I've had one of the LEDs installed for over a week now and the heat sink gets warm to touch but not hot to touch, so I'm optimistic about them not needing the fan. So I am going to continue running it in the winter without the fan and see how it goes. One thing I am curious about is if I keep the fan connected and the fan eventually fails, do I run the risk of causing a short or any other electrical problem?
As far as brightness is concerned i originally thought I noticed quite a large difference but now I am more inclined to say the difference is quite marginal and the LEDs are only a tad brighter. However my main concern was the electrical power consumption so I'm very happy with that if I am able to continue to run them.