Is Your LED Light Bar Installed Properly?

While it is not advisable to install a light bar in a vehicle that you drive on city roads, it is a different story when it comes to driving on dirt roads, mountain trails, and poorly lit rural areas. An LED light bar is a great help when navigating formidable terrain as it helps supplement the light generated by your regular headlights. With extra illumination, you can avoid accidents that can place your safety at risk.

A Few Things to Avoid When Installing an LED Light Bar

Proper installation is as important as the type and quality of the light bar you'll purchase. After all, even if you buy the most powerful and highly rated light bar on the market, you might still encounter problems if it isn't installed properly. Here are some of the common installation mistakes you should avoid.

1. Fitting it loosely

Most car owners take a do it yourself approach to installing an LED light bar in Australia. However, one of the most common results of DIY-ing the installation is that you often got yourself a loosely fitted lighting device. Take note that most vehicles sporting light bars are driven on bumpy and uneven roads, where even the best car shocks won't protect your car from extreme vibrations and prevent it from bobbing up and down forcefully.

This causes the light bar to produce an unsteady and flickering beam of light. Because of the loose fitting, the light bar will eventually cease to function properly, therefore, causing you to buy a new lighting device sooner than expected.

2. Not installing according to manufacturer's specification

LED light bars come in different sizes and capacities these days and each of them usually come with specific installation instructions that may differ greatly from each other. One installation process may involve removing switches or may require custom work done, while others don't need extensive modifications at all.

Even if you have done LED installations in the past, it's still important to be careful and to follow manufacturer's specifications when installing a new 4WD LED bar light, even if it is the same light bar brand. If you end up damaging it during installation, your warranty could be voided.

3. Failing to align bolt holes

This mistake often occurs when you're replacing an old light bar. Sometimes, people fail to align the new bar with existing bolt holes, while others don't even decide to replace the old bolts with new ones. This is a huge mistake to make because this doesn't ensure a tight fit, which could lead to the problems discussed in No. 1.

To avoid these mistakes, consider going to a professional installer or to someone who's very knowledgeable with the installation of light bars 4x4. This way, you can eliminate potential problems that can cause you to replace your light bar prematurely.

Similarities and Differences between an LED Light Bar and LED Driving Light

If you frequently find yourself driving in rural areas after the sun has gone down, it would be wise to install an LED light bar or driving light in your 4WD. These lighting devices help supplement the light generated by your car's factory headlights to give you better road visibility. With a better view of the road ahead of you, you can easily avoid objects blocking your path.

Facts and Info about LED Light Bars and Driving Lights

If you want to enjoy better road visibility, you can choose between a light bar and a driving light. Can't choose between the two? Here are their similarities and differences to help you decide.

1. Light quality

Light bars are known for generating intense white light that pans out to the side more. It provides you with excellent road visibility so you can see signs and hazards even if they are a few distances away. Beam patterns offered by LED light bar in Australia usually come in three options: spot, flood, or a combination of both.

Driving lights, meanwhile, often come in pairs. They usually have a rectangular beam pattern, but can also generate spot or flood light. As compared to high beam headlights, the light produced by LED driving lights has a longer and wider reach. In most cases, they can also illuminate the side of the road, depending on where they are installed.

2. Light temperature

Both LED light bars and driving lights can produce light of varying temperatures or colour. But if you want to enjoy maximum reliability, opt for a light bar or driving light that produces white light (around 6,500K) because white lights are more powerful in the dark than other light colours.

3. Installation

As mentioned earlier, driving lights are always installed in pairs, while light bars can be installed in pairs or singularly depending on their size. Whether you opt for a driving light or a 4WD LED bar light, know that you must never install them at the back of your vehicle because it can endanger the lives of other drivers and it is against Australian Design Rules.

4. Energy efficiency

Another similarity LED light bars and driving lights share is they are both energy-efficient. Thanks to their LEDs, at least 95% of the power they consume is transformed into light and not wasted as heat, unlike other lighting devices. They also last longer than other auxiliary lighting equipment.

When to Use

Driving lights are a recommended option if you frequently drive on highways at high speeds. Light bars, on the other hand, are perfect for off road driving and for driving in rural areas with limited road visibility and illumination.

Please share this article with your friends so they'll know whether to get light bars 4x4 or a pair of driving lights.