Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

BACKGROUND I am a mechanical engineer by trade and I have been looking for a simple solution that provided my 2004 Ford F150 (and possibly other vehicles) with some significant increase in light output, would provide me with long term durability, and is easily installed. HID certainly have their allure with the significant light output they provide, but their poor reliability has always turned me away. A friend of mine recently pointed me towards these LED alternatives. Having seen the "power" of CREE LED's first hand in my automotive endurance night racing, and the number of significant reviews found here on Amazon, and the seller's outstanding customer service, I decided to pull the trigger on these bulbs. FIRST IMPRESSIONS So I ordered a set of the OPT7 H13 LED bulbs and they arrived in less than a week. Out of the package they looked very nice. I personally could do without the red anodized finish, but end the end, the H13 bulb base is not visible in the 2004 F150. The bulb itself is built on an aluminum chassis that is with shaped like a blade. Each side of the bulb blade was labeled with a “L” and a “R”, which I assumed referred to left and right, respectively. So immediately I realized that the orientation of this blade would be important (continue on to see how important). There are 2 CREE ignitors on each side of the blade. The 1st set of CREE are used for low beams (1 on each side of the blade) and the 2nd set of CREE fire (1 on each side of the blade) with high beams on. The relative position of the CREE ignitors mimic the actual filaments on the H13 Halogen bulb. The bulb has a polymer (plastic) adapter ring that allows it to mate with the lamp housing on the car. This adapter rings is a slip-fit over the aluminum chassis and is held in place with a single screw. Overall it appears that some good thought went into the design of this bulb, as the design seemed very modular, allowing the chassis and wiring to be adapted to many different bulb types and vehicle applications. BULB TESTING Unfortunately with the F150, the headlamp housing have to be removed to install the bulbs, but this is a relatively simple task. First things first, I removed the Sylvania H14 bulbs and hooked up the separate "adapter harness" that was provided by OPT7 and then hooked up the bulbs. The passenger bulb fired right up, igniting 1 CREE on each side of the bulb blade, for a total of 2 CREE's per bulb. The light appeared quite impressive. I turned on the high beams and a 2nd CREE ignited on each side of the bulb blade for a total of 4 CREE's per bulb. The passenger bulb was quite difficult to look at due to the intensity of the light. I switched sides to test the driver side bulb. I hooked it up and was less than impressed. Something was wrong and immediately began to regret my purchase decision. The low-beam CREE was on, but lacked the intensity of the passenger bulb. I flipped the high beams on and the driver bulb when completely dark. Convinced that I was boxing the bulbs up and returning them, I began to remove the bulbs when I noticed that one of contact pins that plug into the factory harness was not install properly. The contact pin on the adapter harness was not properly latched into the housing, so the pin simply was pushed out of the housing when I plugged the harness in. With a pair of needle nose pliers, I was able to simply pull the contact pin through the housing and properly lock the pin to the housing. Relief set in as a retest showed a fully functioning bulb. Bulb test complete. BEAM TESTING Next step was to get the bulbs installed into the head lamps and test the beam pattern. A simple twist to install the bulb, and dry fit the housing for a quit light beam test. I turn on the headlights and notice a very poor beam pattern that is split. See beam indexing photo. Immediately, I began to question if the bulb was properly oriented. A quick visual inspection indicated that the flat side of the blade was oriented at approximately 11 o’clock, and that it should probably be oriented at 9 o’clock. This can be seen in the photo I provided. Before removing the bulb, I made a mark at 12 o’clock on the white plastic bulb adapter ring. I then removed the bulb, removed the screw that holds the adapter ring to the bulb chassis and re-installed everything, but this time I was able to manually rotate the blade orientation. After experimenting with bulb orientation, I confirmed my suspicions that it is critical that this bulb be properly indexed. It is not overly sensitive to being perfectly aligned, but I would say the blade needs to be orientated vertically (flat sides at 3 and 9 o’clock) to within + or – 5 degrees. BULB INDEXING (MODIFICATION) Indexing the bulbs was a relatively easy task, but was certainly not planned or anticipated, and probably added an extra 30 minutes to the installation. Start by installing the bulb into the lamp housing. Mark the white plastic adapter ring at 12 o’clock (or Top Dead Center, TDC). Remove the bulb. Remove the screw holding the adapter ring to the chassis, and slide the adapter ring off. Mark the orientation of the screw hole on the chassis so that you can see your mark after you slide the adapter ring back on. Now slide the adapter ring back onto the bulb chassis. Orient the bulb chassis such that the blade is properly oriented relative to the TDC mark on your adapter ring. Now this is where you have a couple of options. If the threaded hole in the aluminum chassis is NOT aligned with one of the adapter ring prongs, you can simply drill another hole in the adapter ring for the screw. Unfortunately in my application the threaded hole in the chassis was perfectly aligned with one of the adapter prongs. So I marked the chassis where the original adapter ring screw hole was, then slide the adapter ring off and drilled a new hole for the screw. I did not have a tap to thread the chassis, but simply chose a drill bit that fit inside the original threaded hole. Drilled the new hole approximately 1/8” deep. The new hole did not break through to the inside of the aluminum chassis. Because the aluminum was soft, I was still able to install the screw a couple turns to secure the adapter ring in place. You should now have a properly indexed bulb when reinstalled in the lamp housing. FINAL INSTALLATION & AIMING After properly indexing the bulbs, I simply installed the bulbs again. Reinstalled the lamp housings on my F150 and tested one last time. There was very little change in the beam aim after installation. In fact, I suspect that much of the change was simply due to positioning of the lamp housing and not the bulb position relative to the housing. I made some quick adjustments to the level the beams when shining against the garage door. Then drove out for a quick test drive. After driving some, I felt the lamps were aimed a bit low, so I raised them slightly will out on the road. I returned home and adjusted the lamps one last time to level the beams to the highest aimed lamp. FINAL IMPRESSIONS I am really excited with the results I achieved. The amount of light output is so much greater than my OE H13 bulbs. While the light intensity at any given spot is not necessarily that much great than OE, there is a much larger dispersion of light that far exceeds the field of view of the OE Sylvania bulbs. If I compared the light intensity of the LED H13 bulbs to the wife’s Acura OE HID bulbs, the intensity of light would not match the HID’s, but the dispersion of light or the field of view easily matches the HID’s. As impressive as the low beams are, the high beams knocked my socks off. Wow! The light intensity over the field of view increased significantly, and the depth of view or distance increases significantly also. Also worth noting is the vertical cut. The beam pattern appears to be of pretty good quality with good light distribution and with my properly aimed lamps, the vertical cutoff in the beam keeps the light out of other vehicles mirrors when following from behind. As for the color temperature of the light, I will say I would prefer a slightly warmer light color. I feel that with a slightly warmer color temperature that illumination of the road would be improved some. My preference would have been 5000K or 4000K, but from a purely aesthetic standpoint though the 6000K color temperature looks great on the truck, but again I feel it compromises light output ever so slightly. Assuming that these bulbs will live up to their claim with regard to durability and longevity, I am thoroughly happy with my purchase and would recommend these to friends. That said, I think that OPT7 and the manufacturing should give some thought to allowing the customer to index the bulbs without having to modify them as I have done, but then perhaps my bulbs were manufactured improbably.