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I'm about to replace a second right rear tail light assembly on my wife's V90 in a little over a year. I bought an aftermarket one to save some money and the plastic inner housing that holds the bulb holders has melted.
Well, I don't want to really have to afford an OEM, especially since I'm seeing all these LED replacements being advertized now. But when I go to look at the particulars for 1157 replacements, almost none of them list "brake" as being one of the lighting situations they'll replace. Keeping in mind here that the 1157 is a dual-element bulb and one of the elements is much brighter than the other, the one for the brake light.
I did a search here and found only a few listings and they were short on specifics. So I'm hoping this thread might be able to nail things down somewhat.
Now, I understand that LEDs tend to be more directional, which is why many of the bulbs you see have the diodes on the sides of the "bulb" as well as the front. I have noticed some are not made this way -- they're made with the LEDs pointed to the front only, and I've read reviews that this design can't be seen from the side, so the right design is important.
With a few LED 1157s, I've followed their listings over to Amazon and read the reviews. Some owners had no complaints, others complained they weren't bright enough. A few bulbs apparently weren't built to the right tolerances and fit very loosely in their sockets. ??? How can some bone-head mistake like this even make it to market? Mostly what concerns me is buying an 1157 that isn't bright enough. Oh, and I plan to replace both sides, to maintain a balanced circuit, should it matter.
I checked at my local AutoZone and they want $20 each for their 1157 replacements. I see ones that look the same on eBay ranging in price from $4 to maybe $9 or $10 each. At this point, I'm just so confused. I want to go with LEDs because even OEM tail light assemblies will fail from the heat eventually. But I just don't know which to go with. So I figured I'd ask here. I'm thinking some of you are bound to have found 1157 LEDs that work well and that aren't too expensive. So, fill us in. What have you found?
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