[walmark]

Seriously, why? We have LED clusters, LED tailights, LED door handle illumination. And yet the angel eyes are based on the convoluted system of fragile tubes to carry light around from a halogen bulb. Why not just simply LED? Surely it wasn't the cost, but then why not?

[RaceTruk]

Why doesn't the older model have something that wasn't designed yet?
This is a retarded question.
You should go one more step and ask why the low beam lights aren't LED on prelci like they are an option on the newest bmw models.

[JesseJames]

Why is water wet ?

[wdeerfield]

why didnt the e30 have a retractable hardtop?

[Dylanize]

Originally Posted by wdeerfield

why didnt the e30 have a retractable hardtop?

Dumb germans.

[Rotary Rasp]

A more legitimate question would be "why don't the new 3 and 4 series have led tail lights?"

[LuxAngelEyes]

Well at least its not too hard to install aftermarket Angel Eyes bulbs in there to make them look newer

[dwells]

Originally Posted by RaceTruk

Why doesn't the older model have something that wasn't designed yet?
This is a retarded question.
You should go one more step and ask why the low beam lights aren't LED on prelci like they are an option on the newest bmw models.

It's not a retarded question, what he's getting at is why hadn't they been designed yet? The technology was there, and BMW instead opted for a dated and less effective solution.

BMW does this on purpose so they can change them for the LCI to attract people to upgrade to new cars and make money off retrofits. It's sleazy, and it punishes people willing to be an early adopter and get a car right when it comes out.

They've been able to affordably produce LED taillights since the E46 facelift which had them, and yet the new $75,000+ M4 has conventional bulb taillights just so BMW can withhold the LED tails for the LCI models. It's absurd. Just like how the majority of F30 3 Series on the road have halogen reflector headlights, but the new Corolla for a third of the price comes with LED projectors standard.

[b_minus335]

Originally Posted by dwells

It's not a retarded question, what he's getting at is why hadn't they been designed yet? The technology was there, and BMW instead opted for a dated and less effective solution.

BMW does this on purpose so they can change them for the LCI to attract people to upgrade to new cars and make money off retrofits. It's sleazy, and it punishes people willing to be an early adopter and get a car right when it comes out.

They've been able to affordably produce LED taillights since the E46 facelift which had them, and yet the new $75,000+ M4 has conventional bulb taillights just so BMW can withhold the LED tails for the LCI models. It's absurd. Just like how the majority of F30 3 Series on the road have halogen reflector headlights, but the new Corolla for a third of the price comes with LED projectors standard.

Completely agree with this. Its ridiculous

[wdeerfield]

Originally Posted by dwells

They've been able to affordably produce LED taillights since the E46 facelift which had them, and yet the new $75,000+ M4 has conventional bulb taillights just so BMW can withhold the LED tails for the LCI models. It's absurd. Just like how the majority of F30 3 Series on the road have halogen reflector headlights, but the new Corolla for a third of the price comes with LED projectors standard.

the halogen headlights keep the price down $1k so they can say the 3er starts around 33k instead of over 35k. its the same reason they offer fake leather and manual seats.. the tail lights not being LED is definitely to justify an LCI. i had a 320i the other day as a loaner and couldnt believe how cheap it was. my e46 stripper had more options and better fit/finish than it and even more horsepower!

[dwells]

Originally Posted by wdeerfield

the halogen headlights keep the price down $1k so they can say the 3er starts around 33k instead of over 35k. its the same reason they offer fake leather and manual seats.. the tail lights not being LED is definitely to justify an LCI. i had a 320i the other day as a loaner and couldnt believe how cheap it was. my e46 stripper had more options and better fit/finish than it and even more horsepower!

It actually probably costs BMW more money to make the reflector headlights than it would to just make the projectors. The reflector headlights only exist so they can make big profits off of the incredibly marked-up projector headlights.

The Corolla is $16,000 and comes with LED projectors. There's no excuse for BMW having reflector headlights. It's done solely as a means of extorting more money out of people who expect their luxury car to have a decent lighting system instead of something that was already considered dated fifteen years ago.

[Dark_Knight_335]

Because if they were, then BMW wouldn't have anything to entice us to fish those greenbacks out of our pockets for the next LCI model- same with them newfangled purty LED LCI tails- marketing 101

I see dwells already got to this point before I did, so +10000 for dwells

[VTECaddict]

Cost would be a factor, and technology probably wasn't where they wanted it yet. The E92 was the first model with angel eye DRLs. For a 2007 model year that began production in 2006, it probably began development in 03/04 if not earlier. Think back 10 years from now and how technology was. LEDs probably weren't bright enough to function as DRL back then or too difficult to package into a headlight. Tail lights are easier for packaging since you don't have to deal with high beam, projector, ballast, etc.

Even just think about if you had LED interior bulbs or something for your car back in the day vs the brightness of what you can get now, it's a huge difference.

[Game]

Always pissed me off as well.

Solution: Change the rings.

[Dark_Knight_335]

While we're on the topic, I wonder how these current white LED rings on my 2011 light up so uniformly? I wish I knew where the LEDs were lighting them up from.

[rollinstone157]

Originally Posted by Dark_Knight_335

While we're on the topic, I wonder how these current white LED rings on my 2011 light up so uniformly? I wish I knew where the LEDs were lighting them up from.

It's actually a pretty cool system. Imagine if you will, the shape of a drill battery but with LEDs mounted on the top. The whole module is metal which helps to wick the heat that the emitters generate away from them ASAP--heat is the enemy of LEDs. That whole module slides into the headlight, and the LEDs meet up precisely with acrylic tubes that bring the light up into the rings.

The F30 3 Series uses one like this (3x Philips Luxeon Rebel LEDs from the Automotive Line)


The E92 E93 F06 F12 F13 use one like this (If I'm correct, a Philips Luxeon Altilon Module but it could also be a Osram Ostar from the headlamp line)

[Delta0311]

Why can't the PS4 play PS5 games? Srsly what's up with that?

[dwells]

Originally Posted by rollinstone157

It's actually a pretty cool system. Imagine if you will, the shape of a drill battery but with LEDs mounted on the top. The whole module is metal which helps to wick the heat that the emitters generate away from them ASAP--heat is the enemy of LEDs. That whole module slides into the headlight, and the LEDs meet up precisely with acrylic tubes that bring the light up into the rings.

The F30 3 Series uses one like this (3x Philips Luxeon Rebel LEDs from the Automotive Line)


The E92 E93 F06 F12 F13 use one like this (If I'm correct, a Philips Luxeon Altilon Module but it could also be a Osram Ostar from the headlamp line)

I was wondering what emitters they were using these days, thanks for the links. Those heatsinks appear to actually be total overkill, but better more than less in this case. Is it one unit per headlamp with the two rings made of a single acrylic piece, or is there a unit per ring?

I wonder if there's a dedicated driver for these LEDs or if they're getting direct feed power from one of the modules and it's all managed by the existing PWM circuits.

[Dark_Knight_335]

Originally Posted by rollinstone157

It's actually a pretty cool system. Imagine if you will, the shape of a drill battery but with LEDs mounted on the top. The whole module is metal which helps to wick the heat that the emitters generate away from them ASAP--heat is the enemy of LEDs. That whole module slides into the headlight, and the LEDs meet up precisely with acrylic tubes that bring the light up into the rings.

The F30 3 Series uses one like this (3x Philips Luxeon Rebel LEDs from the Automotive Line)


The E92 E93 F06 F12 F13 use one like this (If I'm correct, a Philips Luxeon Altilon Module but it could also be a Osram Ostar from the headlamp line)

Wow...pretty damn impressive!