I drive quite a lot around the countryside and the headlights on my car (Hyundai) are crap. I’m thinking about replacing the bulbs with LED bulbs. Halfords make a big song about these being for offroad only. Are they actually illegal, do the police care and are they an MOT failure?

yes they are unless they are specifically designed repplacement.

NEver mind the police its a dick move as thye blind everyone coming the other way!

Going by the amount of cars I see around here with dazzingly bright and badly adjusted LED headlights – no, the police don’t care.

But intentionally installing lights so bright that they pretty much blind oncoming vehicles is not only hugely inconsiderate but would also make you a bit of a dick (imho).

Have you considered uprated regular bulbs?  Osram Nightbreaker get good reviews I believe.

I’m not looking to blind anyone, just get decent throw in the light. Not particularly set on LED, just as happy to look at other upgrades

Be Swedish and fit a moose finding lightbar with the highbeam?

Just put Philips racing vision bulbs in my Hyundai i40 – massive improvement over standard bulbs.

how long have the bulbs been in there?

if ages, then just replace the bulbs with decent ones, and they’ll be brighter

halogen, LED, etc. all degrade and dim over time, and replacement pair costs about a tenner

LEDs won’t work well in reflector or projector housings unless the light unit was designed for that type of bulb. Even HID and LED have their light ‘bulb’ source at slightly different points in the bulb body.

do your headlights need polished?

I wasn’t suggesting you were being a dick just that tehre is a reason that halfords say for off road only.

Oncoming excessively bright headlights are a serious problem for many drivers, especially in rain. It’s a bit like having pratts who don’t dip coming at you.

If you’re comfortable with having the car coming in the opposite direction having a driver who now cannot see where the road is, try to think what a head on collision at road speeds could do to your health…

Get the 50/75/100% brighter halogen bulbs, whichever fits your budget. You don’t want to be that twunt that everyone immediately assumes is a boy racer following them with dazzling LED bulbs.

Be aware that fitting bulbs not designed for the exact shape of the reflector in your headlight will probably fail the MOT and could lead to getting pulled over by the plod.

I recently bought and fitted a set of Halfords 150% bulbs. Definite improvement over the (old) bulbs and still cut off correctly.

LEDs won’t work well in reflector or projector housings unless the light unit was designed for that type of bulb. Even HID and LED have their light ‘bulb’ source at slightly different points in the bulb body.

as far as I know they should be fine in projector housing – the whole point of it is it can take wherever the light source is and project it to the right spot on the road (which is why they work with both HID and filament bulbs). You’re spot on re: reflector housing though

Local garage has a warning on the noticeboard that retro fit LED s are an MoT fail. Spotted when I was in before Xmas.

It’s also worth checking that your current bulbs are absolutely 100% bang on properly in the right place – sometimes they have a flange with cutouts etc to mount it in the back of the headlight unit, and given the contortions needed to change most lights these days it can be an chievement just to get the damned things in the light unit, let alone aligned correctly.  MrsP’s were a bit off line in her car and the drop in light level was dramatic, but immediately resolved when they were installed correctly.

If your car is never going to drive on a public road again, then crack on and fit those off road LEDs.

Otherwise, fit decent bulbs and/or get the lenses polished.

Fitting LEDs and driving ON road is dangerous and therefore an MoT fail/police stop.

+ whatever for uprated halogen bulbs, but be prepared to change them more often. They tend to have a shorter life than standard bulbs.

On the LED front, Philips, who know quite a lot about headlights and bulb technology, produce very expensive aftermarket H4 and H7 LED replacement bulbs – Xtreme Ultinon – which are not road legal in the UK, before anyone jumps down my throat… But claim to accurately replicate the beam pattern of the original halogen bulbs, presumably because they’ve managed to very precisely reproduce the exact position and dimensions of the original light source using LED technology.

I’ve driven, briefly, with a set of the H4 ones in a halogen reflector housing, and they worked really well, same beam pattern as the originals, brighter, but not insane. They cost something like 150 quid a pair, which presumably reflects how much work Philips have put into them and also suggests that cheapo eBay versions are going to be every bit as awful as they seem to be.

I’m not suggesting anyone use them, they are not road legal in the UK, but it’s clearly not impossible to produce an effective LED bulb that’s a direct replacement for halogen if you happen to be a massive international lighting corporation with millions to spend on development. Less so if you’re a dodgy eBay seller.

The other thing that OP could check is whether there’s a voltage drop between the battery and the headlight bulbs. If the wiring is sub-standard or badly designed, you can fit an upgraded headlight loom taking power direct from the battery to the headlights and triggered by a relay activated by the original wiring.

Finally, some headlights are just really poor regardless of bulbs – the standard H4 units in T5s and T6s for example – and there’s not much you can do with them bar fitting a better, aftermarket headlight unit if such a thing exists.

If you fancy to know proper information about LED, HID solutions head to http://www.theretrofitsource.com

If that’s not enough to screw your head right, head to http://www.Hidplanet.com forums. Plenty of Topics from automotive engineers there, be it how reflector housing designed or what is bulb geometry and how it differs in different applications.

^^video^^

Just put Philips racing vision bulbs in my Hyundai i40 – massive improvement over standard bulbs.

That’s not hard. I had an i40 for a while, replacing the headlamp bulbs with a couple of candles would have been an improvement.

could lead to getting pulled over by the plod

unlikely round here, can’t remember the last time I saw a traffic car.

Osram nightbreaker are really good.
I had 80w dipped in my renault scenic, they were so good that i hardly ever used main beam.
Yes, I’m aware they were illegal, but the car passed 4 mots, and i never ever got flashed, because i spent some time making sure they were aimed correctly.
In fact OP, id be checking the aim first.
I’ve done a (little) bit of research on led replacements, not worth the bother imo.

In fact OP, id be checking the aim first.

As I said a couple of posts back, if the OP’s Hyundai is anything like the i40 I had a few years ago then the stock lamps are absolute garbage to a point of not being fit for purpose. It’s not the aim (or at least, not just the aim).

I 100% would have changed them for something better if it were my car rather than a lease. I’ve been driving for 30 years and it’s the first time I’ve thought this about a car since my old mk1 Fiesta.