LED headlights and snow

Took a long drive in the Tundra in a reasonably heavy snow storm. Quickly found out that the headlights do not produce enough heat to melt themselves clean. Luckily the DD fogs I have stayed clear and we were going slow enough that they were ok. But I had to stop and clear the lenses on the headlights a few times.

I am sure I am not the only one with this issue. Anyone have ideas or solutions?

 

I went for a drive last week during our first big snowfall of the year.

Was -15*C and drove about 60mi ranging from 35-60mph. Didn’t have to stop and clear the lenses. Maybe it was a lot colder out where you are?

 

Nope, but that may be part of the problem. It was just under freezing, and pretty wet heavy snow.

 

I wax my morimoto lenses with plastic wax. Seems to keep snow/ice from sticking to em

 

I've seen people have this issue running LED's as they don't have enough heat to melt snow / ice vs. halogen. The wax might help for what you need. I'll need to keep that in mind as well.

Do you do this just for snow / ice build up? or just normal element protection?

 

In heavy snowstorms I'm more worried about my windshield wipers icing over. Happened in my 4R all the damn time - so hopefully it's better in the Tundra.

 

it gets to -40 where i live for about 3 weeks a year. i can't say i've ever done more than brush the snow off. given enough time they'll melt whether it was halogen bulbs or the LED's i currently run.

 

Rain X wipes on the lights and WD 40 on the wiper blades.

 

this isn't a vehicle specific problem so chances are you'll experience it again. if you know the snow is on its way just lift them up and they'll be mint!

 

I will try that, easy to try anyway. I had probably 3/4" of snow packed on the entire front end.

Yes it SUCKS! I kept the defrost on and that seemed to help. IDK why Toyota wont adopt the heat strips under the wipers like some other brands.

This was while driving. Yes if parked, its easy to just brush off. LED did not melt it off at all.

EDIT: the reflector LED design is the worst at heating the lens.

 

I had the same problem last winter. I had to pull over multiple times to clean off the snow. I will try the rain x wipes or wax liked mentioned above.

 

I wax my headlights constantly. Helps with bugs splatter in summer as well. I also use rain ex or wax on windows and mirrors as well. Just wipe it off really good especially the wiper blade. Rain ex is really just a real thin wax coating. I use Maguires wax as you dry on headlights, mirrors and windows

 

Very interesting that this is an issue with oem headlights. Truck-lite makes nice led replacements for round headlights (I was researching for my FJ60). I’ve seen them in garbage trucks too. Anyways it caught my eye that they have a heated model for this very reason. Kind of surprising Toyota doesn’t have that as an option.

 

Yes I have seen the heated truck lites.

I was really hoping these would be ok, but the reflector design kills any and all heat to the lens.

 

I have headlight washers on my Sequoia. I suppose that can help melt the snow a little. Never used it though.

 

No, no - I mean while driving. On long hauls in cold snowstorms, they start to ice because they're regularly immersed in freezing water/snow. After 30-60 minutes the ice has to be broken up or has to sit down where the defroaster warms up em - which is pretty dangerous.

 

Right. You just made me remember when I was in snow storm in Colorado in April. Yes, headlights were covered by snow. I was not aware it is due to LED bulb until now. Thank you.

 

Mine was easily 3x that thick...but also the newer style headlights

 

ahhh yea fair enough. if the snow is damp and the air temp is cool enough i could see it collecting and causing an issue.

 

I have factory housings and Amazon LED bulbs. It snows 8 months of the year here and is generally -30 and snowing.

Never had an issue.

 

These are OE LED lights.

 

You can get washer fluid with a de-icer in it. I bet it would work.

 

My GS350 has LED headlights and headlight washers. The headlight washers do a great job of clearing the snow as they have quite a bit of pressure.

My Tacoma had the LED headlights and I drove it in the snow but never had an issue with build up on the headlights, though definitely on the front emblem, knocking out PCS and such. I haven't had a chance to get the Tundra out in the snow but hope to this winter.

 

Yup, I try to remember to switch to a winter blend that’s freezes at -20 degrees F, otherwise it will get frozen.

 

Yes I think it's the wet heavy snow.

I have headlight washer on a previous car but not Toyota

 

I thought we did have heating strips in the windshield for the wipers, at least from reading other threads.

https://www.tundras.com/threads/heated-windshield.69173/

 

Pretty sure we don't. I don't see a heat wire anyway.

DD S3 Max FTW

 

Yep! It was snowing hard enough that 20mph was about max. So they did quite well.