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[forgitaboutut]

??
wondering if the LED will give more range....

[Richard230]

Someone correct me if I am wrong, but I don't think the headlight makes enough of a drain on the battery pack to be noticeable.  Even if you just removed the bulb, I don't think you would notice any increase in range. My guess is that the stock headlight probably uses about 35 watts, compared with the motor's draw of how many thousands of watts?

[manlytom]

I believe the standard headlight draws nearly 50W and the LED around 30W as ithas to be bright enough. So not a major difference. However, I am considering to go all LED on my 2011S -- to make the point tweak out anything possible. It will as well change the look - make it complete - just like the white headphones on the ipod. Find though the pricing of LED headlight from Zero a bit high - hope it comes down or we find a DOT approved alternative. For the indicators I am looking at options that replace the relay and not just LEDs and resistors that seem to burn of the energy - not good enough.

T

[protomech]

Probably the LED lamp saves 20-30w. At 70 mph you need around 500w for each mph gain, so it'll bump your top sustained speed from 75 to 75.05 mph. Or thereabouts.

At 70 mph the ZF9 Zero S exhausts its battery pack in about 37 minutes. The LED lamp saves enough power in that time to get you an extra 450 feet or so (0.2% range extension OR 0.2% less energy consumed).

In the UDDS city driving schedule the ZF9 exhausts its battery pack in 5-6 hours. The LED lamp saves enough power in that time to take you maybe an extra 2 miles (1.8% range extension OR 1.8% less energy consumed).

A 1 hour daily commute would save approximately 25 wh, or 30 wh at the wall. At the national average of $0.11/kwh, that's a third of a penny per day. The HD LED bulb that Zero sells is $400 retail, so it'd only take 120k days or so to pay for the lamp. Or about 330 years.

LED lamps are quite cool. But the only real justification is that you like the technology, or you like the light characteristics of the lamp.

[nick5446]

LED lamps are quite cool. But the only real justification is that you like the technology, or you like the light characteristics of the lamp.

Something else to keep in mind is that the LED is significantly heavier than the stock light. Call Zero for specifics, but it's probably 5lbs heavier.

[eddiebee]

The Truck-Lite 7" LED headlight uses 32 watts on low beam (stock H4 bulb is 55 watts) and it's a little bit heavier.  You can buy them online for ~$260.

It's true there's almost no difference on battery life, you're better off just removing the headlight fuse during the day... but after using this LED headlight on my bike and truck for the past few months I've found it's safer because the color and intensity make you more noticeable to other drivers.  Plus it looks a lot more modern and appropriate for an electric bike IMHO.

They also have a new reflector-based version that uses only 23 watts but I haven't tried that one yet.

[trikester]

How does the night vision compare with LED vs H4?

I changed my 2010 DS to Xenon and save 20 watts over the H4 and I get a lot more light (spec 3.5 times more), However I don't have high & low settings with the xenon. I wired it so that when I switch to low it shuts off. I do that when riding daytime on dirt or no opposing traffic.

[eddiebee]

Trikestar, this is a great comparison of a stock H4 bulb to the Truck-Lite LED as well as the more expensive Harley LED headlight which ZERO actually sells as an upgrade on their website:
http://www.lrsanitary.com/0/leds_update.pdf

If you want to be street-legal again you can use a bi-xenon kit which is much cheaper than going with LED. The first one I bought ten years ago was made in Germany and cost $650, now they're made in China and cost $30 for a basic kit.  Since you already have xenon you could actually just modify your harness and buy a $7 bi-xenon bulb like this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/HID-Xenon-Headlight-Bulbs-H4-3-Hi-Lo-Bi-Xenon-4300K-X1-/250758127894

Especially when using xenon in a headlight not designed for it, you should also upgrade the headlight to a european version like this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/7-H4-EURO-MOTORCYCLE-HEADLIGHT-/250897367552
It still won't be street-legal but you'll get a better beam and cause less glare to other drivers.

Only thing I'd watch out for is make sure there's enough depth in the headlight bucket to clear the solenoid on the bixenon bulb. I never ran into this problem on any other bikes but the Zero's bucket is pretty shallow.

[trikester]

The reason I only went with one beam was that there was not enough room in the headlight, on my 2010, for the solenoid.