Audew LED Headlight Kit Review
I’ve replaced most of the lights on my car with LEDs, but I thought I would need an expensive kit to do the headlights. Fortunately, prices for LED headlight kits are very reasonable now. Audew sent us an LED conversion kit that retails for under $40, which isn’t much more than traditional halogen bulbs, which typically run for $15-20.
Hardware
The Audew LED Headlight Conversion Kit has all electrical components contained within the bulb itself, rather than an external box. There is a braided cable with connector intended to fit the socked for your bulb type. The LED assembly is IP68 rated and has a descent sized heatsink with a small 10,000 rpm fan to cool the device. The bulb is a 72W COB LED that is supposed to be 4,000 lumens per light.
Color Temperature
The biggest thing I was looking for in the headlights was the color of the light. I don’t like the yellow bulbs that my car came with and I hate those ‘blue’ lights that are typical of the aftermarket HID kits. If you’ve ever been blinded by another drivers lights, you know exactly what I’m talking about.
I was looking for lights in the 5500-6000K range – daylight white color. They’re referred to as “daylight” because they’re supposed to be the same color temperature of our sun. With all that being said, the Audew LED kit is rated as 6000K, which is in the range that I was looking for.
Finding Your Bulb
I mistakenly ordered a “9005” kit, because that’s what came up the first time I Googled my car. As it turns out, my car needed an H11 bulb. So you can avoid the mistake I made when ordering headlights, I’m providing a link to a website to check what size bulb you need for your car:
Once I got the correct bulb in, I was in business.
I will note that the “9005” was for my high beams. Apparently my car is funky with high beams, so the 9005 bulb did not work.
Installation
Installing the headlights in my ’08 Scion XB was very easy, though I wish I used gloves the first time due to the grease buildup in the engine bay. All I had to do was rotate the original bulb counterclockwise to remove it, disconnect the bulb, and plug the new one in. I thought I would need to adjust the new bulb to level the light, but everything was even. If you need to adjust your light, park in front of a garage or wall with the lights on and rotate the assembly.
Results
I knew the brightness was going to be more even, but I was honestly surprised at how much clearer the light is compared to my original headlights. Rather than having a hotspot where the bulbs are, the light is diffused more evenly.
The results while driving were far better than the original bulbs. I was able to see the road more clearly at night. It also greatly improved the visibility on the sides of the car.
Conclusions
If you are interested in upgrading your headlights to LEDs, I would suggest giving this kit a try. Compared to traditional bulbs, these are significantly better for driving at night. Plus, being LEDs, they should last a lot more hours, so you shouldn’t have to replace them as often.
