H4 headlamps with LED bulbs
- Thread starter Bianchi Brink
- Start date
-
- Tags
- bulb h4 bulbs h4 headlamp led bulb
I find that if I’m the only vehicle on the road, my H4’s are marginally acceptable on dipped and main. Better on main. I can see where I’m going but need 100% concentration.
As soon as another vehicle comes the other way the projected light from my van is sort of drowned out / lost. This is the bit I find dangerous.
I think (hope) going with brighter bulbs should help this phenomenon.
SWMBO has LEDs / HIDs in her Octavia and it has the best headlights of any car we’ve owned or driven - that said they’re probably dazzling all oncoming traffic and cost a fortune when they go wrong.
Ian
As soon as another vehicle comes the other way the projected light from my van is sort of drowned out / lost. This is the bit I find dangerous.
I think (hope) going with brighter bulbs should help this phenomenon.
SWMBO has LEDs / HIDs in her Octavia and it has the best headlights of any car we’ve owned or driven - that said they’re probably dazzling all oncoming traffic and cost a fortune when they go wrong.
Ian
I am relatively new to the t6 scene. I was really shocked at the poor headlight performance when driving it home . I have previously had a touran and Tiguan and the lights were ok . So I wasn’t expecting it to be so bad . Just ordered vanstyle upgrade DRLs kit with h7 and dip /high beam conversion kit . I guess it won’t be brilliant but will be better than the current performance.
only better if u add led , otherwise not worth it
I have similar headlights to the ones you have ordered, maybe even the same, but from THQ and with a standard H7 halogen bulb they are better than standard H4 headlights. I would say they offer very similar performance to the H7 dipped image in the post from @RedUn earlier in this thread, but with a sharper beam cut off due to being in a projector housing rather than a reflector. An improvement over the H4 ref light output yes, but not a huge one.
I have since fitted Philips Ultinon LED bulbs to the dipped beam and had the alignment adjusted to make sure it's all good. These improved things further, but I'll be honest, I was a bit underwhelmed by their performance, especially considering they were £115 for the pair. Having said that, they are better than with the H7 halogen bulb installed, just not quite £115 worth better if that makes sense. I'll try and get a photo of them on dipped beam in similar conditions to the pic I mentioned above and you can see what you think.
To sum this up, if you're expecting a major improvement with the new headlights you may be disappointed, it will be better, but not amazing. Upgraded LED bulbs (good ones, that's a minefield too) will help further and it's the best option I've found so far.
I'm still considering a xenon HID kit for the dipped beam and may then sell the Philips bulbs for half the retail price or something. This seems to be one of those subjects where it's difficult to be 100% satisfied, without spending thousands on OEM LED units.
@andys has got decent light output from his H4 LED lamps and they were £30 bargains (sadly no longer available) and I've got a modest improvement over halogen with my £19.99 specials (which are on Amazon) so there definitely are relatively simple upgrades out there.
Replacing the headlight units is also an option but as we're all starting to realise unless they have something better than a 55 watt halogen lamp in them then apart from looking pretty in daylight or driving around with their dip and main beam on regardless of traffic then they're still not fit for purpose.
We're getting to be on the same page with headlight surgery too as the brighter these Leads get the more butchering that has to go on so for some it might be better to get a spare set of the unloved H4 headlights before getting in too deep.
Regarding the complete headlight though it's only the lamp access cap that gets modded to accept the deeper rear end cooling fan, if the lamp has a short fly lead to get connect to the original VW 3 pin plug then that can tuck behind the reflector actually inside the unit and the fan caps altered in my pics above refitted.It's fitting the higher powered LEDs with bigger cooling fans and external driver/campus boxes that will test garden shed engineering as the tails on the lamp are pretty short and will need extending to bring the VW 3 pin plug feed out of the headlight unit to the LED driver and then back into the headlight on the LED flying lead from the driver.
There you go not plug and play but bear in mind you will have to muck about with an H7 headlight or aftermarket projector type too if you want decent headlights.
Replacing the headlight units is also an option but as we're all starting to realise unless they have something better than a 55 watt halogen lamp in them then apart from looking pretty in daylight or driving around with their dip and main beam on regardless of traffic then they're still not fit for purpose.
We're getting to be on the same page with headlight surgery too as the brighter these Leads get the more butchering that has to go on so for some it might be better to get a spare set of the unloved H4 headlights before getting in too deep.
Regarding the complete headlight though it's only the lamp access cap that gets modded to accept the deeper rear end cooling fan, if the lamp has a short fly lead to get connect to the original VW 3 pin plug then that can tuck behind the reflector actually inside the unit and the fan caps altered in my pics above refitted.It's fitting the higher powered LEDs with bigger cooling fans and external driver/campus boxes that will test garden shed engineering as the tails on the lamp are pretty short and will need extending to bring the VW 3 pin plug feed out of the headlight unit to the LED driver and then back into the headlight on the LED flying lead from the driver.
There you go not plug and play but bear in mind you will have to muck about with an H7 headlight or aftermarket projector type too if you want decent headlights.
If you read through the 40+ page THQ lights thread, or one of the original OEM H7 threads, this just isn’t the prevailing view. Personally, I have THQ lights with pretty standard osram +130% bulbs and they are absolutely better than the standard H4’s. Still a long way behind factory LED however.
What headlight were you running your +130% in?
@Stay Frosty I was going to suggest that when I order my HID kit I send you my Philips Ultinon for a trial in the standard H4 headlight, until I remembered that they are H7 bulbs! 
@t0mb0 the Philips racing vision 130s were in my H4s and looked the same as @RedUns pictures on the previous page, maybe a 15% improvement over stock but certainly still not adequate.
The cheap and cheerful £19.99 LEDs are on the pictures on page 2 of this thread and beat the Philips halogen 130% ones hollow.
Cheers Chris but this is turning into a make the best of a bad job H4 crusade!
The cheap and cheerful £19.99 LEDs are on the pictures on page 2 of this thread and beat the Philips halogen 130% ones hollow.
Cheers Chris but this is turning into a make the best of a bad job H4 crusade!
It would be interesting for someone to give them a try in the standard H7s though? That might be the sweet spot? H7s and Leds? In theory the beam pattern should be a lot better than the 1970s H4s@Stay Frosty I was going to suggest that when I order my HID kit I send you my Philips Ultinon for a trial in the standard H4 headlight, until I remembered that they are H7 bulbs!
We could do with @Dellmassive running this thread as he covers all bases on his "how I did this" posts, however @ChrisR the H7 reflector looks to be slightly smaller than the H4 but then each reflector in the VW H7 headlight is dedicated to a single task so in theory there should be less light spillage ie. a better beam.
We know the LEDs all produce a better colour rendition than halogen which is a lot of the problem, factor in a genuinely higher lumen output above 3000K than can be produced by a blue painted halogen lamp and H7 headlights with LEDs should be an improvement over the VW H4 headlight, halogen H7 v LED H4 and the H4 (with a decent LED lamp) is better and round we go again!
We know the LEDs all produce a better colour rendition than halogen which is a lot of the problem, factor in a genuinely higher lumen output above 3000K than can be produced by a blue painted halogen lamp and H7 headlights with LEDs should be an improvement over the VW H4 headlight, halogen H7 v LED H4 and the H4 (with a decent LED lamp) is better and round we go again!
It's great you've got good results with putting LEDs in the stock H4 headlights, this puts you in a select group! If your bulbs are still available, that's even better as the ones that andy got good results with aren't still available it seems. Maybe there are specific designs of LED bulbs that work well with the VW H4 reflector.
I got my THQ H7/H1 headlights a while ago, when all the feedback from the big original forum threads were full of people getting good results from upgrading to either OEM H7 lights or THQ ones. In my specific case, I moved from osram 130% bulbs in OEM H4 to osram 130% in THQ H7 and I moved from a situation were it was dangerous to drive at night to a situation where it was now safe.
If a genuine forum consensus builds about a specific LED bulb that improves the THQ lights emerges, I'd be tempted to try them. Currently though, even the very expensive phillips ultinon bulbs seem to get pretty mixed feedback. I had high hopes for the Twenty20 compact series of bulbs but, again, the feedback here seems mixed.
With your lights Chris any of the higher wattage/price LEDs are going in the right direction to make things even better.
Read between the lines on the adverts but after a while you'll see the 2 x 25 watt, 2 x 30 watt and best 2 x 50 watt spec start to appear, then your only problem will be how to accomodate the fan, driver box etc. per lamp!
Read between the lines on the adverts but after a while you'll see the 2 x 25 watt, 2 x 30 watt and best 2 x 50 watt spec start to appear, then your only problem will be how to accomodate the fan, driver box etc. per lamp!
I genuinely don't think the philips are that powerful, I think they are 20w? I think with a projector lense, go for the biggest beasts you can get your hands on! The 50s that @Stay Frosty put in his other car might do the job well?
Bill, could you get a picture of the lights at night so we can see the beam pattern? Cheers!
I don't fancy going through endless LED bulbs to find the one with the correct light dispersion for my headlights, especially given the specs of most of them appear to be made up on the spot. As I say though, if consensus on specific recommendations builds from people more adventurous than me, I might dip my toes in the LED waters at that point...
I've tried the Phillips and Twenty20 LEDs as well as a couple of 'white' halogen bulbs in the THQ lights. They have all been pretty disappointing. I'd go as far as to say, not as good as the OEM H7s that they replaced. I am going to have a go with some 100W halogens using a relayed loom to handle the extra draw, but I think that the best result will come from a H7 HID.
From what I've learnt some bulbs are better in projectors and some are better in reflectors.
I genuinely believe that you need some big wattage ones in there though, the twenty20 ones are 20watts which is nothing.
I can only find a couple of led bulbs in 50w each so it's quite rare!
I'm going to go 50w leds in the headlights and fogs, hopefully I'll be able to see then
Similar threads
