Electrical loads
 

I've seen a few people hint at this, but nothing concreat said, so maybe tomarow I'll take the multi meter out and run some tests.
electrical loads seem like they should be a very real load on the gas engine, and those loads should be minumalized and eleminated when possible, 1 watts = 0.00134102209 hp, that might not seem like alot, but turning your cars mecanical energy in to electricity is said to be around 60% efficent.
I've noticed that my vent fan on high makes my idle drop almost as much as my headlights being turned on.
my head lights are 55/60 watts each, 1157 bulbs that are used for running lights, and brake light combinations are 5/25 watt for low/high, normal running lights are 5 watts each, two lisence plate lights at 8 watts each, handfuls of small 1.5 watt indicator and dash lights hide all over the place.
I've been impressed with my LED lights, altho with this car the back up lights, and two brake lights are all that easly fit, and I've been running my fan on the lowest setting, insted of #2 or #3, leaving the sun roof open while parked in the summer helps alot for keeping it cool of course, and an ice scraper insted of fixing the rear defrost seems to work prety well.
but are there any other tips for reducing electrical loads?

I was going to experiment
 

I was going to experiment with this but never got around to it. DieMaster replaced all of his lights (except for the headlights) with LEDs. It ended up costing him around $100 for the whole car (taillights, interior lights, etc.)

I am fairly certain it cuts your electrical load in half, but that's just based on something I read once.

less then half, my brightest
 

less then half, my brightest LED 1157 bulb replacment draw less then one watt at full out put, so that is 1/25th, I'll try to remember to pull a few out and dubble check with the amp meter and a power supply, but I think my figures were that if my battery went dead in 12 hours from leaving my dome light on with a 25 watt bulb, it would over a month with LED's in the dome light.
my LED bulb replacment that screws in to a normal household light socket draws less then 2 watts (1 watt LED and a little extra for voltage regulator) and it's light out put is suposed to be simaler to a 30 watt bulb.

I wish I had some electrical
 

I wish I had some electrical knowledge because I knew from a couple of years back if you switch to LEDs you will save power.

I won't do this on my car but my next car I'll make sure everything is LED except the headlights.

Re: I wish I had some electrical
 

I'm not sure what electrical knowledge you really need for this. They make LED replacements for this exact application. It's just like replacing a light normally.

I agree, BUT
 

I agree Matt, but I'm hoping that new blinker LEDs pull the same amount of Voltage, or the signal relay will think a bulb is out and blink quickly. I haven't looked into this for a while, tho...

RH77

blinker blink blink
 

The blinker relies on heating a bi-metal snap spring heated by the current flowing through it to the light bulbs to make it bend and break the connection - then cool and make the connection and then heat etc. making the bulbs blink - the reduced current of LED bulbs would not heat it enough for them to stay off very long if at all and the bulb (led) would just stay on all the time. A heavy duty blinker uses a different blinking process - digital timer I think and a relay or solid state switch / power transistor to blink the lights and is not sensitive to load - thus they should work with the LED lamps at a light load. There may also be LED Blinker modules available too.

Also since the LED lights up in about 0.00001 seconds compared to a incandecent bulb that takes 0.1 seconds or so then you have a quicker RED brake light so you save about 8.8 feet reaction time at 60mph. Enough to save your rear bumper.

Be careful with the red LED for a brake light because the red lens in the tail light may be a slightly different red frequency and filter out the red LED color - you may need a clear lense or a white LED.

Re: blinker blink blink
 

It's my understanding that most people use clear LED's for this very reason.

Re: I wish I had some electrical
 

Do you have a link where I can buy some???

Re: blinker blink blink
 

I was fooling with it many hours one weekend trying to get it to work. But for the front, since the lens was clear, I had yellow LEDs viewable at 270-degrees, and I customized the incandescents in the rear with stock lenses (not much for that "Altezza", bolt-on look). Since the incandescent bulb reflects and refracts in near 360-degrees, it's tough to duplicate that look. I'd probably try to find something like that for the brakes and see how they work, and work-out a timed blinker system. Really it's for safety and looks both. If at all, the high-mount stop light could be the best for safety, like the Taurus and other models: LEDs for the high-mount brake light which lights up before the traditional brakes. As far as where you buy them, it's just a shop-around kinda thing. I'm sure it's more popular than 4 years ago when I had them.

RH77

the very reason why i never
 

the very reason why i never use my fan. I even set the themoerstat to "COLD" i notice the water temp rises faster when monitering it with the scangauge.

man i wish i wasent working
 

man i wish i wasent working so i could read thease faster :P

yes as matt said, i replaced all the lights (even the little ones in the buttons) to leds. i like the "white" light they put out. mor of a blueish-white. evrey bulb in the car except for the headlights are leds. and i'll tell ya i gained bout 2 mpg. total was $135. start with the brake, turn signals, and backuplights to start out with as thease take the most current to run. look here

https://www.superbrightleds.com/1157.htm

heres what they say about converting:

White LEDs behind color lenses
 

So, the site recommended not to use clear LEDs behind red lenses (but use red instead). That doesn't make much sense because the original bulb is clear. What did you use, DieMaster?

RH77

saw the website, very
 

saw the website, very interesting!!

Might have to go this route. The funny thing is at first my headlights are bright but after some driving they get very dim. I think If I change everything to LED they will stay bright and I might still gain 1mpg.

Re: White LEDs behind color lenses
 

regulare bulbs are white-ish, and then the light is filtered thru a colord lens, white LED's produce what is pretty close to a white/blue (very clean looking white light) red LED's are not simply a white LED with a red filter, but the silicon chip that produces the light in an LED produces red light, or whatever color light it is without a filter.
I have a handful of each LED bulb replacement for my old car (new car is newer style of base on the bulbs for alot of the lights) and I tried a white LED in one side, and red in the other, and the red was brighter for the same manufacure of bulb replacements, also red LED's are much cheaper to produce, so I see no reson to use a more exspensive white LED behind a red lense.

Re: White LEDs behind color lenses
 

The more I think about this the more sense it makes.

A red filter will filter everything EXCEPT for red, which means if your light is red to begin with, you have nothing to worry about.

I noticed these bulbs are on
 

I noticed these bulbs are on sale at canadian tire
<A HREF="https://www.canadiantire.ca/assortments/product_detail.jsp?PRODUCT%3C%3Eprd_id=84552444328 5172&FOLDER%3C%3EbrowsePath=2534374303517494&FOLDE R%3C%3EbrowsePath=2534374303517495&FOLDER%3C%3Ebro wsePath=1408474396670062&FOLDER%3C%3Efolder_id=140 8474396670062&ASSORTMENT%3C%3East_id=1408474396670 271&bmUID=1143910252341">LED bulb</A>
Ive thought about getting some but I dont think my lights are on enough for me to notice a gain. Maybe i'll just do brake lights for now and see if i notice a difference.

I did some research and LED
 

I did some research and LED turn signals are a no no on a nissan. Even with the flasher unit. I already had a problem with my turn signals this year I don't want to mess it up. I think I'll just buy the 2 red brake lights and 2 white license lights.

That should save me some power.

I have some good news and
 

I have some good news and some bad news

bad news: turn signals won't work even with flasher unit, instrument cluster is full of bulbs, 3rd brake light hard to get to.

good news: my AC controls are only lighted up by 2 LED's, I can replace the 2 brake lights and 2 license plate lights with LED's.


And I just saved a bunch of money on my car insurance by switching to geico, just kidding, LOL

Re: I have some good news and
 

lol i love those adds

why are led's no in tursignals? mine work just fine. u gota get the led flasher or get a heavy duty flasher so the flasher dosent buzz from the low current. i even hooked up a pot on my flasher so not only do i have leds, i got variable flash rate too :D lol i'm such a geek... lol

BTW if your car has the brake light burnd out idiot light just take the bulb out of the cluster :P it sounds stupid but u can allways use the crome bumper if the semi behind u to see of the lights are working :D

The maxima guys bought
 

The maxima guys bought flashers but for some of them it didn't work. I want to see how the license plate and brake lights work first since they waste the most electricity.

If the LED's are bright enough then I'll get on the 3rd brake light and all the turn signals. Beyond that I don't want to do anything because I like the way my instrument cluster looks. I don't use any other bulbs besides that.

Re: I have some good news and
 

LED's don't work in some cars as turn signals because they use less energy, a resistor, or pot is just acting as a dump load, wasting that energy that the LED's are not useing, the two commen style of flashers tell you that a bulb is burnt out by flashing at a differnt speed when the electrical use of the bulbs changes, so by adding a resistor, or pot in there is sort of like replacing all the light switchs in your house with metal cans over the light bulbs to turn lights on and off, a set of turn signal bulbs use around 50 watts for the pair, led's use less then 1 watt for the pair, adding a resistor that draws 50 watts just so your flasher works properly doesn't make sense!

Re: I have some good news and
 

EXACTLY!!!!!!!!!!!

Anyway I ordered everything I need. I ordered another set of license plate lights and a 3rd brake light. And that's it.

Re: I have some good news and
 

C-888: BTW, did you order from the Maxima website? And if so, what's the address? I tried LEDs a while back for blinkers and it freaked out the system. I definitely need the HD/LED relay. I think I'll start with blinkers to see how well they work -- I love the look.

Also, I liked your photo test -- good info -- much appreciated.

RH77

Yep yep, jared and I right
 

Yep yep, jared and I right now are discussing buying an *** load of LEDs, hopefully we'll DIY it!

Same here...
 

Going to try to assess how well they work, and if we get get results, I'll be ordering a schload as well.

RH77

my last roommate redid his
 

my last roommate redid his entire crx dash with the high candella superbright leds from japan or china on ebay
he used the 3mm bulbs...it was like $11 shipped for 100 pieces
and i must say it looked great in person...
it took some testing to figure out how to light them all at the same time without reinstalling the dash...as they were directional (diode)...and had to put in one way...
i wish my dash was brighter...

https://users.adelphia.net/~digitalcongo/bluedash4.jpg

https://users.adelphia.net/~digitalcongo/bluedash6.jpg

Re: I have some good news and
 

I ordered from the website that Diemaster recommended.
Which is superbrightleds.com

The maxima guys order from https://www.superlumination.com/

The problem where the maxima guys order is they are too fricking bright and their prices are more expensive.

The superbrightled's website is perfect but don't order the standard stuff. If you're going to be ordering from superbrightleds.com make sure the brake lights are at least 20 LED's in a bulb. 12 is okay but it could be better. Also for the license plate I ordered 1 led per bulb and it's too dim as you can see. Also blue which can get me pulled over. Make sure you order at least 4 LED's in a bulb for the right brightness.

I found that there is no point to do my turn signals because without resistors it just won't work. If I use resistors then what's the point of using LED's since it will waste the same power.

Sorry I didn't respond sooner, I thought this thread was dead.

LEDs and power
 

FWIW: I just joined this board, but (after my dad clued me into that store) have been using superbrightleds.com stuff for a few months now (with my Honda CRX, with my wife's Honda Civic, and even use a few of their 110v units in the house). So I have a little (consumer) experience with their stuff.

I've tried the 12 and 24 led modules, and they do work, but even the 24 LED units (much less the 12 LED units) are NOT as bright as the (much higher power usage) 1156/1157/etc bulbs they replace. And for small wedge bulbs, their 5 bulb "wide angle" units are IMHO very nice for replacing 168 or 194 bulbs (I like the 5 LED WLED units, as their design makes them excellent at throwing light in a very wide angle, thereby filling up most car lenses). But IMHO their "3 watt Luxeon" bulbs are the cream of the crop (if they happen to make a Luxeon bulb in the size/shape you need). Yes, they are $20/each, BUT they are reasonably wide angle (130 degrees), are rated for 50k hours (i.e. years of service even driving 24/7), appear to be solidly constructed, and they are the brightest bulbs they sell (my CRX's tail lights and turn signals, both converted to their Luxeon bulbs, look noticeably BRIGHTER than the stock 1156/1157 incandescent bulbs they were replacing, and yet use a small fraction of the power, and turn on/off faster)! And I also got more "pure looking" color (having amber/red LEDs behind the lenses), than I got with the stock (white incandescent) bulbs being behind those lenses. All around, I'm not only saving power in the car, but IMHO the lighting is more safe/useful as well!

BTW: I too am working on lower electrical loads in my car (and until I saw this forum thread, I thought I was one of the few). The simple idea I had, was that ALL electrical generators (that convert mechanical energy to electrical energy) need to put more drag on their mechanical power source, as you increase the electrical load (i.e. the more electricity you use, the more mechanical work is required to keep the generator running). And a car alternator is just one example of such a generator, so it HAS TO follow the same physical principals. So (despite what many people think) electricity in a car isn't "free" (it's paid for, in the form of increased engine drag), even if/when your alternator has more than enough capacity for that electrical load. And in fact, I am able to actually hear/feel the extra engine work difference between high and low electrical usage, so the theory is sound!

I haven't really done the tests needed to quantify how much of a difference it makes in FE (although the "cleaner" light color, longer lasting "bulbs", and faster on/off activation, are all worth while IMHO, even if there wasn't also a FE boost). But FWIW I'm pretty sure it is one of the contributing factors in me recently getting 47mpg out of my 1991 Honda CRX (EPA 33 combined). How much of a factor it was in the mix I can't say (for example, I personally think synthetic oil made a bigger difference), but it is one of the things I was doing to help FE.

BTW: While all incandescent bulbs are inefficient (from the standpoint of lumens per watt), they get worse the smaller your light output per bulb (whereas LEDs are actually the opposite, being slightly more efficient at lower light/usage conditions). So while taillights are obvious for swap out, don't overlook the small bulbs in your car: running lights, license plate lights, high break lights, or even dash indicators (if it's easy to get into your dash to replace the lights). Remember, even very dim incandescent bulbs (for example, dash indicator lights) are usually somewhere between 2 and 5 watts each (whereas the LED equivalent is a small fraction of a watt). This might not sound like much, until you add up how many small lights many cars have on them, and realize just how many watts you can save by swapping in LEDs for many "misc" (small) bulbs.

NOTE: I agree with the recommendation (on the SuperBrightLed's web site), to (when possible) use the same color LED as the lens you are behind (even if/when the bulb you were replacing was white). The reason for this, is that you get a lot more effective light output this way. The reason is, a color filter (which is what a car lens is), works by throwing away light that doesn't match the color you need (and only letting the light color you want through). In the case of red (and to a lessor degree with amber), this is often 70% or more of the light being thrown away (to turn a white light source into a colored light)! But, when you put a true colored light source behind a lens of the same color (i.e. red LEDs behind a red lens, amber behind amber, etc), virtually all the light goes through the lens (saving the normal "wasted" light). The main benefit of this, is that you can get roughly 3x the effective brightness "for free" (using no more LEDs, nor any more electrical power), by simply avoiding the "wasted light" (by matching the LED color to the lens color)!

BTW: You do need to watch their warnings about "turn signals" and flashers. I did indeed have to swap out my stock flasher (with an electronic flasher unit), before replacing my turn signals with LEDs (on my CRX). However, I was easily able to swap the break/tail/running lights with LEDs before the flasher swap. And I also found swapping the cabin and trunk lights with LEDs resulted in more cabin/trunk light (while being much lower power drain, should I ever have a need to leave those lights on for a long time). And just for good measure, I made my cabin light RED (instead of the normal white), so that a passenger can read maps/etc at night without killing my "night vision" (red light doesn't kill your night vision the way white light does).

And finally, after poking around on the net, (while it is easy to swap many bulbs with LED units) I don't really see any way to significantly decrease headlight wattage (but you could of course leave the headlights off, except when they are needed for legality and/or safety). You can get slightly more efficient halogen bulbs, but that bonus will be maybe 20% more efficient (and even then, they probably don't make them lower wattage, but rather the same watts with slightly more light output). You can also convert to HID ("High Intensity Discharge", i.e. fancy arc-lamps), but (after market) HID conversions cost several hundred dollars, and appear to be illegal for street use in the USA (sort of defeating the purpose IMHO). And I also decided that swapping out the "backup lights" was a bad idea (even though, unlike the headlight situation, you can get white 1156 LED "bulbs"), as you don't get any lens bonus with white light (meaning that even through white Luxeon 1156 "bulbs" use much less power than the 1156 incandescent bulbs, the incandescent still give you a little more "useful light" in this situation). And I personally want (for safety purposes) as much backup light as I can get (especially at night). And really, my percentage time backing up vs driving is pretty low (and it's only during backup when swapping the backup lights with LEDs would save any power)...

Edit Reason: Minor fix to my car's EPA estimate.

I did an electrical load test once, and posted it at https://www.gassavers.org/showpost.ph...20&postcount=7

This was alternator current times voltage, so it should be related to engine load. Voltage made a big difference in load. You can tell when it's at the lower voltage, but it's not too annoying.

For me the biggest load change other than voltage would be running lights. I often use lights even when I don't need them so my car is more obvious. I think a switchable daytime running light system would help.

Wow! I didn't realize just how much power some cars use with fan blowers (especially on "high" setting). I wonder how common those fan motor numbers are with other cars? And if many fan motors have numbers that bad (which IMHO would just be pathetic, given how common energy efficient DC motors are these days), I wonder how hard it would be to swap in a much more energy efficient DC motor for the fan?

Hmmm... If power usage is noticeably higher when the alternator is on, that would be the one argument I could see for having a circuit/switch to cycle between alternator on and off.

Because if (and only if) the charging power losses are less than the losses due to the higher alternator voltage, you would actually be gaining a little (overall) by completely "cutting out the alternator" until your battery is partially discharged, and only then turning on the alternator just long enough to charge up the battery (then repeating the cycle). Heck, you could probably tie this to a battery charge detection circuit, so it happens automatically. And naturally, this would probably work better with a quality "deep cycle" battery, than with a normal car battery...

Of course, the mod that someone else mentioned, where they didn't even use an alternator, is the extreme example of this idea (since 0% alternator load, which is what a disconnected alternator gives you, is the theoretical "upper bound" of what lowering the car's electrical usage, but leaving the alternator connected, could buy us in increased FE).

And, we could also possibly gain something (even if the alternator remains connected), by hooking up solar cells (carefully placed in the car, so that sunlight can reach them through the windows) to the electrical system (to both "charge" things slowly when the car is off, and also to slightly lower the load on the alternator). Of course, finding a useful place to mount the solar cells might be a problem, and the cells do add a little weight (which can work against you)...

In my CRX, it looks like the "running lights" is what you get if/when I click the first switch position on my headlight switch (instead of the normal situation of switching to the 2nd position, to fully engage the headlights/taillights/etc). Even if your car isn't wired up this way, I bet it would be pretty simple to tap into that light switch position, and wire it up as just whatever you want for daytime "running lights". That would give you an easy/clean way to turn on your "running lights" without even putting an extra switch into the car. :D

Some car bulb power numbers.
 

A while ago, I was looking for power usage of various car bulbs (so as to get an idea as to how much power could be saved from going to LEDs). It was actually harder than I would have thought to get this info on stock car bulbs. So FWIW here are some of the links I found in my search:

1) Apparently, many pinball machines use standard car bulbs. With that in mind, this pinball resource actually has a lot of useful power info on it:
https://www.flippers.com/lights.html

2) Here's a table listing a few of the more common "running lights" in a car (or in the case of the website it is on, a van):
https://cybrvanr.tripod.com/bulbspec.htm

3) Here's a PDF file, made by a magazine/company dealing with renewable energy for homes. As it turns out, some solar/wind home power systems use car bulbs for lighting. With that in mind, this PDF has some useful info:
https://www.homepower.com/files/hp1-31.pdf

NOTE: While the largest gain per bulb are gotten by swapping out the highest power/light bulbs (such as the break/tail lights), the highest percentage gain is gotten by swapping out the smallest bulbs for LEDs. This is because the efficiency (lumens per watt) really tanks in very small incandescent bulbs, whereas LEDs don't have that problem. So swapping several small incandescent for LEDs, can easily gain you more power than just swapping a few larger bulbs..