led bulb fitment in the oem headlight housing?

I took the headlight out of the housing to check out how much room there is behind it on my 85 maxim x, & there sure isn't much. No thanks to all the wiring from the gauges, etc in the housing. I was surprised how difficult it was to move all the wires & connectors out of the way just to reinstall the factory headlight. It seems like it would be almost impossible to install any type of halfway decent led, due to the size of the ballast on the back of the bulb. Have any of you guys done this?

 

Fitting an LED H4 bulb in the stock headlight would make it impossible to cram all the "rats nest" wiring in with it too.

I am using a 7 inch housing for mine, but was a PITA to fabricate it to work using a Seca 650 mount, a Suzuki Bandit 1200 housing, and a Peterson LED headlight assembly. The end result is well worth it though.


Tony

 

For my bike headlight buckets I get the braid-cooled LED H4 lights. The alternative (still more expensive but coming down every day) is a complete drop-in LED unit, which look as if they'll fit nicely.

 

Dave, I'm guessing your bike doesn't have the whole "rat's nest" of wires inside the housing though?

xHondaHack, that is cool, but I think I'm too lazy to do that.

I might just add a couple supplemental led lights. I was driving in front of a newer goldwing the other night, the thing had 6 headlights blinding me in my rearview. I think it was actually stock. It looked like some kind of UFO, kinda cool actually.

 

Every Yamaha XJ of the era comes with that.

 

The bike in his sig, a 92 xj900f, may not. I don't know anything about that bike.

 

It's got the usual rat's nest, but the cooling braids of the LED are easily splayed out and folded back over the rear of the shell, so don't take any real space up.

 

it seems like anything with a heatsink would benefit from some air flow. like some extra holes in the shell, can't let water in though....?

 

the LED with the braided lines work well xj 750 but ! Just this stupid instrument cluster bulbs says the bulb is dead not enough load I saw somebody posted something a way of changing the regular lights on the bike, but I didn't see anything on the headlight still trying after all these years I must admit though I haven't been looking that hard I've been busy

 

Covered here, with a fix: New LED Head Light - casuing issues

 

I recently installed an LED retrofit bulb with no space issues. I just had to push some of the wiring out of the way enough to fit the housing. It doesn't sit any deeper than the OEM bulb, and the back of it is some sort of plastic, so it would be a pretty poor heatsink even with airflow. Here is a link to what I bought:

https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https://www.ebay.com/ulk/itm/232549328661

 

I've been watching the price of the all-in-one units plummet as the Chinese started knocking them out, undercutting Trucklite and Speaker by huge amounts. I've held off getting one yet until I get some feedback from someone who knows what they're talking about rather than just a 'it's bright and great' report. Do let us know how it is for quality of beam and scatter.

 

It definitely is bright and pretty. It has a fairly clean cut off at the top of the lighted area, not a blurred line like when people install HIDs into sealed beam housings. The projector housing all seems very solidly mounted. I did also notice it is not a straight line that cuts the light from left to right. There is a slight step with the left side of the light a touch lower than the right. Though this may have been a manufacturing defect, I believe it was intentional for the purpose of keeping the light out of the eyes of oncoming traffic. She. The brights are applied, that dip is no longer present. The materials used all seem to be of good quality. The lens seems to be glass, though I'm not sure how chip/crack/scratch resistant it is, the rear is some sort of plastic, and the connection for the plug seems very securely mounted. The one I ordered did come woth a few adapters for other plug styles, but I did not need them. For ~$40 it has been well worth it for me. I only have a few hundred miles with it so far, as my bike has been down for swapping cams, but it seems.to be something that will last a while. The color of the light is a cool white, not blue like some of the cheaper HID/LED stuff, but definitely not yellow like the outgoing halogen bulb. After medium length rides (45-60 minutes) the bulb does not get warm enough to burn and you could comfortably leave your hand on it. I have been caught in the rain for about an hour with the bulb already and it survived without issue. There are some that integrate turn signals, but I did not opt for that version. No halo ring either, just two stacked Less. Overall, very happy for the purchase and, assuming it lasts a reasonable amount of time, I would gladly buy another one.

 

Is it DOT approved?

 

It is not listed as DOT. Not sure if this is allowed, but this is the link to the exact one I bought. It claims the housing is aluminum, but it is most definitely not. Perhaps the internal "chassis" holding the LEDs is aluminum?

https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https://www.ebay.com/ulk/itm/232549328661

 

it says DOT on the lens

 

Thanks for the write-up. I'll keep an eye on that one.
Difficulty here is the kick-up to the right, which would dazzle drivers on these roads.
I need to find one that has a level dip, which will do fine, as the wanted kick-up to the left is much rarer.
I stumbled across this review of a range of 7" LED light units. Definitely a bit biased, I think. However, there are one or two of the knock-offs that look ok to me.