HID Bulb Mod

[yoka]

Scorphonic: where are the photos man????

Interested to do this mod.
For me, i want still got the bike as stock. Want to go HID 4500K for the low beam, and do the dual headlights mod. Want to go something like 8000 / 10000K for the high beam "just to wake up sleepy drivers or the ones on the phone" I wouldn't blind the coming drivers as most roads here are one way double lane at least.

Anyway, quick question "small hijack of the thread"
The light color is controlled by the bulb, or by the blasts?

Also tell me your opinion about if my idea will work.
cheers.

hope Scorphonic post his photos

 

[Zanch]

Fuses don't pose any problems. What is an issue, is the high AWG (small) wire the bike has for halogens. It will decrease the life of you're ballasts (the expensive part). Because of the higher current draw when the ballasts fire up. BTW, the 55watt kits are very nice. I wouldn't worry about buying 55 watt bulbs though. The 55watt bulbs are exactly the same. How do I know? I used my 35 watt bulbs for a year before I finally finished the retrofits in my car. The 35's and 55's work basically the same. As far as buying HID's for your high beam... don't. HID's take a while to warm up and if you ever flash your high's that won't light anything up and it will just decrease the life of the ballasts.

 

[Zanch]

Scorphonic: where are the photos man????

Interested to do this mod.
For me, i want still got the bike as stock. Want to go HID 4500K for the low beam, and do the dual headlights mod. Want to go something like 8000 / 10000K for the high beam "just to wake up sleepy drivers or the ones on the phone" I wouldn't blind the coming drivers as most roads here are one way double lane at least.

Anyway, quick question "small hijack of the thread"
The light color is controlled by the bulb, or by the blasts?

Also tell me your opinion about if my idea will work.
cheers.

hope Scorphonic post his photos

Bulb = color temp. You can't have dual low beams and a high beam unless you put a bixenon projector in (has a solenoid move the cutoff shield up and down). If you wana do headlight research go to http://www.hidplanet.com/ and check out the forums. There will be more info than you'll ever want to know.

One thing that I'm interested in is what the beam pattern looks like with HID's in the stock reflectors as terrible as that sounds (the retro job on my RSX was a real pain).

BTW I got my 55 watt kit from this guy... lifetime warranty, good prices and everything works great. http://www.retro-solutions.com/

 

[Zanch]

Absolutely vital to use shrink wrap alright! give its a clean finish too!

RSW, how much of the double sided industrial tape did you require on each side? I'll only get the chance to buy it on Saturday and want to know how much and what quality i'll need to keep these ballasts on!

The ballasts have internal igniters installed (the H4 comes with an additional box that aids in the high low change. The power comes from the light wires and not the battery as I said earlier...apparently this is enough to power the ballasts. The guys I bought from are one of the leading companies in the whole of the UK and they make their own units...very high quality! I'm just glad i dont have to fit igniters in an extra place too!!

so what double sided tape did you use or does it really matter?

I still don't get this... how can you have a high beam by only adding more power. It doesn't make any sense because high beams aren't any brighter than lows ... they just point stright like this --- instead of down like this \

 

['05FZ6]

I want the best lighting performance in the majority of all driving conditions possible and therefore just performed the headlight mod so that I have dual low beams (and one high beam).

I have HID's on my car and I love them, I'm thinking about going the same path with the bike. That being said, since we only have a spot for one bulb on each side (in my car I have two for each light, one for low, one for high), in order to have a high beam we must use a dual filament bulb.

I also understand that, like others have stated in this thread, HID's in the high beams may not be the best idea due to warming times/longevity of ballasts.

What is the ultimate solution for our bikes regarding lighting?

Do HID's come in a dual filament bulb?

At this point it sounds like using HID's for the low beams and not using the high beam at all is the best decision. The only other option that I see as worthy is using some bright halogens, a dual filament in the right side (as you are sitting on the bike).

What do you guys think?

 

[mellofelow]

On the high beam side (H4), you have 2 options for HID conversion. First of all, you must have the dual-headlight mod. As for the HID, the 2 types are 1) Xenon LOW and halogen HI. and 2) Single Xenon with magnetic mechanical switch to move the bulb to HI and LOW positions.

<--- 1

<--- 2

I've seen #2 being more common in H4 hi/low variety. Here's a video of #2.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19C1uaAYQKk[/ame]

Here's a video of #1, halogen High beam with HID low

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yylXsu5A-6I[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfKrR49qY94"] [/ame]

 

[Zanch]

H'mmm ... neither of the videos look like they are from our bikes... could anybody put up a video of our bikes with both options or any option for that matter. My guess is the best solution would be low beam HID and high beam halogen because of the beam pattern etc.

 

[rsw81]

H'mmm ... neither of the videos look like they are from our bikes... could anybody put up a video of our bikes with both options or any option for that matter. My guess is the best solution would be low beam HID and high beam halogen because of the beam pattern etc.

I've done the HID on both sides of my bike (the bike is no longer in existence) and can tell you it didn't work very well. The halogen high beam is a better and safer solution. The only way to properly do HID in our bikes is to do a projector retrofit, which I eventually did. This way you can find bixenon kits that will provide both high and low beam patterns. Cars that you can get this from include most new BMWs, Infiniti FX, Acura TL.

 

[Zanch]

I've done the HID on both sides of my bike (the bike is no longer in existence) and can tell you it didn't work very well. The halogen high beam is a better and safer solution. The only way to properly do HID in our bikes is to do a projector retrofit, which I eventually did. This way you can find bixenon kits that will provide both high and low beam patterns. Cars that you can get this from include most new BMWs, Infiniti FX, Acura TL.

Yeah, I had mentioned bi-xenon's in an earlier post. I did all the research for my RSX and I originally had an Ebay projectors with HID's and now I've got one of both... I should take a picture to show off the beam pattern you get with reflectors that aren't designed for HID's so everyone knows. The other thing is to avoid cheaping out on ballasts. Bulbs don't matter much since they're simple, but cheap ballasts will typically fail within 6 months. and If you've only got one bulb ie no dual headlights then a failure would be bad.

 

[rsw81]

Yeah, I had mentioned bi-xenon's in an earlier post. I did all the research for my RSX and I originally had an Ebay projectors with HID's and now I've got one of both... I should take a picture to show off the beam pattern you get with reflectors that aren't designed for HID's so everyone knows. The other thing is to avoid cheaping out on ballasts. Bulbs don't matter much since they're simple, but cheap ballasts will typically fail within 6 months. and If you've only got one bulb ie no dual headlights then a failure would be bad.

Yeah, I have an RSX as well. Didn't do the HID and projectors on it though. Next car will just come with it standard :thumbup:

There are tons of people who posted pics on here of before/after HID with reflectors and then with projectors. I posted mine on SBN somewhere, too lazy to look up the link.

 

[Zanch]

Yeah, I have an RSX as well. Didn't do the HID and projectors on it though. Next car will just come with it standard :thumbup:

There are tons of people who posted pics on here of before/after HID with reflectors and then with projectors. I posted mine on SBN somewhere, too lazy to look up the link.

I'm too lazy to search.

Plus most people don't manually set the aperature / shutter speed so the before and after shots typically aren't comparable.

I'm bidding on some 6 dollar (shipped) HID bulbs on ebay. I've got some extra ballasts that belong to my yet to be installed fog lights. I'll give the low beam HID a try and see how it works. It's also got a halogen bulb strapped to the side... kinda crazy but I'll see how it works. I'll try low beam HID + halogen and if that doesn't look any good I'll try adding the halogen to the high beam halogen.