4th Gen LED headlight durability

Hard to know - till there is some data out there. They're reputedly better in testing than HID and halogen bulbs, and run far cooler. I read somewhere that they'd be surprised if they didn't last the life of the car - but how long is the life of a car.

One local report said:
Halogen - a claimed working life of between 500 and 1000 hours;
HID - a claimed working life of around 2000 hours;
LED - a claimed working life of around 15,000 hours

 

On the Trim Two the LEDs are used for DRL, low and high beams. Essentially they are on whenever the car is on.

 

Except when you turn them off, but we don't have the off position on our selector.

 

My understanding is that you will probably need to replace the car before the LED headlights need changing. They last a very long time. Many websites put an estimate of 50,000 hours.

 

Yes, even 15,000 hours equates to 500-600,000km. I don't anticipate any car lasting 50,000 hrs driving - and if it does, I don't think I'd deny it a new LED Bulb.

The real issue is that someone posted last year that the whole unit costs, if I remember right, about $1500 EACH. I remember when multi-airbags started coming into cars, a relatively minor front end collision not only cost a radiator, pair of headlights, A/C condensor etc etc - but also 2 or 4 airbags - in one case I knew about, an extra $5000, writing the car off.

 

More likely is damage to the frontal glass of the unit.

 

You bring up a good point. Not much worries with the service life of the LED bulb... they will outlive us.

In your case, with frequent use, I would have more concern with all that cycling on & off -- the switching and circuitry involved in the auto high-beam feature. Let's hope Toyota didn't use a cheap $2 switch.

 

Another good question... for the Dealer. My guess, it's not covered. LED light bulbs I bought for the house are supposed to last 15 years with regular daily use. My DRL's are always on, so I too am curious about their life-span.

 

Relax - I'd suspect they are a "consumable", but with expected 15-50,000hr life, I'd be surprised if it is ever a worry for us - unless we're Millennials who intend to keep it till it's vintage.

 

I agree, I'm fairly certain they will outlast me! If I drive 3 hours per day, every day of the year, that comes to only 1,095 hours per year. Yep, no worries. Unless of course they used a cheaper version of an LED bulb. If I get 10 years out of this car, with no major problems, I'm happy. I hope it's my LAST car.

 

I'm only 64 - I can't see this as my last car.

But then, I got into the "habit" of replacing them every 3 or 4 years, and enjoying the lack of worrying about an older car - some I've had were up to 25yrs old - meaning greasy hands every Saturday.

That was when I had children in University, and had an old clunker myself, and provided one for my daughter as well, and the other 2 children had bought older cars themselves - for Dad to maintain. I must say, I learned a lot about cars that way - including simple panel repairs, welding & spray painting!!

 

It would probably be cheaper to fix the headlight than replace the whole thing. It's time for Toyota technicians to read up on how to fix these fancy LEDs. When my LEDs die and they're unfixable, I might as well replace the car.

 

That would be nice, Alan.Especially the lack of worrying.

I've only owned a few vehicles. I always buy them, no lease, and try and keep them for 10 years. Been very fortunate, and never really needed any major repairs. Just did routine maintenance. I hope this Prius does as well. They seem to have a very good history.

 

Wow - I think my tally is about 20 including a couple my children had but I had to keep running.

 

The high beam mechanism better last too since it is part of the headlamp assembly.

 

I can guarantee you that Toyota has done reliability studies on every system in the car. That said, all reliability curves resemble bell curves. Some people are going to have the bad luck to have -2 standard deviation reliability and some are going to have the good luck to have +2 SD. Most of us are going to be in the -1 to +1 group.