-seal just enough for the cable to pass. (almost too little for it really) You can use some silicone-rubber or similar to protect it further more.

The cooling element of the LED is supposed to have the narrow part close to the LED. But I put it in the opposite direction with the cooling wings close to the LED. This is not enough however to get space, because the beam hight adjustment still causes the cooling wings to touch the inside of the headlight housing. I had to look where the problem occurred and remove a little bit of the cooling wing(s).

Be careful not to force the beam hight adjustment so it causes the mounting/fixing screw on the LED to get moved!!

Check that no cables are compressed by accident. I also have put a "systoflex" heat protection, in the headlight-housing, around the cables where I "stole" current to my headlight-relays.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the detailed reply. I have fitted the H11 version of this kit into a Toyota Prius and it went in very easy, but there was no separate rubber moisture seal to contend with.

I'm not sure I follow you when you mention the relays etc - I am assuming you already tried to retro fit higher capacity cables to the headlamps and effectively moved the connectors to outside of the lamp assembly. I did wonder whether to splice into the connector that goes to the outside of the headlamp and get the feed that goes to the internal H4 to power the LED driver and only have to to feed one cable through the rubber seal, but I would prefer not hacking cables.

My hope is there there is enough space for the LED lamp and integral heatsink to connect and it be possible to connect the driver to the H4 connector - having the actual LED driver on the outside of the rubber seal, but I'm concerned with space and heat. I would hope that the LED heatsink is not trying to disperse more heat than the regular bulbs would generate. Obviously I would need to pass both connectors through the rubber seal for this to work and hope it would not prevent the headlamp level adjustment.

This is where some decent photos would speak a thousand words!

I really hope it is worth the hassle!

They wont be type approved and will not be road legal. Off road use only I would assume.
Expensive to boot!!!

Not wanting to get to involved in the legal debate (which is clear - the bulbs are illegal!), but I am curious as to why some think there is a need to 'upgrade the wiring' to use LED lights?

The existing wiring works just fine with 55watts of power needed for a halogen bulb (the calculation for current in amps - which in turn determines the size of wire needed - is 'watts divided by volts equals current', so 55w / 12v = 4.6 amps of current per bulb)... So long as the wire can deliver 12 volts at that current without voltage drop, as is well. The electrical designers will not have use a cable the is 'too small' as this would pose fire risks etc. Modern wires do look very small compared with older cars - but they will not be 'under-rated'

The whole idea of an LED light is that less power is used (compared with a halogen), as you get many more lumens per watt (more light for a lot less electrical current). This means an LED can therefore 'get away' with an even thinner wire owing to that lower current draw (12v LED lights at, say 30watts will draw 30 divided by 12 amps = 2.5amps). Also, LED will deliver the same light output across a wide range of voltages (for example between 8 and 30 volts), so again the issue of voltage drop is ruled out.

Just saying...

You are totally correct regarding the wiring, it's perfectly adequate for lower consumption LED lights. There could be an issue of course with non canbus types with flicker, there are other ways to stop that problem though.

There is NO need of thicker cables for the LED lamps!!! Absolutely NOT!

My change of cables was because of an previous experiment, with conventional H4 bulbs! Then it was practical to re-use the cable-drawing from this earlier arrangement when I installed the LED-lamps.

Yesterday evening it was an "open-house" offer. at the test-station where a use to do the annual vehicle approval of my car. I let them test the car lamps (this time with no official test-protocol written)

The lo-beam figures was just PERFECT!!! NO adjustments needed, or has been done after the change from regular H4 to Ultinon LEDs.

They seems to be perfect manufactured!

I have used them all time since mounted, nobody has ever complained.
The LED-lamps gives me so much advantages and safer drive that it would be stupid not to use them!

I will keep on, legal or not, I don't care. I do not make harm to anybody, but It will perhaps keep myself alive for a longer time..

svenb said:

There is NO need of thicker cables for the LED lamps!!! Absolutely NOT!

My change of cables was because of an previous experiment, with conventional H4 bulbs! Then it was practical to re-use the cable-drawing from this earlier arrangement when I installed the LED-lamps.

Yesterday evening it was an "open-house" offer. at the test-station where a use to do the annual vehicle approval of my car. I let them test the car lamps (this time with no official test-protocol written)

The lo-beam figures was just PERFECT!!! NO adjustments needed, or has been done after the change from regular H4 to Ultinon LEDs.

They seems to be perfect manufactured!

I have used them all time since mounted, nobody has ever complained.
The LED-lamps gives me so much advantages and safer drive that it would be stupid not to use them!

I will keep on, legal or not, I don't care. I do not make harm to anybody, but It will perhaps keep myself alive for a longer time..

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Hi.
That's good.
I also think its safer to see where you are going especially as the standard Panda lights are so poor.
I have fitted 130% Osram night breakers but don't wish to fit relays and heavier cable so if the Philips LED's get cheaper then I'll consider fitting them.
A properly designed LED bulb that is fully to H4 beam pattern spec in my mind should be legal. Some of the Zenons and HID's in SUV's are horrendous and down right dangerous to oncoming vehicles and cyclists and yet they get type approval. All wrong in my book.

The legality issue is not the brighter lights but the systems that have to be fitted on a car with them. The 'rules' haven't been updated yet for LED, but were for HIDs and these are what they apply to LEDs too (for the moment).

Any bulb used on the outside of a car has to carry the correct 'e' mark, and this refers to minimum brightness and correct beam pattern or correct illumination of the reflector behind the light. And the light fitting also has to be 'e' marked.

And then, specifically for the headlights, because the lights are brighter (which makes them safer for you as the driver), they can cause more dazzle to oncoming cars if not correctly aligned all the time. A car with HID or LED headlights has to have automatic levelling of the lights to compensate for the load in the car. And, the headlight has to have high pressure washer jets fitted to keep the 'glass' clean - again to avoid dazzle caused by dirt. These two bits are missing if you just add LED bulbs...

Herts Hillhopper said:

The legality issue is not the brighter lights but the systems that have to be fitted on a car with them. The 'rules' haven't been updated yet for LED, but were for HIDs and these are what they apply to LEDs too (for the moment).

Any bulb used on the outside of a car has to carry the correct 'e' mark, and this refers to minimum brightness and correct beam pattern or correct illumination of the reflector behind the light. And the light fitting also has to be 'e' marked.

And then, specifically for the headlights, because the lights are brighter (which makes them safer for you as the driver), they can cause more dazzle to oncoming cars if not correctly aligned all the time. A car with HID or LED headlights has to have automatic levelling of the lights to compensate for the load in the car. And, the headlight has to have high pressure washer jets fitted to keep the 'glass' clean - again to avoid dazzle caused by dirt. These two bits are missing if you just add LED bulbs...

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Hi.
Yes I am aware of the law with self levelling and washers. I believe from what I have been told is Zenon (Discharge tubes) produce light scatter and require the correct reflector and it has to be clean, free from scratches, and not opaque. In my mind these must only scrape through the regulations and other factors are not taken into account like normal wear and tear. A number of years ago you could buy H4's with 100/80 watt rating, they were for off road use due to the wattage, nothing to do with light output, also the the previous non Halogen continental bulbs 40/45 watt were given a boost when aftermarket 55/60 watt Halogen came with the correct base, these were pre "E" marking and were a great upgrade.
Philips have been at the forefront of lighting technology for over a century, they were Called Philips Lamps many moons ago, they also bought out our Mullard Valve company in the 1920's and are as we know a very innovative company. I really cannot see Philips making an H4 that would be dangerous to other road users knowing full well the "off road use" warning will be ignored. The odd thing is the regulators must be aware of this too and if this bulb is non compliant then why are the makers not given the rap?
Night driving is a pain these days especially in the wet, road markings are poor, the roads are full of pot holes and tall vehicles with overly dazzling lights blind you and you can drive many metres literally not being able to see.
So at times I get frustrated with regulations, these regulations and the law about aftermarket bulbs need to be carefully examined along with innovations from the likes of Philips, car makers fitting really old tech H4 bulbs and reflectors also need ticking off.
If these 130% night breakers still don't light up the road enough for "me" to feel safe then I'm afraid I'll need to consider a better solution.