LED Headlight Bulb & Wattage Question

[New2Scoots]

After much research I ordered an LED headlight bulb. There's a lot of junk on the market (no reviews or bad reviews) but this one got good reviews. Shipped a few days ago & due to arrive in 6 weeks. Yikes! Slow canoe I guess. Anyway it's rated at 30 watts but one reviewer said his draws 21.93 watts. Since the stock bulb is 35 watts am I going to fry anything? Is it possible to have too few watts? Also, my "deadlight" kit arrived & the 2 LED bulbs included are 2.5 watts each so I may install them all at the same time. If interested the headlight bulb is called "High Power 30W 3000LM 6000K H4 9003 HB2 XM-L2 CREE LED". Not sure if I can mention brands, if not let me know. The stock bulb is ok but I may outrun it once my engine's fully broken in & I'm riding faster. And I love to tinker. Mechanical curiosity often has me "fixing" things that aren't broken. Oh, the bulb is an H4 which should fit but an HS1 bulb won't fit an H4 because one of the 3 tabs is too wide. At least from what I read. I'll post pics of high & low beam compared to the stock bulb soon after it arrives in June.

[thatvwbusguy]

Running a lower wattage headlight will put less strain on the electrical system and definitely won't fry anything. In general, going with a more efficient electrical accessory will always be okay, it's when you add something that requires more juice that wiring harnesses can get overloaded and your charging system might not be able to keep up with demand.

The bad news is that installing any of the drop in LED conversion kits in a stock headlight won't give you a defined beam pattern or cutoff like a filament bulb, the technology is just too different to work properly. Headlight systems are designed around the lighting source. Changing to a different light source negates all of the photometric engineering that went into the original design.

A washed out, non-defined lighting field for you and lots of glare for everyone else on the road will be the result of any of the LED conversions. Anyone who tries to tell you differently either doesn't understand how headlights work, or is trying to sell you an LED conversion kit. The new generation of LED conversion kits is just an update of the HID conversion kits that don't work right either.

Another problem with LEDs in a small space like the headlight housing on a scooter is that they run really hot and usually burn out in a short amount of time due to the lack of moving air to cool the heat sink. In an automotive setting, there is usually plenty of air space behind the headlights that allows the heat to escape.

All drop in "headlight conversion kits" are technically illegal as well, since you are changing the light source type from the original design spec and making it automatically non DOT/SAE compliant. In the long run, this is far less important than the fact that the conversion kits just don't function properly.

Installing an HS1 bulb like the PIAA Super Plasma GT-X will give you better lighting than the stock bulb and will function properly in the stock headlight housing. To install an HS1 bulb in an H4 headlight housing, all you need to do is trim about 1mm off each side of the thicker tab on the base of the HS1 bulb with a pair of wire cutters. I have run HS1 bulbs in multiple scooters and motorcycles. High quality HS1 bulbs are expensive, but they work well to improve night time riding safety and won't blind oncoming traffic.

[New2Scoots]

Thanks, good info. This bulb has a fan in a finned aluminum heat sink but the beam pattern remains a big question mark. If it doesn't work out I'll try that PIAA.