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Old 04-12-2016, 08:31 PM   #87 (permalink)
The donkey CRX
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Join Date: Feb 2013
Location: TN
Posts: 300

MULE VX - '92 Honda civic VX
Team Honda
90 day: 92.6 mpg (US)

White 94 VX "Show Car" - '94 Honda Civic VX VX
90 day: 79.92 mpg (US)

The Walrus - '02 Honda Insight base
Gen-1 Insights
90 day: 100.88 mpg (US)
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Thanks for your kind words NoD

I will be glad to show you what I have done as far as LED replacement of headlights and other bulbs, but I feel I am still on the "bleeding edge" of LED technology. I think that mostly LEDs still have a ways to go before they are affordable and reliable.

Most of my purchases were done almost a year ago, so I'm sure improvements have been made since.

Here are the headlights that I have used on all 3 of our cars (92&94 Honda VX and 2002 Honda Insight). These were the best I could find at the time with 3200 lumens per headlight of very white light. They are far superior to the OEM lights they replaced as far brightness with no complaints from oncoming traffic. These lights are kept cool with a fan that has been a reliability issue. The fans are noisy and one had to be replaced after only 2 months use. It seems the newest ones coming out use a large heat sink to cool the bulb and I think that's the way I would go If I had to replace the ones I am currently using. I bought these lights from Amazon for about $120 per set.











Below are the type bulbs I would recommend for brake, running, backup and turn signals bulbs in either red, amber or white. These bulbs cost about $30 to $35 for a pair, but are the only ones I have purchased that are twice as bright as OEM. Each one of them have a "projector" type lens on the end with very bright LEDs as well as many bright LEDs on the sides. They were plug and play on the Honda VX cars, but are too long to fit into most of the lenses of the Insight, so I had to modify the lenses in order to fit them as turn signal bulbs for both the front and rear. I bought these bulbs on Amazon and they are JDM ASAR brand.




Note that the two on the right fit the light sockets on the VXs and the one on the left fits the Insight sockets.

Here are some poor quality pictures of where I had to use a 5/8" hole saw to make a hole in the amber lenses in order to fit the too long bulbs. Also note that the front turn signal lens broke off inside the larger lens cover.
The turn signal still works fine because of the large reflector and amber colored bulb.









Here is an example of a $7 dollar bulb that looks like it would work well, but is actually not as bright as an OEM bulb.





The best source to find out which type bulbs will fit your vehicle is Super Bright LEDS, but their prices are very high an they don't always have the type bulb that is bright enough. It was hard for me to determine which bulbs are the brightest because the vendors don't always list the lumens and also the amber and red colored bulbs don't have a "lumen" rating.

Now your know why I said I feel like I am on the "bleeding edge" of this technology.

The good news is even these very bright bulbs use a fraction of the amps of the old OEM filament bulbs.

Hope this helps

Last edited by The donkey CRX; 04-12-2016 at 09:29 PM.. Reason: spelling
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