Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi READ LAST POST

[AudiA4Turbo22]

Hey there new guy here,

i was searching through google and found this forum and could not believe te amount of info on this forum :twothumbs to u guys/gals, anyways i was
wondering if u could help me out with my LED driving/fog lights.

A friend of mine designed these LED driving lights for our cars and he
used nine 10mm LEDs on each side, and he states they are 0.5W, well
anyways, they had resistors on each LED individually and were connected
in a series i believe. I burned some of the LEDs on one side by
mistake, and am currently trying to get some help to find replacements.
These LED lights replace my fog lights on my car and these were pretty
bright i mean u can see them on the road, and very bright during the
day as well, but i want to use a higher powered LED for this usage, so
i can get a bit more function out of them, and have been contemplating
on 1W LEDs and 3W LEDs for them. Now the issue is this:

Space is limited, BUT i don't want something that can melt and so on, i can fit a heatsync i guess on each, and am looking at some options. I was looking at the Luxeon 1w and 3w LEDs. The way i have planned to make these is to continue the 3 by 3 by 3 setup so 3 strips of 3 LEDs. The issue is can these LEDs be mounted in a series? what is needed? Also, the output from a
car's alternator is 14.5V, and so with the way the LEDs sit now i get a
Bulb out warning on the dashboard, and would like to eliminate that.

I have included a picture of how my LEDs looked before i burnt half of them lol.

Thanx very much in advanced,

Kirk

the car now:

 

[John_Galt]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

Very cool. Nice to see some new mods. Bu I hink that a real high power LED in the neutral/warm output would have looked better. Those will definitely need some good heasinking. But i that location, I think forced air cooling would be pretty simple to do.

 

[AudiA4Turbo22]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

i personally loved the color when they worked, but not intense enough to where they matched the Xenon headlights. I really need help on wiring and choice of LEDs for this project, i have emailed every website and person i know, and their answers have always been half a** u know?

 

[DM51]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

Welcome to CPF, AudiA4.

That is a nice photo - getting the right exposure must have been quite difficult (would have been for me, anyway.) Please could you re-size it, though. The CPF maximum is 800 x 800 pixels.

 

[spencer]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

I like your car :twothumbs.
For LEDs I recommend some Cree XR-E LEDs. Depends on how hard you drive them but driven at max rating they are 3.7 watts (wattage is a terrible way to rate LEDs). I recommend these over the Luxeons because they are twice as efficient. That means with the same power you get twice the brighness (now you see why wattage is a bad way to rate LEDs).

As for running them I would suggest a driver over a resistor. When the vehicle is off the voltage is considerably lower so the brightness won't be the same. If you use 18 LEDs then you would need two drivers for sure. The CCHIPO driver from taskled.com seems like it would fit the bill.

If you have enough metal in your heatsink then you shouldn't need additional cooling.

Hope that helps a bit,
Spencer

 

[AudiA4Turbo22]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

thanx Spencer appreciate the help, not the question would be wiring.

How would i wire these to work together?

I use these a lot on my car so they should be reliable. Also, heat wise, they would be mounted on a metal bracket designed based on the shape of the bumper.

 

[mds82]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

I actually made a custom LED fog light setup a few months back. I used 6 MC-E's per side with a mirror placed over each of them to make a perfect cutoff beam. There isnt a whole lot of light being projector forward, there is a lot of light going down into the ground instead.

I have some pictures, but not too many.

 

[AudiA4Turbo22]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

i looked at ur thread bu the pix need resizing but i'd love to see what u did, and if u can give me some pointers i'd really appreciate it, i want the ground to be illuminated more than anything else.

 

[John_Galt]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

Maybe take a look at the Hayabusa headlight thread? Might help with the overall design, heatsinking, etc.

 

[AudiA4Turbo22]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

Now that i look at it, i would not be able to use heatsyncs that large i can barely fit 2.5" IC piping.

 

[AudiA4Turbo22]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

wow it has been over 2 months i haven't had my LED fogs running because of this issue. No one knows the answer, and no one seems to want to help. No offense to wither of u at all. But i need a step by step method to do this i do not know much about heat and power consumption LED driver stuff, and what is needed. I can get around with LEDs though, but no idea how to work high heat ones at all. Can someone please help by pointing me in the right direction by drivers, LEDs, heat sync or heat diffusers, reflectors, and where to buy this stuff, and give me a sample as to how bright these would be? Ands something that does not cost an arm and leg like MC-E's that are $30-$40 each considering i need 18 at least and another $100 of drivers, and other stuff. PLEASE?

 

[TexLite]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

wow it has been over 2 months i haven't had my LED fogs running because of this issue. No one knows the answer, and no one seems to want to help. No offense to wither of u at all. But i need a step by step method to do this i do not know much about heat and power consumption LED driver stuff, and what is needed. I can get around with LEDs though, but no idea how to work high heat ones at all. Can someone please help by pointing me in the right direction by drivers, LEDs, heat sync or heat diffusers, reflectors, and where to buy this stuff, and give me a sample as to how bright these would be? Ands something that does not cost an arm and leg like MC-E's that are $30-$40 each considering i need 18 at least and another $100 of drivers, and other stuff. PLEASE?

I had a large post typed up and lost it due to a glitch, heres the short version.

Can you post some pics of your curent setup? Without knowing size and space confinements it almost impossible to make good recommendations.

I don't think you'll need 18 "3W" emitters though. Driven at max spec (1000mA-1500mA) output would be around 4200lm. The current setup of 10mm LED's driven a max (20mA-40mA) would probably be around 200lm.

The easiest thing to do would be to change out the damaged 10mm emitters for new ones. And replace the resistors for constant current drivers which would extend the LED's lifespan by keeping the drive curent within limits.

The second option would be to build a new setup around "3W" LED's. It would be more involved but still possible. Constant current drivers would still be required.

Try to give a better picture of size confinements and your expectations and it will be easier to make recommendations.

Here are some links to get you started:

LED's-
Cree LED
Seoul Semiconductor (SSC)
Lumileds

Drivers-
LuxDrive (sealed units)
TaskLED
SandwichShoppe

Optics,Reflectors and LED's-
PhotonFanatic
LITEmania
Cutter

-Michael

 

[AudiA4Turbo22]

Re: Requesting LED Fog Light Help For Audi

thanx Tex,
I want to design a new set around the 3W LEDs, these were prototypes and fitment was not great, and they did not emit enough light.

here's a pic of the design:

[Oversize images deleted. You have been warned about this before Please read Rule 3. - DM51]

 

[bshanahan14rulz]

extruded aluminum bars from walmart or HD, possibly extending down to the "chickenwire" area for airflow.

I don't know how well the light will be for fog, since it will probably glare a bunch of light back at you.

How about Luxeon leds? they are supposed to be more sturdy than rebels and competitors.

Perhaps cutting chunks of mirrored acrylic and putting them above the LEDs to "fold" the beam in half would help with the beam pattern and also double the amount of effective light on the road.

 

[AudiA4Turbo22]

^^exactly what i'm looking for, i just don't know how to go about wiring them 3x3x3 and keeping out the bulb out warning.

I will put the acrylic mirror pieces to fold the beam, but do i need any reflectors?

will the Luxeons overheat? i was thinking the osram low heat 3W GD LEDs due to the low heat output, but i don't know who supplies them.

 

[DM51]

here's a pic of the design:

[Oversize images deleted. You have been warned about this before Please read Rule 3. - DM51]

Please take note.

 

[AudiA4Turbo22]

^^my apologies the pics were not mine but from the original creator, i'll resize them

 

[bshanahan14rulz]

I'd say optics are a good idea as well.

the bulb-out warning might be hard to get around... Perhaps somebody else can chime in about ways to bypass this? I don't want to suggest finding a power resistor. Does the car just look at the current through a sense resistor or something like that? I'd better stay away from idle speculation. Worse case scenario use stock switch to activate relay (instead of going to the cpu or something like that) to supply power to your LED modules.

luxeons can put out their fair share of heat, but the package is very sturdy at handling heat.