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LED H4 Headlight Bulb

21K views 67 replies 18 participants last post by  markwilliamson 
#1 ·
I seem to be on an accessory kick, windshield, saddle bags, usb phone charger, trunk, upgrade the flasher to electronic for future led turn signals, and the current project is an LED H4 Headlight bulb. I wanted to share this for anyone interested in a drop-in solution for an LED headlight replacement/upgrade for the H4 Halogen Honda Headlight.
here is an H4 Halogen bulb.

Note the forward filament with the reflector under it, this gives you the fan-out and down pattern to see the road and not blind other drivers. the High beam is rearward to give the correct flood pattern.


This is the wrong bulb, triangle of LEDs, upper 2 for low beam, add the bottom one for high beam. They are in the wrong position (wrong geometry for the reflector) and give you a spot instead of a fan.



Needless to say I returned it.
then I found this one, with the correct geometry, forward with reflector for low beam, rearward for high beam, and it's whiter and brighter. (its not upside down, I photographed the other side and realized it after I was composing this)




You remove the H4 adapter ring to put that in the headlight and clip it down, then insert and twist-lock the bulb into it, and it fits beautifully into the bucket.

I'm not specifically advertising this particular one, I'm sharing what to look for in the physical geometry of the LED, but if you care this was found on Amazon.
 
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#3 · (Edited)
Two bulbs in the box. I stuck my Halogen in the box and keeping the 2nd and the halogen just in case but so far so good. from reading lots of led bulb reviews the most common expected problem is a bad led that burns out in the first 6-10 hours of use.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XHD78DQ


this is one of the "pick 4" type with multiple products in the same offering page, and you have to be careful reading the reviews since they are all mixed together, filter for the H4 only.
A couple that had a bad bulb or early failure, most negative reviews were for cage specific use where the supercomputer didn't like not having the higher impedance filament detected without the inline load corrector added, which is more user error than the product.
5 star ratings were about two orders of magnitude more then the 1,2, and 3 combined, and all the ones that identified using it in a motorcycle were in the 5 stars.
 
#5 ·
At the moment I'm leaning toward 4.9 out of 5. It's a perfect drop in solution, 3 amps compared to the 5 amps of the halogen bulb, it is brighter and whiter light, perfect geometry to get the correct fan-low-beam pattern and flood-high-beam effect. I've only put a few hours on it and waiting to see if it passes the 'burn in' time of 6+ hours to get a 5.0.
 
#9 ·
I have about 6 hours on mine now! Each bulb is 25w and 4000 lumens. And it feels like about 4000 lumens. I can see pot holes clearly in the night on the FDR Drive. The light pattern is good. Possibly a blinding light. Very white, nearly bluish. I thought, toying with the idea, that maybe a set of two on the Rebel would be even better.
 
#12 ·
Welcome to the forum.

If you thought the headlight in your 2007 was bad, you should see how little light the first generation Rebels sealed beam put out! Did you find what you needed about turn signal relocation?
 
#13 ·
Thanks for the welcome. I don't want to even think about a dimmer headlight! That would be some white knuckle riding.

I found the bracket design plans, but I live in an apartment and don't have very many tools. I think I'm going to have to buy a prefabricated bracket to move the lights before I get some bags.
 
#15 ·
I'm looking around for an all-in-one-tail-brake-turn-license assembly that will work on the rebel
something like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B073TYWXQ7
but fits better....
 
#21 ·
No, I replaced it with a standard incandescent 1157 bulb. It worked out well. Jim Wilson and I were riding at Lake Hope and I noticed just his brake light was coming on. The store only had a two pack of standard bulbs, which Jim bought. Sure enough, the running light filament on his bulb had burned out. When replacing his, I checked mine and discovered it was only flashing intermittently. I used Jim's spare bulb to fix mine.
 
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#25 ·
I'm at 3 months and still happy with mine. Still seems brighter/whiter than the halogen did, and is supposed to pull 3amps instead of the 5-6 that the halogen pulled.
 
#31 ·
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