realtyman

They've got to give us some reason to want to buy a MY 2006.

EBMCS03

DOH!! ok I'll cancel my order and wait for a MY06.

streak

The LED's really do light up a lot quicker than incandescent bulbs. Could make the difference between someone seeing your break lights in time and not hitting you. One of the reasons why they have used LED technology in the third break light.

I have considered using the aftermarket LED bulbs but I dont hink it will look that nice. If you see how BMW have done it in the CAB's there is a whole spread out network of individual LEDS which make the whole light fitting glow. You wont get the same effect from an aftermarket LED bulb.

Just my 2c's worth.

Streak


My Land Rover Horror Story

das

A few bits of information. First, let me say that I'm a *huge* fan of LEDs, and not just for vehicle lighting.

I did try LED lamps in place of the brake and turn signal lights on my E39.

To put it simply, LED light, and the mechanism used to create it and the optics used to deliver it, is a *completely* different kind of light than an incandescent bulb. It does not reflect nor disperse well in a bulb housing designed for incandescent bulbs.

My experience was that if the housing was small enough - such as the E39 brake lights - you could get sufficient reflection and brightness. If the housing was too big - like the E39 turn signals - you wouldn't get enough reflection, resulting in a little 1" circle of light in the middle of the lens, visible mostly only directly from the rear, and not lighting up the rest of the lens surface. There's no question the light is *bright* enough, but it's not spread out over the lens, and becomes dim quickly as you move off axis from the lamp.

In the end, I felt that they worked great in the brake light housing, because of the way it was shaped and the lens surface; in other words, it looked just as bright or brighter than incandescents, even in sunlight (night wasn't really a problem for either). It does give a great effect, too: a brilliant pinpoint of very bright light, that instantaneously powers on and off.

The turn signals were a little different. In daytime, the whole lens surface is pretty much dark, except for the lamp itself. And in very bright sunlight even at a minimal angle, it wasn't really visible at all unless you're specifically looking for it.

When you see LED taillights on new cars, and the retrofits on things like trucks, and the new emergency vehicle lighting, you'll notice that there are a LOT of LEDs covering, and near the surface of, the lens, and generally there are some pretty sophisticated optics to make sure it's visible at angles as well. This is why retrofits for bulbs alone haven't taken off - they'll never light up every possible lens configuration brightly enough to pass US DOT muster (or that of other regulatory agencies in other countries).

The other problem is the one of sensing the bulb. In "simpler" vehicles, you can get electronic flasher modules that won't see the bulb as burnt out. BMW's lamp control module will see the bulbs as burnt out. The only way around this is to wire a resistor pack (or another incandescent bulb) in parallel with the leads to the lamp. The E39 rear CELIS lamp retrofit assemblies (the ones used on 2001-) which used LEDs and lightpipes for the rear "parking"/marker lights, had special electronics that came as part of the retrofit kit that "tricked" the car into thinking that the real lamps weren't burnt out.

These two posts are a must-read, and give some details why it's just not that simple to retrofit with bulb replacements:

1, 2

All that said, I still wouldn't stop anyone from trying it.

But you definitely can't get just any LED bulb. Most of the cheap "ricer" replacements (like the ones mentioned above) are complete crap. The only ones I'd even begin to consider would be from LEDtronics (and possibly Super Bright LEDs, though I haven't tried any from them yet). The catch? The *good* LED bulb replacements are $25 - $30 a pop. This is because the LEDs themselves are much, much brighter, there are more of them in the assembly, and they make an attempt at mounting LEDs laterally to at least try to get some reflectivity out over the rest of the lens.

So if you want to try it out, I'd get a couple from LEDtronics, and see how they work - maybe one for turn, one for brake/tail. If you think they're going to be bright enough, illuminate the lens enough, and are reasonably visible from angles, go for it! Both LEDtronics and Super Bright LEDs now sell a resistor pack that I'd buy to fix the fast blink/sensing problem (instead of splicing in incandescent bulb sockets in the trunk to act as a load, like I did).

If anyone tries this on E60's lamp assembly in particular, I'd be curious to know how it goes!

frenchyrider267

So what is the minimum/maximum resistance needed to get rid of the error message, as well as not ruin the LEDs?

ETNav382

I think you win the award for oldest thread revival. Anyways, welcome to the forum and good on you for searching, also I can't help with your question.

paul535xi

any way you can help me out??

im getting bulb out warnings from the LUX brand leds i bought from Bimmian.com...

shitty

would like to solve this problem but hey dont seem to have a fix for my ride... 2008 535xi

im considering getting Mtech lights i saw on ebay... just cant handle the random Dinging anymore... you soon realise that 250$ is a small price to pay for sanity

tgm001

There is a solution to your problem, you have to do some coding,, there a thing that you have to desactivate,(activ to nich_activ)..but I don't remember where I saw this..I think it was bmwcoding.com...

Anyways hope I helped you a little bit lol

And yeah you certainly get the award for oldest thread revival as ETNav382 LOL

Welcome to the forum and GL