Disappointed OEM LED

Because a halogen build has a lumens of 350-500. A HID is around 3500-4000. And A LED varies by the watt, but a 4w LED is the equivalent of a 35W Halogen, give or take. While I dont know the exact lumens of the OEM LEDs, the Morimoto Tundra headlights are around 3500-400 lumens and have around the same output as OEM.

 

Just for fun. Here an 08 Tundra I had with LS460 Bi-Xenon retrofit. These are low beams by the way. To me this is the ultimate headlight combo.

 

That's an incredible over-simplification of lighting design. While LEDs are brighter per watt, a headlight is much more than an LED. It is an led, a driver, a diffuser and a means of projection. My issue is not with the led itself, but the design of the headlight. As stated by others above, the majority of the brightness is cast in a tight focal point caused by poor diffuser design. The same poor diffuser design casts light unevenly across the road. If a headlight had 1mw leds, but the projector pinpointed the brightest point of the light in a 1 inch square on the road and the rest was dimly scattered, the head light fails to be better even with a massive led. That's an extreme example, but my point lies somewhere in the logic that a bad design can't be fixed by brighter leds. I hope that makes sense

I do work in electrical design and construction. Today I brought home with me a nice fluke lumen meter. I'm going to draw out an area of setpoints and map out lumens provided by each fixture. My assumption is that dead center of the small focal area, the OEM led will provide better lighting. Everywhere else will be less. I'll share whether I'm right or wrong.

 

I dont argue the fact that the design was poorly executed. Just about all LEDs in a reflector housing are a poor way of using the available light out put and the way its distributed. Same reason when you put a led bulb in a halogen housing, there is light scattered all over the place. The hot spot of the LED isn't the same as the hot spot of a halogen. Nothing beats a projector when it come to light intensity and evenness of light distribution. There was a member here that was supposed to have done a very extensive test on OEM, MM and a few other LED housings. Hasn't happened yet and it been a while. So, with that said, it would be nice to see your findings. Obviously I expect the center of the beam to be the brightest as it was designed this way. Poorly designed I might add once again. I also wasn't a fan of it but the addition of the DD SS3 filled in the void.
Can you take samples at the housing also? Like to see numbers right at the housing and then further away.

 

I will try but the output might be too high for my meter at that distance.

 

I want to add my 2008 tundra retrofit with Lexus RX330 projectors, Toyota OEM ballast, and Philips bulbs, light output is way better than my 2021 LED. I also had a 2019 jeep wrangler with the LED headlights, that is still the best light output I have so far.

 

most people prefer the stock led over morimoto for the output so thats definitely odd