Switching to LED headlights to save battery

There may be any number of good reasons to switch to LED, but "saving battery" or "saving fuel" isn't one of them.

 

switch to LEDs in your house instead, you'll save a lot more money. they're like $8 a bulb but they save money in the long term because a) more efficient and b) there's no filament that gets destroyed with each power cycle. you know how the light bulbs in your closet go out a ton more frequently than any other bulb? yeah, that's a thing of the past now

i know this isn't the answer you were looking for, but i've never met anyone who "upgraded" their headlights and was actually happy with it for the amount of $ spent.

 

You can leave the battery out of the equation, and go direct from the engine-MG1 combination to figure the fuel savings. The same thing applies to a regular nonhybrid without any traction battery.

Anything that reduces electrical load will save some fuel. But like other respondents, I'm not seeing much fuel savings in this, compared to the cost.

What fraction of your driving time involves headlights being turned on? If you use headlights in daytime for safety, then LED DRLs will save a lot more electrical load for a lower installation cost.

 

There are no DRLs in the 2013 v.

 

1) In the U.S., only Liftbacks of that era, not the 'v' or 'c', had DRLs. Fortunately, they were separate LED units, not reduced power high beams. You might be able to retrofit these to a Five, or get some aftermarket types. Control would be TBD, I don't know whether or not a 'v' can run them automatically.

2) On the regular headlights, I just don't know. For separate aftermarket DRLs, get units that are originally LED, don't use an LED conversion bulb replacement in an originally halogen unit.

 

Light bulbs
A: H11 halogen bulbs low beam 55 watts each
B: HB3 halogen bulbs high beam 60 watts each

I cannot find the wattage of the OEM Prius v LED headlights, but aftermarket low beam LED bulbs to fit in the Halogen sockets seem to be 40 watts each, not much of a savings. (in my home "60 watt" LED replacements I use are only 10.5 watts, a much more substantial savings amazon.com/Philips-433227-Equivalent-SlimStyle-Dimmable/dp/B00I134ORI)

HID bulbs for Halogen sockets tend to be 35 watts, which saves more energy. (and has the same legal issues as LED bulbs)

I do not advise any Prius owner to run any electrical load on the battery, stay in Ready

 

I'm one.

Less than $150 for Corolla LED projectors and clear lenses from The Retrofit Source, installed in the stock housing. Couldn't be happier with the light output, and the LED chips are 11W per side vs. 55W halogen.

 

88 watts = 0.12 Horsepower

 

are they DOT compliant?

by the way, where can I read more about these mods you listed in your sig:
Lawn edging air dam and side skirts
ABS lower and upper grill blocks

thanks

 

I like math. Here is the given:

15000 miles per year driven
40 mph average speed
2 headlights
55 watts each
290 Wh to travel 1 mile according to EPA on a PiP
50 mpg fuel economy of a Prius
$2.50 for a gallon of gas

Let's assume a Prius driver never turns off their headlights and drives for a year or 15000 miles. How much money did the person waste?

15000 miles per year / 40 miles per hour x 2 headlights x 55 W each headlight / 290 Wh / 50 mpg x $2.50 cost per gallon gasoline = $7.11 per year.

I'm ignoring the cost of converting gasoline to electricity because I don't know what it is. So the number is $7 give or take.

If I did my math correctly, we're talking an absurdly low cost to use the headlights. The savings won't be able to make up the cost of the LED bulb "upgrade."

 

mmmodem,

Here's my calculation:

Let's assume after headlight replacement that you drive the car 100,000 miles with the lights on 1/3 of the time before selling the car.

100,000 miles /40 miles per hour average/ 3 = 833 hours of lights on time

Let's say you replace the headlights and other running lights with LEDs for a savings of 100W.

833 hours * 100W = 83,300 watt hours of electricity used

1 watt hour = 3.41 BTUs,

83,300 * 3.41 = 284,053 BTUs used

However, keep in mind that in the prius the energy in gasoline must first be converted to mechanical motion (~30% efficiency average, though peak is close to 40%) and then to ~240V electrical (~80% efficiency) and then to 12V electrical (~85% efficiency). These numbers may even be slightly worse due to charge/discharging loss of hybrid and 12V battery.

So to generate 284,053 BTUs for the lights, 284,053 BTU / .3 / .8 /. 85 = ~1,392,417 BTUs of gasoline must be burnt

There are ~115,000 BTUs (varies with winter/summer blend) in a gallon of gasoline.

1,392,417 / 115,000 = 12.1 gallons of gasoline

12.1 gallons * $2.50/gal = $30.27

So if you use your lights approximately 1/3 of the time, over 100k miles, a 100W savings in power used would save you around $30. However if you're a European paying $5/gallon for gas and required to have lights on 100% of the time, you'd save $180 over 100k miles. It makes sense for European drivers to put in a kit similar to Vman in the right circumstances.