Illuminating best practices for effective LED headlight installation
Obviously, the best way to install headlights is by following the manufacturer instructions, but there are a few general guidelines. First, pick what type of light: LED or incandescent.
“An LED light is interchangeable with an incandescent,” stated Kyle O’Dell, director of engineering and new product development at Optronics International, a lighting manufacturer who then discussed the added benefits. “Moving to LED, you don’t draw as much power, which can be used for telematics systems and different things to improve efficiency. Your alternators don’t have to work as hard to power that battery, or replenish what the lights are drawing.”
He said while lighting has been seen as an afterthought and only addressed when a light goes out, fleets can be more proactive and realize a better total cost of ownership.
“There’s a lot less maintenance with the LEDs just because we do have lifetime warranties,” O’Dell said. “And you’re using surface-mount components now on the LED, so you’re not having breakage and failure issues like we see on incandescent.”
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Along with less amperage draw, savings can be found by switching to thinner gauge wire, which use less copper. The raw material which increased 34% in price from 2020 to 2021, according to the International Monetary Fund.
LEDs are really easy to install, though the modules are about quadruple the price of incandescents, noted Lucas Coyle, master technician at TA Truck Service in Gaston, Indiana .
One tip Coyle offered was to not overtighten the rivets, as that will cause them to sit and spin the fiberglass mounting. They would have to be removed and replaced with an oversized rivet and washer, which could make future work on the component more difficult. Using a hand tool, not a power tool, is strongly advised to limit your torque.
“Always be cognizant of that, because what I’ve always tried to teach my guys is if you’re working on this truck once, you’re probably going to work on it again,” Coyle said. “Don’t make it a pain in the butt the second time around because you just did something silly.”
LEDs also require a bit of computer work as well.
“If the tractor was spec’d with an incandescent light, the control module is programmed that way,” said Dan Miller, field services/special projects manager at Peterson Manufacturing . “So, you just don’t pop in the LED, you have to go in and reprogram the light control module or you get a fault code.”
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Reprogramming is done with the truck maker’s proprietary software and a laptop.
The installer also will want to make sure the headlight is at the right height and angle, crucial to help road visibility in dark conditions.
“For LED headlamp systems, as well as all of the LED signal lighting, there’s a positive locking feature on the connection,” said Paul Sniegocki, EVP of engineering and CTO at Clarience Technologies, parent company of Truck-Lite. “One of the reasons that you’ll see flickering of lights [on a vehicle with LEDs] is that connection is not intact, as it’s vibrating down the road. The positive locking connector can seal from the environment and secure the connection in place, to eliminate that as a failure mode.”
Shops also need to carry a headlamp aiming system to verify proper alignment of headlights according to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration requirements.
