#Halogen vs hid vs led vs laser plus#
#Halogen vs hid vs led vs laser series#

You have an enclosed tube filled with gases, an electrode at each end and an electric current passing through. HID lights work pretty much like your neon tube in the basement.

#Halogen vs hid vs led vs laser series#

The first xenon headlight appeared on the BMW 7 Series in 1991 and slowly became the number one option for several car companies, which avoided however to offer it as standard equipment. HID HEADLAMPS (XENON HEADLIGHTS)Xenon headlights, officially known as high-intensity discharge headlamps (HIDs), are usually defined as a more efficient solution, mostly because of the color temperatureĪnd the amount of light they generate. In just a few words, there are the pros and cons of halogen headlamps: Still, halogen light bulbs have a number of advantages that could make it the number one option for most carmakers: they create a decent illumination for the least amount of money they come in a number of different sizes, which basically means that such bulbs can be installed on most car models they are dimmable, thus allowing carmakers to build multiple versions, depending on body type and dimensions.

It you touched it, try using a clean cloth and an alcohol-based substance to rub it off. For example, when replacing a faulty bulb, it is mandatory to avoid touching the glass of the spare one! The grease on your fingers will stick to the quartz glass, causing it to heat unevenly and drastically cut the bulb’s life. The biggest problem is that, while generating the radiating light, the bulb also creates a large amount of heat which basically represents wasted energy.Īnother major problem with halogen bulbs is also the way they react to various substances. When the halogen light bulb comes to the end of its lifetime, it usually happens so because the tungsten in the filament evaporates and leaves the filament, getting deposited on the glass and causing the filament to rupture at some point and render itself unfunctional.īut that’s not the major issue, though. In order to create light, the tungsten filament receives electricity from the car’s battery and heats up to around 2,500 degrees Celsius thus starting to glow (incandescence process).

#Halogen vs hid vs led vs laser plus#

The reason? Halogen isn't exactly synonym to efficiency and, to better understand why, we'll explain how such a light bulb works.įirst of all, it is made of a glass envelope capable of resisting very high temperatures, plus a gas, usually a combination of argon and nitrogen, along with a tungsten filament. However, halogen bulbs are becoming the second option for more and more car companies around the world. Basically a halogen light bulb has a lifetime of about 1,000 hours under normal conditions, while replacement costs are usually very low comparable to the other types bellow (around 30 bucks for a decent set). HALOGEN HEADLAMPSHalogen headlights are currently the most popular in the automotive world and, in case you're wondering why does this happen, it's mostly because of their primaryĪdvantage: they're simple and cost effective. So, let's take one at a time and see what this is all about. Some of you will agree with our statements, others won't, but either way, each of the four types of headlamps has its very own pros and cons. We'll thus try to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each of them, although people generally believe, and it sometimes happens to be true, that the newest is also the best. We won't talk about the headlamp history today because we already did that, but instead we'll try to focus on the four major headlamp configurations of today and see what they're up to. Laser headlights is an example, but before discussing them, we have to go through more common systems available for a larger use. Furthermore, researchers are continuously working on the whole 'headlamp' idea, trying to find new breakthroughs that would obviously make their products better than the rivals'. Although the whole automotive industry uses them, only a few people actually know how they evolved from simple acetylene lamps in the 1880s to very complex LED assemblies nowadays.