Inspection
If you want to drive at night, you have to have good lighting for night driving. Stock headlights work ok for basic highway driving, but when you venture out into the sticks the night grows darker and supplemental lighting can help you find your way better. This is especially true if you like to travel at speed. The faster you go, the better and brighter lighting you need to clearly see the terrain.
Enter Rigid Industries, a manufacturer of several different types of lights. These include LED light bars that range in size from 4-inch to 50-inch long. They also build a full line of aircraft and off-road HID lights, and a line of RV interior LED lights.
Their LED light bars use industry leading technology. Each light consists of two rows of high intensity LEDs, each sitting in a patented reflector assembly that measures about one inch square. The smallest 4-inch light contains eight LEDs and each light contains progressively more as the size grows.
In a traditional light bulb, high electrical current is sent through a small metallic filament held under vacuum inside a glass bulb. The current makes the filament glow brightly and yields illumination. A polished reflector behind the bulb is then used to capture and focus the light forward in some desired dispersion pattern. Modern incarnations of the light bulb have made them ever brighter and more efficient. Examples include halogen bulbs which contain an inert gas and a halogen material used to prevent darkening of the bulb over time. Another example is the high intensity discharge (HID) light which uses high internal voltage to form an intense plasma to create light.
LEDs are light emitting diodes. They are composed of semiconductor materials and when a current is passed through the formed junction, they emit light. Various colors are possible depending on the characteristics of the material used to build the diode. A big advantage of LEDs is their efficiency. They can produce far more light for a given amount of input power than conventional bulbs. They also have high service lifetimes (typically in excess of 10,000 hours). LEDs are much less sensitive to shock and vibration damage, which is especially useful for off-road applications.
We mentioned the power efficiency of LEDs. It's not uncommon for a halogen light to be rated at 100 to 150 watts. This translates to a battery current draw of about 8 to 12 amps per light. A step up in improvement (and cost) is a comparable 35-watt HID light that would draw about 3 amps of current.
For similar light output, you could use a 6-inch "E" Series light bar that would only consume about 2 amps of current, keeping your alternator and battery happier. Also, unlike the HID light that needs a ballast module, the LED arrays simply hook up to 12 volts with power and ground.
Rigid Industries currently offers lights with the highest efficiency on the market. With their power-friendly design, durable assembly, and choice of lighting and housing colors we were impressed with the Rigid offerings. We will say that you won't find this quality of lighting at discount store pricing, but you will get an awesome light for the cash you pay for these quality lights.
As you probably know, we've joined with Rigid industries to give away a 2008 Yamaha Rhino they've loaded up with cool mods. You can go to Rigid's website (see below) to fill out an online entry form.
Rigid will be including one of their 10-inch "E" Series LED Light Bars with the giveaway UTV. It'll be mounted on the front bumper much like the one in our lead photo above. This light will throw out some serious illumination for playing in the dark, yet still be kind to the Rhino's charging system, sipping just a bit over 3 amps of current.
 What helps make these lights...  What helps make these lights so bright and efficient is the lens and reflector system. Rigid uses a patented dual reflector system (egg crate shape on the left) combined with a bonnet lens (right) that fits over the reflector to effectively capture 93 percent of the emitted light and focus it forward into a useful light pattern. |  Here you can see a partially...  Here you can see a partially assembled light showing the LED circuit board (green) inside the housing and the right portion has the reflector and bonnet pieces added.A clear 0.125-inch thick UV resistant lexan sheet serves as the final layer over the reflector array to keep dust and moisture out of the light. In the rare event that one LED in the array fails, it's not like the fatal blow to a string of Christmas lights. Each LED is wired to the power bus on the circuit board separately, meaning one LED failure does not affect the operation of another. |  The circuit board, reflector...  The circuit board, reflector assembly, and lexan front cover all fit within a sturdy aluminum extrusion that is heavily finned for heatsinking purposes. Heat from the LEDs is carried through an aluminum bar on the back of the circuit board to the finned housing. The heat sink is actually designed to size so the lights can operate with no airflow (standing still) and still work without light output degradation. LEDs are very susceptible to overheating, and if operated without a proper heatsink, the output will degrade. |
 Again, you can see a built-up...  Again, you can see a built-up circuit board in the foreground with the 20 small LEDs surface mounted for this 10-inch light. Each individual LED is operated at about 1.8 watts. Unlike lights that use a single bulb source, an LED array of multiple overlapping light sources has no hot spotting or large variations in the illumination over the lighted area. This makes the array spread the available light more evenly and can reduce eye fatigue for the driver. Rigid offers their smaller lights in both a narrow pencil beam and flood beam patterns. |  The lights are available in...  The lights are available in four illumination colors: cool white, warm white, natural white, and amber. The color is produced at the LED source so no further filtering is needed to get the desired color. By using only clear optics (instead of color filters over the LED) most of the light output is preserved. Rigid can recommend a color best suited to your nighttime needs based on your use, as some are better suited for dusty conditions or dirt color, etc. |  Each light comes with a footed...  Each light comes with a footed mount on each end that allows the housing to be rotated up or down. Available optionally are clamp mounts that can allow the light to be mounted to round tubing. |
 The "E" Series lights come...  The "E" Series lights come standard in a matte black finish but can be custom ordered in the powdercoat color of your choice. This can allow you to color match the light to your chassis or body color. |  The guys at Rigid knew their...  The guys at Rigid knew their lights were built to be tough but wanted to subject one to some real world challenges. They took on of their larger lights and started by dragging it around their parking lot behind a Jeep, then drove over the light a few times, and then took turns beating it with a 2x4 stud. The light looked ugly but still worked. Following that, they took the light to a shooting range and shot it with a couple of 9mm and .223 bullets, and then blasted it with a shotgun. The hex drivers in the light housing above show where some bullets went clean through the light. After all the destruction, two-thirds of the LED's still functioned! |  Here's a shot of one of their...  Here's a shot of one of their 40-inch light bars over the windshield of a Hummer. One light on the vehicle can fulfill all auxiliary lighting needs. Their 20-inch-and-larger lights combine both pencil beam and flood patterns in one light assembly for the best of both worlds. |
 As an alternative, Rigid offers...  As an alternative, Rigid offers their "G" Series HID lights. These come in multiple sizes up to a 5-inch with internal ballast...... |  ......Also available is a...  ......Also available is a whole line of HID replacement lights for ATV's, UTV's and vehicle fog lights. These offer lighting output similar to that of a 150W halogen but are rated at only 35 watts. | |