When were the first LED lights on cars?

bobbyss

Very much a car novice here with two questions.

Almost every second car you see on the road these days have LED lights. Before this the only car I saw on the road with lights on during the day was the Volvo.

1 When were LEDs introduced in Ireland and on which car? I presume as a safety feature?

2 The auto break or auto stop (or whatever it is called) is a new feature in some new cars and it just turns off the engine when you are stalled at traffic lights and so on. But at these stops you could have A/C on high and radio or heat or whatever and they remain on when the engine is off.

When the engine is off at such stops (and very regularly if you are doing a lot of driving) would all these functions -including the use of LEds themselves drain the battery?

9935452

OldMrBrennan83 wrote: »

bobbyss wrote: »

Very much a car novice here with two questions.

Almost every second car you see on the road these days have LED lights. Before this the only car I saw on the road with lights on during the day was the Volvo.

1 When were LEDs introduced in Ireland and on which car? I presume as a safety feature?

2 The auto break or auto stop (or whatever it is called) is a new feature in some new cars and it just turns off the engine when you are stalled at traffic lights and so on. But at these stops you could have A/C on high and radio or heat or whatever and they remain on when the engine is off.

When the engine is off at such stops (and very regularly if you are doing a lot of driving) would all these functions -including the use of LEds themselves drain the battery?

1. I think Audi started it in the mid 2000's.
2. Stop-Start. They'd need to be left on for hours to run down the battery.

And a different type of battery in a stop start car.
Plus if the battery was running low the car wouldnt use the stop start function

Silent Running

The stop-start won't operate if the battery isn't getting enough charge. If you sit for a long enough time it will restart the engine.

colm_mcm

I think the first car to have LED headlights (as opposed to DRLs) was the Lexus LS in 2007. The Audi R8 got them around the same time though and had the high beams in LED too. I think the 7 series was the first with LED DRLs.

swarlb

bobbyss wrote: »

Very much a car novice here with two questions.

Almost every second car you see on the road these days have LED lights. Before this the only car I saw on the road with lights on during the day was the Volvo.

1 When were LEDs introduced in Ireland and on which car? I presume as a safety feature?

2 The auto break or auto stop (or whatever it is called) is a new feature in some new cars and it just turns off the engine when you are stalled at traffic lights and so on. But at these stops you could have A/C on high and radio or heat or whatever and they remain on when the engine is off.

When the engine is off at such stops (and very regularly if you are doing a lot of driving) would all these functions -including the use of LEds themselves drain the battery?

Stop/Start is not a new feature. It was in a Fiat Regata I had in the mid 80's.

Truckermal

swarlb wrote: »

Stop/Start is not a new feature. I first saw it in cars in the early 80's.

Yep Fiat Punto had that as standard only it was stop/stop sometimes.

JoeA3

Front LED DRL's only started becoming mainstream about 10 years ago and generally only on higher spec'd cars also equipped with xenon headlamps... e.g. remember the last generation Audi A4 with the "fairy light" DRL's. Lower spec'd cars tended to use cheap halogen yellowy bulbs for the DRL. Ugly. These days, I'd say the vast majority have LED DRL's and some such as Audi really make it a signature of the design..

Full LED main headlights are much less commonplace, but seem to have replaced xenons.

Eric Cartman

colm_mcm wrote: »

I think the first car to have LED headlights (as opposed to DRLs) was the Lexus LS in 2007. The Audi R8 got them around the same time though and had the high beams in LED too. I think the 7 series was the first with LED DRLs.

Audi R8 was the firs car in 09 to have all LED lights for everything.

Wishbone Ash

bobbyss wrote: »

But at these stops you could have A/C on high and radio or heat or whatever and they remain on when the engine is off. ..

As has been said, the auto start doesn't kick in when the engine needs to be running - e.g. when the engine is cold, it doesn't switch off at the lights.

pablo128

LEDs use far less electricity than normal bulbs, so they would be a plus to have in a car equipped with stop start.

w211

pablo128 wrote: »

LEDs use far less electricity than normal bulbs, so they would be a plus to have in a car equipped with stop start.

My led lights consumes 15W (each) more power than HID. Only good side is that, the temperature are way lower.

zilog_jones

bobbyss wrote: »

...But at these stops you could have A/C on high and radio or heat or whatever and they remain on when the engine is off.

Traditionally, the aircon compressor is belt-driven, so in that configuration the engine won't stop if that's running. Newer cars may have an electric compressor.

I think you're mainly talking about daytime running lights which may or may not be LED. Any other lights on a car can also be LED.

Duke O Smiley

swarlb wrote: »

Stop/Start is not a new feature. It was in a Fiat Regata I had in the mid 80's.

Yeah, some Audi and Volkswagens of the 80s had it too