What are your thoughts of changing out the stock Halogen bulbs to LED bulbs for my 2018 F 150? Heat issues, damage to electrical systems, or harm to the truck?
Thanks and love your show.
Even though LEDs don't generate heat the resistors required in an automotive LED lighting circuit do generate heat.
I'm an old man and I live by the philosophy, if it ain't broke, don't try to fix it.
When it comes to automotive circuits I believe it's best to stick with the manufacturer's design unless they issue a TSB saying otherwise.
Heat issues
There are no issues with heat. LEDs are designed to emit light in only a dedicated frequency, halogen and incandescent bulbs generate heat because of infrared light that we can't see, as well as light that we can.
damage to electrical systems
You would need to completely replace the headlight housing and probably splice in new wiring as well. It's probably not worth risking damage to you vehicle in order to put more "flashy" headlights in.
If you change the taillights to LEDs and they were formerly incandescents, your turn signals will flash rapidly. The vehicle was designed with incandescent lights, so there's an expected resistance, and it's high. The LED means the resistance is very small, so the computer thinks a bulb is bad.
LEDs still generate A LOT of heat. The difference is that LEDs are damaged by heat. They're quite sensitive to it, whereas halogens get more efficient the hotter they are. This is why LEDs come attached to massive heat sinks to try to get rid of as much heat as possible
I didn't know that. I'm used to LED flashlights and stuff like that.
I've also put custom LEDs in Styrofoam model buildings that I got at RadioShack, when that was still the go-to place. Those LEDs were only 3-volt LEDs, haha.
the tiny 5mm ones won't get too hot, but the big 15W headlight ones will. In a flashlight, the LED will be mounted to an aluminum slug or even use the thick aluminum case to draw heat.