LED lighting promises a tomorrow of futuristic designs and hopefully never having to replace a bulb ever again. Some LED setups are terrific, while others don’t seem much better than the halogen bulbs they’ve replaced when it comes to reliability. It seems Dodge, Hyundai, and Kia products have a reputation for failing in annoying ways, but it doesn’t have to be viewed as a bad thing!
Today, Lewin wrote about how Dodge Mexico is trading a Japanese-based car for a Chinese-based car and weirdly, it actually looks pretty cool. Autopian reader Timbales was distracted recounting something we’ve all seen:
I was behind a Hornet on my way into work today.
1/2 the light bar on the back hatch wasn’t working.
Canopysaurus should work at a PR firm:
That means half of it was working! Woohoo!
Earlier today, Jason wrote about fake sunroofs and other fake car accessories. It can be baffling to us why anyone would waste their presumably hard-earned money on a non-functional sunroof, but Cheap Bastard has an idea:
“Maybe I’m wrong! Are there those of you out there willing to defend the fake sunroof? If so, please, please explain in the comments here, because I’m dying to hear this argument.”
As I mentioned earlier I had a friend in HS who was the epitome of fake it till you make it. In the late 80’s put one of those phony phones in his car, antenna and all. He would pull up to a light next to a pretty girl and pretend to talk on it, look over and strike up a conversation. It worked. Later he told everyone he was going to a prestigious and expensive private university when in reality he was going to a mid tier state school. At parties he would – and I’m serious – don a pair of fake prescription eyeglasses to appear smarter. All that worked too! On beautiful, grown ass women! I asked a couple, WTF?! They knew it was stupid and they loved it. In retrospect I think it was his confidence and the effort he went through to impress them. He went to dental school and told everyone he graduated as an oral surgeon. No said his classmates, he was a regular ass dentist. His met his drop dead gorgeous wife by paying a local rag to print a glowing biography he himself wrote. She read it and thought I gotta get next to that! That worked too.
Now he’s married to that gorgeous wife, has two kids, two dental practices, a giant gorgeous house on a hill and a Lamborghini. He faked it and he made it.
THAT is why fake sunroof. Sometimes fake shit is good enough.
Finally, we stop at Lewin’s piece about how Australia converted to metric without everyone burning the country down. Some of you, like 10001010, just want to watch the world burn:
One article from October 1974 noted that “metric conversion in Australia was well past the point of no return,” barely exceeding an inch of column space in the Canberra Times.
You mean 2.5CM of column space, right?
Have a great evening, everyone!
it’s an honor just to be recognized
I dated a woman once that had fake boobs, fake tan, fake blonde hair, etc. She was twice divorced and lived with her parents.I wonder if she ever made it or if she’s still faking it.
That sounds like the missus of a certain disgraced NJ senator.
That probably described the missus and mistresses of a lot of senators. Disgraced or not
I think the tradeoff between style and repairability went to hell a long time ago in favour of style. Of course, having another revenue stream from parts sale doesn’t hurt manufacturers.
It’s a good point. I worry about the medium-term impact on aftermarket choices – so many parts are becoming OEM specific, it’s harder for firms to come up with a viable model to sell parts (and create competitive pressure) since they now won’t fit multiple vehicles.
Another COTD!
Woohoo!
Jerry: Kramer, he’s just a dentist.
Kramer: Yeah, and you’re an anti-dentite.
Jerry: I am not an anti-dentite!
Kramer: You’re a rabid anti-dentite! Oh, it starts with a few jokes and some slurs. “Hey, denty!” Next thing you know you’re saying they should have their own schools.
Jerry: They do have their own schools!
Kramer: Yeah!
I would rather replace a $1.79 light bulb every 6 months than buy an $800 LED fixture every 6 years.
Same thing is happening in residential lighting. Instead of replacing a $1 LED bulb in a fixture that has a standard E27 screw base socket, you get to replace the whole fixture. yay.
I think the days of $1.79 bulbs have passed. I just spent ~$20 for a fog light bulb last month. Normal-ass standard replacement incandescent bulb.
But that bulb was on the shelf at the local parts store. They did not have any half rear lights for 2023 Dodge Darts on the same shelf.
My point stands. Would you rather spend $20 on a foglight bulb, or $600 to replace a bespoke LED fog light from the OEM?
In 6 years you may be able to get an entire Hornet for $800.
You are right, though, repairing is better than replacing.
But none of the lights on that $800 Hornet will be working.
The happy medium seems like it should be a $3 (or whatever) LED light bulb. The problem with automotive LED bulbs, is they are all wildly different. Different locations for the actual light emitting diode on the assembly, different patterns…
I was promised LED bulbs would outlive me, I can’t count how many I’ve had to replace since switching, and these are GEs mind you, not Temu. Think my curly fluorescent bulbs did just as good.
I, on the other hand, have changed everything in my house to LEDs, except for the bathroom vanity. Excluding that vanity, I haven’t changed a lightbulb in about 10 years. I’m living the dream.
After Jack Welch destroyed GE, the consumer divisions of GE are basically Temu these days. All the consumer divisions were all sold off and are just coasting on the GE brand reputation.
Before the formation of the Phoebus cartel in 1925, incandescent bulbs lasted a long time. Some bulbs manufactured before 1925 are still burning today. GE, Phillips and a few other companies formed the cartel to lower the life expectancy of light bulbs and raise prices without fear of competition. It was a win win for the cartel, you bought light bulbs more often, and they made more profit every time you did.
I do the Hue lamps at home. They are expensive if you just look at them as a lamp, but they added dimming functionality to all my lighting, as well as control via an app or virtual assistant. I haven’t had any go bad yet.
I did just spend $200 on a set of LED lamps to replace the halogen ones in the Miata headlights. It was worth it to me to increase the light output to a safer level, and spending the money on a good set meant I kept the horizontal cutoff and beam pattern in the original projectors, while providing 30-50% more light on the road than the weak halogens.
I do worry about the LED assemblies on cars (case in point, the cost of something like a Cadillac XLR taillight). Perhaps some are well done though. I’ve not had a failure of the LED taillights on our 2008 STS. The other problem with the LED assemblies is replacement cost if you hit a deer or something. My parents had a headlight that was over $1000 on their truck when they hit a deer. On headlights though, a fixture designed around the LED’s is going to perform much better than a replaceable lamp.