LED Headlights in a Mazda5?
- Thread starter Kojack
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- headlights mazda5
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- South Carolina
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- 21 CX-9 13 CX-5
DON'T. For real, DON'T! It's a huge mistake doing that. Read This: Daniel Stern Lighting Consultancy and Supply
Our high beams are 9005's, use 9011's. Our low beams are H11's, use H9's.
Trust me on this. Plus the 9011's and H9's are cheap.
Our high beams are 9005's, use 9011's. Our low beams are H11's, use H9's.
Trust me on this. Plus the 9011's and H9's are cheap.
daniel stern is a joke. I have used HID in my previous 5 and they were perfect. No stray light, No flashing by others, no blinding light when in crappy weather. I run LED in my 2016 F150 and it's the same, perfect cutoff, no stray light no flashing by others.
I will take my chance. If you know what lighting system to use you get perfect light. I just want to know if the 5 has PWM or not. Thanks.
I will take my chance. If you know what lighting system to use you get perfect light. I just want to know if the 5 has PWM or not. Thanks.
Nope, no PWM in Mazdas.
And also no burnt bulb checking, so no need for any resistor/canbus thingys.
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- South Carolina
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- 21 CX-9 13 CX-5
What science have you seen that refutes the Laws of Physics as they are currently known?
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- 2008 Mazda5 GT
Dropping HID/LED into halogen reflector headlights is the big no-no but Mazda uses a projector lens that is the x-factor (Daniel Stern argue this too but I disagree based on many empirical user experiences I've come across). Stick with a better set of HIDs b/c the bulb projects light, unlike LEDs which scatter (need proper housing to focus/refract light where its needed) and doesn't give you the 'down the road' lighting you need at HWY speed. From a simple visual, I'm pretty sure the GT's HID uses the same projector housing as the non-GT. I recall old posts of folks trying LEDs and while it looks (stupid) bright in front of you it doesn't go far enough down the road and there's a lot more scatter (blinding) above the projector's cut-off. Then again, aftermarket LED bulbs likely have evolved so hard to say how they perform today and, like all things, YGWYPF. There's also the counter argument that most roads are very well lit; lots of people drive not knowing their headlights are off...
Consider salvage yards for OEM HIDs (OE Sylvania D1S bulbs are super bright!) and you can pull the toggle switch to get manual light leveling? Someone here posted a conversion guide and it is not difficult.
I had HID in my 2007 and they were AWESOME. Pushing light down the road. everything I have read that daniel the "expert" say is crap is just the opposite. He has an agenda and that is to profit from his "knowledge". I agree with the LED in the housings for the 5 and HID works MUCH better. I am not an LED lighting fan by any stretch. I like HID, but I was wondering until I can get some HID from retrofitsource.Dropping HID/LED into halogen reflector headlights is the big no-no but Mazda uses a projector lens that is the x-factor (Daniel Stern argue this too but I disagree based on many empirical user experiences I've come across). Stick with a better set of HIDs b/c the bulb projects light, unlike LEDs which scatter (need proper housing to focus/refract light where its needed) and doesn't give you the 'down the road' lighting you need at HWY speed. From a simple visual, I'm pretty sure the GT's HID uses the same projector housing as the non-GT. I recall old posts of folks trying LEDs and while it looks (stupid) bright in front of you it doesn't go far enough down the road and there's a lot more scatter (blinding) above the projector's cut-off. Then again, aftermarket LED bulbs likely have evolved so hard to say how they perform today and, like all things, YGWYPF. There's also the counter argument that most roads are very well lit; lots of people drive not knowing their headlights are off...
Consider salvage yards for OEM HIDs (OE Sylvania D1S bulbs are super bright!) and you can pull the toggle switch to get manual light leveling? Someone here posted a conversion guide and it is not difficult.
Stern said installing HID into Hella driving lights was useless and provided no improvement over "his recomendations". he failed to say he used the 700FF light housing which was terrible for doing that. If you put HID into the 500 driving housing or fog housing you got proper usable light that punched down the road A LONG LONG WAY (for the driving housing) or great wide light with proper cut off for the fog beam.
As soon as someone mentions his "work" I am out. I have been in the biz a long time. I am not new to automotive lights, suspension and performance. I helped Subaru Canada's rally team set up their cars for the Targa Newfoundland in 2001 and built race cars for said race for a few years. As well as built numerous Jeeps and stuff. I have also built an extended wheel base TJ rubicon to match the unlimited dimensions but have a longer wheel base for overland travel.
I was just asking if the 2017 has PWM or not so I can make sure I don't have flicker with whatever lights I install.
As for LED in reflector housing being a no no? I have 2016 F150 that disputes that claim directly. Proper cutoff, and great beam pattern. No getting flashed by on coming drivers. Had my wife drive past me going the other way and she said they were fine like any other HID/LED factory housing. If you know the products, how to install correctly and aim properly they work fine. Again. Mr stern just tosses the crappiest set of led from 10 years ago in a housing and goes....there ya go. Junk. I know what I am talking about. buy these lights off me.
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Oh, and @Silentnoise713, LED technology has come A LONG WAY in 11 years. The LED kits back when the post you linked was new, were sewage. If you noticed I was commenting way back then because I still had my first 5.Dropping HID/LED into halogen reflector headlights is the big no-no but Mazda uses a projector lens that is the x-factor (Daniel Stern argue this too but I disagree based on many empirical user experiences I've come across). Stick with a better set of HIDs b/c the bulb projects light, unlike LEDs which scatter (need proper housing to focus/refract light where its needed) and doesn't give you the 'down the road' lighting you need at HWY speed. From a simple visual, I'm pretty sure the GT's HID uses the same projector housing as the non-GT. I recall old posts of folks trying LEDs and while it looks (stupid) bright in front of you it doesn't go far enough down the road and there's a lot more scatter (blinding) above the projector's cut-off. Then again, aftermarket LED bulbs likely have evolved so hard to say how they perform today and, like all things, YGWYPF. There's also the counter argument that most roads are very well lit; lots of people drive not knowing their headlights are off...
Consider salvage yards for OEM HIDs (OE Sylvania D1S bulbs are super bright!) and you can pull the toggle switch to get manual light leveling? Someone here posted a conversion guide and it is not difficult.
LED kits have MUCH improved since then. and as such, until I get the kits from TRS, I am going to try LED in the housings. See what happens. If they are crap, I will send them back. Something tells me however, they will performs way better than the LED junk from 2014 that was mentioned in the thread you provided.
So, Again...does anyone know if the 2017 5 has PWM on their electronics systems?
Let's see how this set does. They are ignite brand from Canadian Tire. I am waiting for the dark to give them a proper try. Against my white garage door the beam pattern is exactly the same as the halogen, maybe a little wider because halogen sucks prairie oysters anyways. But ANYTHING is better than the halogen bulbs.
N7turbo
2023 CX-5 2.5T ... 2024 MX-5 RF GT
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- 2017 CX3 AWD
I know nothing on this topic, just came to see how this pic fits in any discussion.
They are........ok. Beam pattern is great but they don't have what I am looking for. They are brighter than the halogens, but not nearly as good as my F150 lights. I am returning them and going with another brand. Report on those soon.
N7turbo
2023 CX-5 2.5T ... 2024 MX-5 RF GT
Hilarious, but the problem with F150's (and many trucks on the road today) is that they don't properly aim their headlights down at the road. They just seem to beam to infinity. Mazda is so much better at this. We don't have the BT.50 here but if we did I'm sure it's engineered similarly to their cars with properly aimed and cutoff headlights.That has nothing to do with the lights and all to do with the miata.
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