I installed the headlamps today (what a pain in the a$$!) and I love them. The only thing is I will have to put some silicone on the edges because right away the lenses fogged up when it started to rain. I am having trouble with the angel eye itself. The instructions are in chinese (I think) and they say not to break the wire (duh) but I was wondering if when I stripped the wire it damaged the wire....well I was testing out the drivers side headlamp with the pos and neg on my car battery and it was lighting up the halo. On the passenger side I first cut the positive wire on the parking light and soldered the end coming from the car to the angel eye positive, and then both those wires were soldered to the positive coming from the bulb. I then proceded to solder the negative wires as well, but all that would come on were the parking lights. I am wondering if maybe there isn't enough power coming from the parking light wire I was using? I am going to work on this tomorrow, but I just wanted to know if someone has had experience with this. All you haters just shut up. I'm so sick of "stock this" and "stock that" is "better". I just choose to be different.

 

Ok, looks like I may have a dud on the driver's side. I am going to check continuity tomorrow to see if maybe just the wires are broken and if so I will try to replace them. I hope LED's don't use a special kind of wire or anything.

 

Well, I wired them up to the parking lights and it seems as though my parking lights aren't enough power to turn on the halos? I dunno, seems like something is up. Anyone know what I can do to get enough power to these halos? Maybe it's the y49 curse.

 

...and at least this post can be used by others that are searching for info on these headlamps. I figured out that either the solder or the heat shrink tubing was interfering with the connections for the halos. I got mine to work, but I accidentally dropped the driver's side headlamp and the halo doesn't work on that side, but the passenger side does work. I'll just order another set to install with BOTH working halos. Thx for nothing H-T. You're welcome, anyone else that needs this info for help on the installation.

 

My drivers side is way brighter then the passenger side too. It's true that there just isn't enough power to light them up aling with the regular corners.

But beware that at high RPM,s the currents higher wich can break the halo's. Solder in a power regulator. Those are 50 cents or something...and protect your expensive lights.

I am working on a way to hook them up in the running light circuit, but give them a seperate 12V feed. Don't know how tho. Until then...one is brighter then the other.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by SETI20 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">My drivers side is way brighter then the passenger side too. It's true that there just isn't enough power to light them up aling with the regular corners.

But beware that at high RPM,s the currents higher wich can break the halo's. Solder in a power regulator. Those are 50 cents or something...and protect your expensive lights.

I am working on a way to hook them up in the running light circuit, but give them a seperate 12V feed. Don't know how tho. Until then...one is brighter then the other.</TD></TR></TABLE>

Maybe because there is not enough power to run them, my driver's side halo won't light up. . I also noticed that on the homemade Angel Eyes website they put in a regulator and something else on the power wires for the led's. I was wondering why this company did not sell the headlamps with them. I know of another guy with a CRX that has gotten both of them to work fine while connected to the turn signals, but he's on his second set of lights since the others blew out. I'm going to see what I can do to fix the drivers side halo (if it's actually broken) and get it to turn on. Like I said before though, I might just buy another set to have "spares" as well.

p.s.: Dammit, that sux, I'll pick up those regulators so my voltages don't change when I'm revvin' high. Is there any way to get in touch with the manufacturer of these headlamps?

 

okay, i have had those things since december last year, and well they suck.. but they do look good.. I had a dud passenger side right out of the box. I took it apart and a connection right at the LED was severed, I went and purchased a new resistor and diode and resoldered it and it still works. About 3 months later the drivers side went. I resoldered it with a new resistor and diode once again, but the LED was burnt up already. . what a POS.. So what i'm doing now is I dremeled out the old LEDs and i'm installing amber Varad leds in there, they are much brighter and they do not need a regulator because they have one built in.

hope this helps you some.

 

I've got the same kind of lights on my 90"Civic. I ran them to the corner parking lights that double as turn signals when engaged. They seem to work fine. As For the instructions, mine said to make note of a small electrical peice in line with the positive halo wire. Saying that make shure not to damage it. <U>But I have had to go into the light housing itself a fool with the connection at the halo L.E.D. when it started to flicker.</U> You might check that if all else fails.

 

I think that is what I am going to do, take them both apart and add resistors. I believe the wiring might be severed on my driver's side as well and that is why it does not work right now. I was wondering, I'm not electrical wizard or anything but, if you connect the positive to a 12v power source and the negative to the ground for the parking lights would you be able to get 12v power to the halo (so that it turns on and stays on) and still be able to use the parking lights at their regular voltage? Lemme know if you don't understand what I am saying.

 

Now, as far as your LED problems. You always need a resistor when working with LED's on a car. No special wires or anything, but the fact is that probably any LED you'll ever run into works at a much lower power level than the relatively high power of your car's electrical system. You're halo's most likely have resistors already on them, probably the "small electrical piece" that Civiclized mentioned. You can use any normal LED like you might find at Radio Shack in your halo's as long as you pair it up with the correct resistor. To do this, you need to use Ohm's Law and do a little calculating. (who said you'd never use math when you got out of school?) Anyway, the resistors that are already on your halos are already done for you. I'm only talking about if you wanted to use your own LED's (ie. if you blow the other ones up and would rather pay $5 instead of $150). If you'd like info on doing that, let me know.


Modified by GetCaughtDead at 12:21 PM 10/10/2004


Modified by GetCaughtDead at 8:08 PM 10/10/2004

 

These headlamps do not have resistors on them. Just a shielded wire that the instructions say not to break. Also, the instructions are very vague as they might even be translated incorrectly and have a huge typo (all your base are belong to us). It says : "#1. Do not break this part, it is important for halo operation. #2. Connect black wire to negative on parking signal #3. Connect black wire to negative on parking signal"

I am not shitting you. That's the extent of the installation instructions.

 

I don't know what experience you have with electronics, but resistors are pretty small. (roughly 1/4" x 1/8") They could be hidden under some shrink tube for protection and you might not even see them. Is there any way you could get some pics of these headlights?

I also meant to ask before, but when you're halos are looking really dim, are your corner lights any dimmer at all?

 

okay since everyone here doesn't realize how much power a led requires i'll let em know... almost none. you could power one with 250milliamps. anyway, the sonar brand halo headlights come with a resistor and a diode on them.. the diode is to prevent you from hooking them up backwards. the resistor and diode are connected directly to the LED, you cannot see them unless you pull the ENTIRE housing apart, they are under some shrink wrap also.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by GetCaughtDead &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">the fact is that probably any LED you'll ever run into works at a much lower power level than the relatively high power of your car's electrical system. You're halo's most likely have resistors already on them</TD></TR></TABLE>
<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by GetCaughtDead &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I don't know what experience you have with electronics, but resistors are pretty small. (roughly 1/4" x 1/8") They could be hidden under some shrink tube for protection and you might not even see them. </TD></TR></TABLE>

That's pretty much what I'm saying, vitrox. My only concern would be if somebody is hooking them up in parallel with the corner light, which obviously requires much more power, they would essentially be shorting out the circuit.

 

I don't mean to change the topic but did you notice a better beam pattern from the projector lights? I have a RM H.I.D. kit on my car and the lights are bright as hell! But the pattern is kinda skewed. I'm looking into the black housing projectors (since my hatch is GB) so I can get a tighter beam pattern. Not quite sold on the look but it's function over fashion.

Thanks again and sorry there wasn't more help from others to solve your problem

 

The cutoff is terrible and the light isn't really all that much different than some nice aftermarket blues. They're cheap projectors so they don't have that much going for them. As for the resistor, maybe mine's disconnected and that is why my passenger side doesn't work, but if they have resistors already, why do they work, then stop working then work again? It has not shorted out the circuit in my parking lights (not yet at least). In a crx you would know because the flasher would blink faster. Mine don't, so everything is fine, 'cept for the halo's being so intermittent (and the driver's side not even working!).

 

i have those sonar halo lights....and i love them...they are so much brighter....and im not sure exactly what is teh problem mine hooked up fine i just spliced themin with my parking lights. i did them on my friends focus too and they worked great. are you splicing the wrong wire? because tahts what i did at first since none of teh wires are colored coded like red and black i did them back wards teh first time.

 

If your only problem is an intermittant connection, then yeah, you've just got a bad connection somewhere. problem solved.

Also for the record, after talking to my brother who is an actual electronics engineer building satillites and cool **** like that, he says you can run LED's in parallel with the light bulb, assuming you have your resistor in place before the LED. (not before the corner light, of course) Therefore, my lecture on relays can be ignored. They're typically for situations that draw too much power (like fog lights) or in cases where a parallel circuit would in fact short the first.

If you do determine that your LED is burned out, you can replace just the LED rather than the entire headlight, in which case you will likely need a new resistor and a diode, which I can help you figure out if you like.

 

Well, what ended up happening....after work today I went driving around, had some errands to run. Went to a paintshop to ask about my mugen style wing, went to get a new dvd/divx player for my tv at home, and then to a family dinner.....all the time thinking "I must really look like an *** driving around with cycloptic halos" So just to satisfy my curiosity, when I arrived at my fathers house I left the car running with the lights on. To my surprise, both halos were on, however the drivers side halo had only one LED bright, and the other might have either been dim or not working. But I know it's not defective now, just a loose connection maybe. Something else I noticed was that the Halo's only turn on when the engine is running, if it's not, only one halo will turn on and it's really dim...in fact, eventually it just fades out. Anyone know why this is? Regardless, I am happy to know that it isn't a blown halo, it's just bad connections that can be fixed (once I crack open the headlamp).

 

bump...

 

Well, they work fine now. Didn't even get to crack the lenses open and they both light up brightly. Excuse the cheap, pos camera, but it's all I had. 56k "oh ****, LOOK OUT!!!"

 

Ok, the pics aren't working anymore. I"ll try uploading them again.

 

how bad is the leak situation on these lights?
i will be installing them in a friends car soon and i do not want to have to take them back out in like a few weeks to reseal them
just wondering how u guys' lights been holding up to rainy days

 

Well, to be honest, I am not sure. Mine will fog up, but then the fog goes away. Dunno how to explain that. Even on the rainiest of days. I would suggest that if you do buy them and are worried about leaks get a tube of silicone that can handle faucet leaks, etc and create a new bead on the headlamps. Oh yeah, and if the halos don't work right away, just give it time, they usually kick in later on.