Things to know when upgrading car headlights

Considered as the "eyes" of a car, Halogen, Xenon, LED or Laser lights all have their strengths and limitations, so when wanting to upgrade car lights, users should research carefully to make the right choice.

Upgrading the headlight system is becoming a new trend among car users. In addition to the lighting function to support the driver's visibility, car lights also have a "beautifying" role, creating a style for the car.

Upgrading headlights is becoming a new trend among car users.

Currently, the race for lighting technology among automakers around the world is giving consumers many options when they want to upgrade their car headlights. The most popular are Halogen, Xenon, LED and Laser headlights. Many car users often think that the more advanced and expensive the lighting technology is, the higher the efficiency. However, in reality, each type of light has its own strengths and limitations. Therefore, car users need to clearly understand the parameters and characteristics of each type of light to make the right choice when they want to upgrade the headlight system on their car.

“The important parameters of a lamp are the Kelvin color temperature (degrees K) and luminous flux (Lumen). In which, the color temperature indicates the color of the light from the lamp, and the luminous flux represents the light output of the lamp,” said Mr. Nguyen Minh Thi, Volkswagen VN Service Director.

Some car models in Vietnam today are equipped with standard LED lights.

Halogen Lamp

Halogen lights are the most common type of light on popular car models today. This type of light uses a tungsten filament, which is heated to 2,500 degrees Celsius to produce light. In addition, some gases such as argon and nitrogen are added to the bulb to increase lighting efficiency. With a color temperature of about 3,500 degrees K, Halogen lights give off yellow light. This type of light has the advantage of providing quite good lighting when passing through foggy areas or heavy rain.

Halogen lights installed on Hyundai Grand i10 model

However, compared to other types of lamps, Halogen lamps generate a lot of heat, consume a lot of electricity, but the lighting efficiency is not high. The average lifespan of this type of lamp is 1,000 hours.

Xenon - HID Lamp

Introduced in 1991, but in recent years Xenon lights have been commonly used in mid-range cars. The structure of the light includes a lens made of quartz glass, which is responsible for distributing light evenly to the front of the car. Behind the lens is a bulb containing xenon gas that will light up when an electric current passes through. Xenon lights produce light 2-3 times stronger than Halogen lights, with a color temperature of 4,300 - 5,500 degrees K, producing white light, close to sunlight. Therefore, with cars using this type of light, the driver's vision is always improved.

Xenon lamps produce light 2 - 3 times stronger than Halogen lamps

However, the production and maintenance costs of Xenon lamps are quite high as they are made up of many parts such as converging lenses, xenon bulbs and voltage stabilizing ballasts. This is the reason why Xenon lamps are limited in their appearance on many car models. In addition, Xenon lamps have a rather slow light-up time. When the lamp is first turned on, the light will be blue, then it takes about 3-5 seconds for the lamp to turn white and reach its highest intensity. The glare of this type of lamp can also easily obstruct oncoming vehicles.

LED lights

Car users are still familiar with LED lights, but not everyone actually understands this type of light. LED is actually an abbreviation for the phrase “Light-Emitting Diode” which means “light emitting diodes”.

Manufacturers can make LEDs in many different shapes.

This type of light uses semiconductor chips that are only a few millimeters in size. The movement of electrons produces light radiation with many different colors depending on the substance in the semiconductor chip. Therefore, manufacturers can make LED lights in many different shapes to increase aesthetics while still ensuring the vehicle's lighting ability. The color temperature of LED lights reaches 5,000 - 6,300 degrees K for white light, the brightness can reach nearly 10,000 Lumens, this parameter is twice that of Xenon lights.

LED headlights on Mercedes-Benz cars use nearly 1,000 semiconductor chips to emit light

LED lights have the advantage of glowing quickly and not consuming much energy to activate. However, this type of light emits a lot of heat, which can easily increase the temperature of the semiconductor chip, affecting the surrounding parts. Therefore, LED lights are often manufactured with a cooling system, which makes the cost and price increase.

Laser Light

This is the most modern and expensive type of lamp today, the light intensity of the Laser lamp can shine up to 600m compared to the 300m distance of the LED lamp, but only uses more than half the amount of electricity consumed compared to the LED. In terms of structure, although it is called a Laser lamp, the Laser beam does not have the ability to illuminate objects. Instead, the laser beam will shine on the lens containing yellow phosphorus gas, this gas will emit a stream of blue-white light when stimulated by the Laser light.

Laser light technology equipped on Audi cars

The disadvantage of laser lights is that they do not have a high beam mode, so the laser light system needs to be supported by Bi-Xenon lights or LED lights when the driver needs to "flash the headlights". Besides, this type of light emits a lot of heat. The price of laser lights is quite expensive, so only some car models such as BMW i8, Audi R8 LMX or BMW 7 series... have this type of light installed.

According to thanhnien.vn