Hyper flashing, also known as rapid flashing or hyper flashing, is the most common phenomenon that occurs when you change your turn signals to LED lights. Since the LED turn signal bulbs draw much less power than the original factory bulbs, this will cause a sudden drop in circuit resistance causing the turn signals to hyper-flare or rapidly flash. This type of event also occurs when you have a burned out or non-working turn signal bulb, as that also causes a drop in resistance in the circuit. This lens will show you four ways to tackle this problem once and for all.
1) The first solution is also the most common of the four and will be a surefire solution to the hyper-blinking problem. Load resistors are resistors that are placed between the positive lead and negative lead of the LED turn signal wiring, bridging the two leads raising the load (hence the load resistors) for the entire circuit. Specifications for most load resistors are rated at 50W with a 6 ohm resistor. Although these will fix the problem in almost 100% of cases, the requirement to puncture the wires discourages some people from purchasing them. Along with wire taps, these also get very hot once in operation due to the electrical resistance created within the resistor, so they must be mounted to a metal surface.
2) The next solution is a plug and play (PnP) load resistor harness. In theory this is the exact same design as the load resistors mentioned above, however these are pre-wired to a specific plug size such as 3157, 7443, 1156 and more. Since the load resistors are pre-wired, they can be easily installed without the need to connect any cables. These are perfect for those who want a PnP style solution to their hyper flashing problems. Unfortunately, the only drawback is that the plugs are universal in design and may not fit all cases. On top of that, most of these are designed with a 3 ohm resistor as they will be in direct proximity to the pre-wired cables to prevent overheating and meltdown. Metal mounting is still required.
3) The third solution is a thermal flasher relay. Most vehicles come equipped with a relay that coordinates the flash rate of the turn signals. These factory flasher relays are designed to work with a regular incandescent filament bulb, not an LED bulb which has lower power consumption. To address this, aftermarket thermal flasher relays are designed to work with aftermarket replacement LED bulbs. The flasher relay does not get hot and is a PnP solution. The only drawback to this solution is that some of the newer vehicles do not use a flasher relay to coordinate the LED corner lights, instead using the vehicle’s ECU (Electronic Control Unit). This brings us to our final solution to the hyper-blink problem…
4) Many European vehicles and some newer vehicles have the ECU to control the flashing of the turn signals. In addition to controlling it, European vehicles also have a system that monitors the draft and resistance of the exterior bulbs and warns the driver when they do not work. These are known as failure or error messages and they can be quite annoying. To alleviate this, some vehicles have the ability to change the resistor and draw the turn signal circuit requirements to use an LED turn signal using aftermarket car computer software. This not only removes the error message, but also fixes the hyper-blinking issue at the same time. As with all of these fixes, there will be a “pro” and a “con” to each solution; the downside to this is that this type of correction may not be available for all vehicles.
In general, having a choice of four different hyperflash arrangements will allow the user to choose what is best for their vehicle. While one solution may not work for the vehicle, another solution may work instead. While these fixes are not rocket science and not difficult to accomplish, they all require some type of vehicle electrical knowledge, it is still recommended that only an experienced professional install these fixes.
