6/19/2023 0 Comments Best halogen headlightsThe poorer performers among all headlight types don't reach the 300-foot mark. That means the total distance needed from recognizing an object to coming to a full stop is about 300 feet.īut in our headlight tests, we've seen that neither LED nor HID low-beam headlights consistently illuminate more of the road ahead than halogens do. Estimates for a driver's reaction time between seeing something ahead in the road and hitting the brake pedal is 2.0 seconds-at roughly 88 feet per second, the vehicle has traveled 176 feet before the driver has hit the brakes. "Even with the new technology, low-beam headlights don't always provide enough forward seeing distance for the driver to react to an object in the road and stop in time," Stockburger says.įor example, CR's brake testing shows that, on average, a vehicle traveling at 60 mph (or 88 feet per second) on dry asphalt in ideal conditions needs about 130 feet to come to a complete stop. In that respect neither HIDs nor LEDs have proved to be superior over halogens in CR's testing. But how far a headlight illuminates straight ahead, in the direction a car is traveling, is what's most important, Stockburger says. it will be similar, with HIDs out in the midterm."īoth LED and HID headlights can produce a brighter, whiter light than halogens, and they illuminate the sides of the road well. Ron Kiino, communications manager at Subaru, says that means there's the potential to save money on gas as well.Īccording to Hella's Pietzonka, "HIDs may be out of the market quite soon, because there are lower-cost options." He adds that "in Europe, every new development project in the industry has no HID/Xenon systems in the pipeline. Last, LED bulbs use less energy than both halogen and HID lights, they run cooler, and they're less of a drain on the vehicle's electrical system. In addition, LEDs are supposed to last far longer than the other two types of lights, which is a convenience and potential money saver for owners who plan to hold onto their car for the long haul. "The different looking headlights and design are attractive to the buyer because the headlights are the eyes of the car," he told CR. Headlight styling helps win over consumers, says Steffen Pietzonka, head of marketing at Hella, a headlight manufacturer. Why the swing? There are several factors at work. We recently tested two affordable cars that came with standard LED headlights: the 2019 Mazda3 and the 2020 Toyota Corolla. Now LEDs are more common than HID headlights, in much the same way that LED lights for the home have bypassed traditional CFLs (compact fluorescent lamps), and they're popping up even in mainstream cars, SUVs, and trucks. "Car shoppers need to think about headlights as a safety feature in the same way they think about brakes or even seatbelts." ![]() ![]() "Yes, they're stylish, but drivers need lights that will make them safer, and not just make a fashion statement," Stockburger says. The problem for many consumers is that they're paying more for the LEDs but not getting much bang-if any-for that extra buck, says Jennifer Stockburger, director of operations at the Consumer Reports Auto Test Center. But in CR's testing, we discovered that these new lights don't offer any more illumination than traditional halogen and/or high intensity discharge (HID) headlights. ![]() LEDs are small and can be used in a string of lights, giving car designers more leeway in how the headlights look. Of the 2019 models we've tested, 86 percent had LEDs. At Consumer Reports, 55 percent of the 2018 models we tested had LED headlights. Automakers have embraced light emitting diodes (LEDs) in headlights, and their use is becoming more widespread.
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