CC LED headlights, is dual burn (heat dissipation) technology employed?

[anthonym]

Clarification: dual burn does not mean simply that both dip and main work simultaneously. It means they are designed to work that way by properly managing heat dissipation.. 

To activate both simultaeously without the heat dissipation being properly managed means shortening the life of the LEDs. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Do the CC LED headlights employ dual burn technology.

This technology allows both dipped and main beams to work in unison when the main beam is on.

Anthony

 

Manufacturer? Paaschburg & Wunderlich?

https://pwonline.de/start/?___store=pwonline_en#home-catalogue

LED HAUPTSCHEINWERFER BATES STYLE TYP 5 on page 43 

5 3/4 Zoll, Metallgehäuse. In der oberen Hälfte leuchtet das Abblendlicht und bei einge- schaltetem Fernlicht leuchten beide Hälften des Scheinwerfers.
LED main headlight, 5 3/4 inch, metal housing. The low beam lights up at the upper half, and both halves light up when switched on high-beam.

 Gehäuse/housing:Ø155mm·Gehäusetiefe/bodydepth:110mm

Schwarzes Gehäuse, untere Befestigung / black housing, bottom mount Art-Nr. / Item No. 223-213
Verchromtes Gehäuse, untere Befestigung / chromed housing, bottom mount Art-Nr. / Item No. 223-214

 

DUAL BURN

https://www.jwspeaker.com/products/led-headlights-model-8700-evo-2-db/

https://www.jwspeaker.com/products/led-headlights-model-8700-evo-2-pro/

 

and I have asked them as well as CC

 Paaschburg & Wunderlich GmbH
 Am Alten Lokschuppen 10a, 21509 Glinde
 Phone: +49 (0) 40 248 277 - 0
 Fax: +49 (0) 40 248 277 - 79
 Email: info@pwonline.de

Edited December 22, 2023 by anthonym

[AlastairA]

My 2022 420R is not dual burn (LED headlights).

It is something I've been considering adjusting though.

[anthonym]

4 hours ago, AlastairA said:

My 2022 420R is not dual burn (LED headlights).

It is something I've been considering adjusting though.

me too hence this thread/question. Whether additional heat will be properly managed by the design or shorten the life of the LEDs.

The mod itself appears simple with a different switch. 

 

an old trhead: https://www.caterhamlotus7.club/forums/topic/252749-caterham-led-headlights-any-experience/

 

Edited December 21, 2023 by anthonym

[AlastairA]

I don’t think temperature rise would be an issue - my concern is on total current draw. I was going to try and measure the current drawn for each of the dipped and main beam LEDs and check whether the loom and relay could cope with the total. Also thinking of implementing it with a diode rather than changing the switch.

[anthonym]

the current draw is much less than standard 

 

this is my thread from the other day exploaringw ways of doing it, I prefer simply switching out the switch; if I can establish the heat dissipation answer.

link deleted and lightadviser link re instated but ONLY as a warning per John Vine's remarks below: 

https://www.caterhamlotus7.club/forums/topic/274405-caterham-cars-led-headlights-how-to-wire-dip-to-be-always-on-when-main-beam-is-active/page/2/#comment-2601306

 

Edited December 22, 2023 by anthonym

[John Vine]

I don't think whoever wrote the lightadviser article has a very firm grasp of Ohm's Law, or of how fuses work:

"Knowing how many amps LED headlights can draw is important, but it’s also crucial to understand how much they can handle.

This is where fuses come in. A fuse will limit the current flowing through a circuit. Choosing a fuse that’s too low means your bulbs won’t work. However, choosing a fuse that’s too high can overload your LED bulbs, causing damage and potentially creating a fire hazard.

If you’re shifting from high-powered halogens to low-powered LEDs, you might need to downgrade your fuse to prevent overloading your lights."

 

A fuse certainly limits the maximum current that can flow.  It does this by blowing when the current draw exceeds the fuse rating  But it doesn't act like a partially opened tap, restricting the flow.  A fuse of too high a capacity will not cause an overload as the bulb will still draw whatever current its wattage decrees, but not more.  If that is greater than the fuse rating, the fuse will blow.  But because an LED bulb draws less current than an equivalent halogen, a fuse of lower rating is wise in order to protect the circuit rather than the bulb.

JV

[anthonym]

yhm

I found this info about unrelated but similar looking LED head lights, is it reasonable to assume ours in all variations are all about the same give or take a bit?

Power: LOW - 1.88A / 22.56W @12V

             HIGH- 2.59A / 31.08W @12V

actually, reading your quotes that article is more cobblers than not. I'll edit it out. You are far more polite than me!

Edited December 21, 2023 by anthonym

[OldAndrewE]

25 minutes ago, John Vine said:

I don't think whoever wrote the lightadviser article has a very firm grasp of Ohm's Law, or of how fuses work:

"Knowing how many amps LED headlights can draw is important, but it’s also crucial to understand how much they can handle.

This is where fuses come in. A fuse will limit the current flowing through a circuit. Choosing a fuse that’s too low means your bulbs won’t work. However, choosing a fuse that’s too high can overload your LED bulbs, causing damage and potentially creating a fire hazard.

If you’re shifting from high-powered halogens to low-powered LEDs, you might need to downgrade your fuse to prevent overloading your lights."

 

Quite scary that this sort of "information" is out there on the internet purporting to be expert advice!

 

[StevehS3]

I believe a standard H4 bulb is 55/60W.

[anthonym]

the code on the LED lens reads thusly (taken from another thread, not my own LEDs)

PL 02 A 01 HC/R E1 20 4304 MD E1 4304 NS-2270                         E6 10R-05 0684

Breaking that down a bit:

PL Plastic lens material

02 A Supposing 02 maybe the year of the regulation and A is a later revision.

01 

HC/R Halogen main beam OR dipped beam

E1 Germany 

20 Guessing a bit here, but it looks like this may be the luminous intensity (dip or main?)

4304 I GUESS this means "ECE Reg R43 Revision 04"  https://unece.org/sites/default/files/2021-05/R043r4am5e.pdf

MD

E1 Germany

4304 NS-2270 

E6 Belgium

 10R-05 0684

and from the Hella site here https://www.hella.co.nz/en/about-us/technology/headlamps-and-inserts/decoding-the-combinations/

and especially

https://www.hella.co.nz/en/about-us/technology/headlamps-and-inserts/hella-headlamp-systems/

where Halogen seems to be used to include LEDs the HC/R means to my disappointment "Halogen Main Beam OR Dipped Beam" as opposed to for example CR: which means "Main and Dipped beam".

Of course it isn't immediately apparent to me if this is about how the lights work automatically (i.e. "dual burn") or whether it is saying thou shalt NOT run dip and main simultaneously. 

So further reading discloses "The slash between the C and R means that the dipped beam and main beam cannot be switched on simultaneously (H4 headlamps)." It's as if the coding system has not yet caught up with LED unless I simply haven't found it yet.

However: https://www.svetila.com/en/content/129-explanation-of-the-car-headlight-ece-codes-and-regulations

not established if the site is "good" yet: update, not convinced as to accurancy of ECE regs descriptions, for example ECE R112 should be R45 .. so beware

What I am looking for in all this is information about heat dissipation and whether the type approvals mention it.

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:42014X0822(02) has only this to say 

Quote

 

Suitable thermal management (e.g. heat sink) may be provided, to simulate similar thermal conditions as in the

corresponding headlamp application.

 

I mean I suppose if dip and main have their own heat sink then using them at the same time should be no great shakes. However that's two assumptions to start with. I seem to be finding that if each of dip and main have their own heat sink then running both at once ought not be an issue. Also that LED manufacturers tend to design for worst case scenarios so again both together should be fine.

In other thinking, say the LED life is 30,000 hours. Say I will only ever run both together for no more than 3 hours in a 5 hour outing, bearing in mind this is at night. How many 5 hour night outings might I do a year? 20? Probably less. So 20 outings times 3 hours = 60 hours a year. I'm 67 so allow me to do these drives until I am 80, 13 years to go. 13 years x 60 hours = 780 hours. To reduce the LED life from 30,000 to 780 would require a degradation of 97.4%  I have DRLs so these lights are not switched on unless legally required by lighting up time.

 

Edited December 21, 2023 by anthonym

[anthonym]

27 minutes ago, OldAndrewE said:

55 minutes ago, John Vine said:

Quite scary that this sort of "information" is out there on the internet purporting to be expert advice!

 

embarrassed here I should have read it better before posting the link. Humble Apologies.

Edited December 21, 2023 by anthonym

[anthonym]

3 hours ago, AlastairA said:

I don’t think temperature rise would be an issue

why? 

[OldAndrewE]

22 minutes ago, anthonym said:

embarrassed here I should have read it better before posting the link. Humble Apologies.

I wasn't having a go at you Anthony, just the idiot who is putting themselves forward as an expert.  No need for you to apologise

[anthonym]

8 minutes ago, OldAndrewE said:

I wasn't having a go at you Anthony, just the idiot who is putting themselves forward as an expert.  No need for you to apologise

No I'd never think you were Andrew, one strives not to post bad info is all. 🙂

[AlastairA]

12 hours ago, anthonym said:

why? 

Good challenge Anthony - it was just an assumption on my part, and because we don't know exactly the OEM part number for the LEDs used within the headlight assembly, it's impossible to be exact. High performance LEDs require heat sinking to ensure the junction temperature is within recommended operating tolerances. It was my assumption that the mounting arrangements of the LEDs would / should include sensible heatsink to maintain the junction temperature appropriately.

Generally speaking if the junction temperature is controlled by a PCB & heat sink arrangement, the lifetime of a High Performance LED should be somewhere between 60,000 and 100,000 hours depending on then exact model. If the LED is operated above the maximum designed junction temperature, it starts to degrade the lifetime and the luminous flux exponentially (before complete failure) by up to a factor of 10 for a 50% increase in junction temperature (again sweeping generalisations employed!)

So, it is a big assumption on my part that the designed heatsink will not allow more than a 50% increase in junction temperature when both lights are switched on, but even if we allow for a worst case reduction of 10x lifetime, the LEDs will outlast me for a worst case usage model in a 7 (e.g. 5,000 miles per year @ 30mph average speed allows 35 years of LED life driving permanently with both lights on).

Apologies for my initial assumption without backing it up, but in reality we will never know for sure without an empirical test!

 

[anthonym]

Interesting. Yes it seems your ultimate guessed conclusion is like mine, even if compromised the LEDs will last longer than me. 🙂

It seems relevant to know if each LED has it's own independent heat sink; do you know at all? 

this looks relevant: https://www.auxito.com/blogs/news/auto-led-headlight-bulb-heat-dissipation

 

 

note to self:

Junction temperature, short for transistor junction temperature, is the highest operating temperature of the actual semiconductor in an electronic device. In operation, it is higher than case temperature and the temperature of the part's exterior. Wikipedia

Edited December 22, 2023 by anthonym

[AlastairA]

I'm afraid I don't know for sure if there are independent heat sinks. I looked back at my assembly record and could only find the following photograph of the rear of the headlight assembly. As you can see, it looks like a sealed unit and there are some ribs which must be there for heat sink purposes - however, the important question is how the LED's are mounted internally and what level of thermal conductivity exists through the LED substrate, PCB and mounting method to the outside world.

 

[anthonym]

do we have any idea what the "bulbs" look like? 

[John Vine]

18 hours ago, anthonym said:

... lightadviser link re instated but ONLY as a warning per John Vine's remarks below:

Thanks, Anthony.  That's makes my comments more intelligible!

For info, I've just emailed the author to point out the article contains worrying misunderstandings.  I'll post up any reply I get.

JV

[AlastairA]

No - looking at the photo below, the DRL's are a linear array across the diameter of the headlight, with LED's facing forward. The main and high beam LED's are housed in the central elliptical moulded plastic and are facing to the rear (so that they are focused and reflected off the rear reflector). Looking really carefully at the reflector, you can see a central oblong area about two thirds of the way up, which shows a refection of the main LED's. Looks like half a dozen or so individually mounted components (difficult to see in the photo) but it gives no indication of how they are mounted.

Edited December 22, 2023 by AlastairA
Spelling!

[AlastairA]

Interesting to see the photo's on the other LED headlight thread - they show the Halo design where the low beam LED's are kept on when the high beam is active:

[StevehS3]

Is it assuming too much to say that if the headlight must not be wired such that dipped and main operate together they would have prevented it in the internal electronics? It wouldn’t be difficult or expensive to do. 

[anthonym]

I am somewhat gutted to have received a response today to this idea in the following terms said to be from the manufacturer:

Quote

the electronics inside along with the heatsink are simply not designed to work this way. Any attempt to force the dual beam functionality will invalidate the warranty and could lead to failure of the headlight and 'unpredictable' failure of the vehicle's electrical systems.

😕

[StevehS3]

Gosh! Why wouldn’t they state this on the spec sheet or, better still, provide protection electronics in the unit.

[RogNeedham]

Now this might be my age, but what I increasingly see out on the road with these very bright front LEDs is the lack of contrast between that light and the indicator, particularly if the two lights are close in the same cluster.

I know the old motoring adage of ‘never trust a left signal’, but sometimes I really struggle to tell if an indicator is on because its light is dominated by the nearby / surrounding LED 

Rog