Topic: Maybe time to re-look at: LED lights?

[newday777]

doesn't look pink to me.
white light through a red lens will appear red. why would that change only because it's a LED source?

Well pink is not what I should have said.
As you will see in this video red behind a red lense is much better light showing through.
I remember reading about LED white bulbs get filtered through a red lense so you don't get as good of output.(it might have been on superbriteleds website 10 years ago)

[newday777]

https://blog.betterautomotivelighting.com/which-color-leds-should-i-use

[flatlander]

yeah ok so if the led source is red then all the red light it emits, passes through the red lens. then you have less loss. that's true.
i was considering that but as the number plate is lit by the same bulb, i went for white. that makes it better visible than a red bulb.
even with the non-red part of the spectrum being absorbed by the red lens, the remaining light is still brighter than that of the old incandescent bulb.

are we splitting the spectrum here or are we splitting hairs 

[newday777]

With the red leds, probably should put a flat white light panel array to LED light the plate.

[HondaMan]

Hmm...interesting thought: maybe a separate white panel and the red LED brakelight? Even then they would use less power than a Chinko-made #1157 bulb, by far. The #1157 is supposed to draw no more than 2.1 amps by specification, but I have seen 2 Chinko-made ones (#1157) that drew over 4 amps on brake.

[Deltarider]

Flatlander, for a tail light yours looks fine. My personal experience is that a brake light that glows on is better noticed than a led that switches on in a nanosecond. I once almost ran in a bus,  when I had missed its led brake leds coming on. The glowing on and of of conventional bulbs is extra safety.

[Don R]

 I just saw an ad for an LED auxiliary light that burst flashes before glowing steady. To me that's a good idea, they bolt to the license plate frame also.
 Also, I just bought a bike (GS1100) with what I thought looked like a big dim taillight, it has an 1157 and a single element bulb for the license plate light. I tried the old-fashioned rear facing LED bulb that didn't impress in my 750 at all, but in this bike it was a good improvement. I can't wait to try a couple of more modern bulbs.

[Deltarider]

I just saw an ad for an LED auxiliary light that burst flashes before glowing steady. [...]

Realise that this bursting flashes comes at a price, knowing: it will disadvantage those that prefer to stick to street legal uniformity in order to have a  level playing field for all of us. Also realise it's a rat race where soon others will fit other extra's to stand out.
For me it's still old fashioned bulbs. The two indicator bulbs in the rear are still the originals bike got at the assembly line in 1976. I have never experienced a charging problem. Next month my conventional Yuasa battery will have its 7th birthday (electric starts only!).

[M 750K6]

I agree with this, but the ship sailed long ago.

That said, I'm with original bulbs. I had to replace my rear right indicator bulb last year. It is an oem replacement. It is brighter than the other rear indicator. Possibly they dim with age? Or, possibly, removing and replacing cleaned up the contacts that side.

[Deltarider]

I agree with this, but the ship sailed long ago.

That said, I'm with original bulbs. I had to replace my rear right indicator bulb last year. It is an oem replacement. It is brighter than the other rear indicator. Possibly they dim with age? Or, possibly, removing and replacing cleaned up the contacts that side.

Realise that wattages varied in various markets. Mine originally had 18 Watts for indicators, aftermarket replacements in Europe are usually 21W, US had 23W and the CB350F model for France even had 10W.

[bryanj]

If you look carfully at spec most books quote CP (candle power) not watts

[Don R]

  I'm not concerned with charging, and all except one of my 750's have original head, turn and taillight bulbs. I even seek out the Stanley bulbs for my 1969/70 bikes. That said, I want the guy behind me to know that I'm there and maybe we're stopping. That GS bulb was totally unimpressive.
  My 69 Firebird is getting LED sequential turn signals like those that came on a Thunderbird. The brake lights can be programmed to sequentially light up also. 
 

[andy750]

Anyone tried the Yamiya headlight LED?

https://www.yamiya750.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=4126

[PeWe]

Anyone tried the Yamiya headlight LED?

https://www.yamiya750.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=4126

A little bit too many $, almost 60 for bulb only.

[Don R]

 My non-Honda bike doesn't like the LED. It now thinks the rear bulbs are burned out and illuminated the warning lights.  I'll look for a 2057, I think that's the conventional bright bulb.

[Bankerdanny]

My non-Honda bike doesn't like the LED. It now thinks the rear bulbs are burned out and illuminated the warning lights.  I'll look for a 2057, I think that's the conventional bright bulb.

Which can probably be cured with a resistor, thus negating the low power draw benefit of LED's. Can you disable the warning light?

[HondaMan]

Flatlander, for a tail light yours looks fine. My personal experience is that a brake light that glows on is better noticed than a led that switches on in a nanosecond. I once almost ran in a bus,  when I had missed its led brake leds coming on. The glowing on and of of conventional bulbs is extra safety.

This is what I've noticed, too. There are many vintage bikes around here and last summer I saw a couple of them that had obviously received some sort of LED bulb, but I could not discern if the brake light was on when the running light was, unless I looked very carefully. That's not a good thing in traffic!

[Deltarider]

Human brains are wired to detect changes happening rather than changes that have happened. That's why the glowing on and off of a conventional bulb is better noticed (it's more alarming) than devices that switch on and off in a nanosecond. In othere words you miss the change happening. As far as indicator- and brakelights this lively glow on glow off effect draws more attention than the somewhat 'dead' leds. German carmakers like Audi* realised this and found a way to improve on this. Note that bulbs also offer a much wider angle where the indicator is noticed. Try it out for yourself.
* Carmaker Audi choose this solution to make LED indicators livelier and better noticed. Difficult to realise on a bike however, so for safety, stick to bulbs.

[flatlander]

the principle of what you guys explain, does make sense. i only wonder if in a practical sense, the split seconds that an incandescent bulb takes to fully reach its light output makes such a big difference? i mean, if the person behind you doesn't actively pay attention to your tail light, will it make a significant difference weather it takes a few split seconds to get brighter, or whether it does that pretty much instantaneously?
in both cases, within a very small period of time the light output changes - the time difference is very small so either way the person would need to pay attention to notice it.

i get the audi idea - but that's a lot more obvious then turning on an incandescent bulb.
i believe their solution works to grab attention. i don't believe the minuscule difference between turning up the output of an incandescent vs. led bulb makes any safety relevant difference.
if a car driver is slumbering or distracted as usual, that's not what will save you.

[PeWe]

The LED rear light my bikes recently got is very visible.
Also a big difference when I brake.

The question is if I'll blind the traffic behind
I think so if I should ride in the dark when raining and traffic behind.

It was better on the roads before cars got blinding white LEDs and xenon.
All will be blinded in need of brighter lamps to see the road with surroundings.
Auxilary headlights on cars for remote/empty roads.

I remember when I added a pair of Bosch Knick 180mm lamps with 100W H1 bulb on an old Renault R6 with assymetric headlights.

When HI kicked in other cars far away got blinded flashing their head lights, I had to reduce to assymetric LO. Bulbs like stock rear light in my CB750. Suddenly very dark!

Bikes needs to be visible among all other bright lights.
As mentioned earlier in this thread and other, a yellow headlight can stick out in the mess of lights.

The good thing with LED on the CB is reduced W.

A bright headlight with very long range will make it easier to drive faster. Not always the best choice.

[Deltarider]

Flatlander I had almost ended my life in the rear end of a bus (in city traffic!). I had missed the LEDs becoming brighter in its combined tail/brakelights. After it happened a second time, I became curious and studied the matter. If you say 'I don't believe... ' this may be a case of cognitive dissonance meaning: you do not want to believe it for reasons like: I prefer to keep the illusion I have improved something on my bike, even when it's irrational. Let's face it, this forum is full of it. Please, don't feel offended. Ofcourse all of us can evaluate their personal experiences in daily practice for themselves. Hondaman and I came forward just to share ours. Everyone is invited.
An analogy. Many favour digital meters over analogue. For many jobs I favor analogue. You can see the dial from the corner of your eye and your brain does not need to interpret digits. Also the pace of the moving dial gives extra information. I have sailed the shallow Waddenzee waters a lot, where you have lots of sandbanks and risks of running aground. Nowadays modern yachts have digital depth sounders. On tacking, my oldfashioned analogue depth sounder would not only tell me the actual depth but also how slow or fast the depth changed, information digital depth sounders will not give you, as your brain has to interpret the digits. Analogue is intuitive. I mean, who wants a digital tachometer on his bike? Not me, I want to see that dial sweep from the corner of my eye while I have my eyes on the road.

[flatlander]

i said "i believe" because i don't have empirical data to prove which bake light is more noticeable, generally: led or incadescent.
so in this case i'm only operating on what i believe is true. that also implies that i may be wrong. which you may be as well.

[willbird]

the principle of what you guys explain, does make sense. i only wonder if in a practical sense, the split seconds that an incandescent bulb takes to fully reach its light output makes such a big difference? i mean, if the person behind you doesn't actively pay attention to your tail light, will it make a significant difference weather it takes a few split seconds to get brighter, or whether it does that pretty much instantaneously?
in both cases, within a very small period of time the light output changes - the time difference is very small so either way the person would need to pay attention to notice it.

i get the audi idea - but that's a lot more obvious then turning on an incandescent bulb.
i believe their solution works to grab attention. i don't believe the minuscule difference between turning up the output of an incandescent vs. led bulb makes any safety relevant difference.
if a car driver is slumbering or distracted as usual, that's not what will save you.

If it DID matter it is simple enough to PWM the light in order to make it ramp up when we tell it to turn ON :-).

Bill

[rotortiller]

It's only a tail/brake light and if it's a bright LED or bright old  filament it matters not to your safety. Both can be made to flash at a rate during decel that you would hope attracts more attention. LED may be more abrupt in the on/off flash and splitting hairs one might think that to be an advantage, however to the average cager, it matters not, they do not give a rat's ass if you have LED or not. If the aft LED light is bright enough that is good enough to equal any similar bike with a competent filament light. Basic CDF lol.

[andy750]

Here is my contribution - K4 with LED brake light that flashes when braking. Good for city driving in Boston.




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