Hi all, recently installed HIDs onto my car but found them dangerously dim when driving in the country (which is where i do the majority of my driving) Found the standard bulbs were bad but these are shocking.

 

This is the kit i bought, seemed to get a fairly decent review

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/330789047472?_trksid=p2059210.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

 

Just wondering if anyone else used this kit and had any problems? Tried to adjust the headlights, but didnt have a proper area to do it but seem fairly close to where they should be, will try and get them spot on tomorrow and see if it makes much difference (probably not!)

Have you cleaned your projector lenses inside and out? You will find that a build up of grime and dust over the years will dramatically affect the beam quality and possibly the pattern more noticeable with HID as they are a more concentrated brighter white.

Mine were pretty dirty and cleaning them made a huge difference to the light output, i do find on a wet miserable night most car headlights seem poorer than on a dry clear night.

What heat rating did you buy?

I got these! They went in ok & r much much better & no messing!

Rating was 4300k. Not cleaned lenses properly, is there an easy way to get to the outside of them without separating the headlight?

Don't think its the outside! It's the inside part of the headlight!

Going through the headlight bulb opening.

If u search I think Garry put up some photos.

4300k is perfect. As above, there are 2 parts that need cleaning, firstly the inside of the main light glass and also both sides of the projector. Ideally you need to split the headlight to do it properly. It's actually not too bad to do, but if you don't, then AndrewG has a method for cleaning the back face of the projector which should dramatically increase light output.

 

I'd personally split the light and do all refraction surfaces.

Yeah i'll try and at least clean the inside, might wait until i do the 120k service to split the light which isn't too far away. What puzzles me is going straight to HIDs and finding them dimmer, which makes me thinks its more of a problem with the unit itself rather than the headlight?

That could be more down to the spectrum of light that's being blocked by contamination rather than the HID bulbs themselves. At a guess, the light range that the HID emits is far more narrow and focused than a regular halogen bulb giving the illusion that the HID bulb emits less light.

Yep Sorry Andrew G !

 

I knew there was a G in it somwhere! Doh!

there is one thing that could be going on here same issue as in my mates evo he had hid lights in in it we was driving one night on the county lanes and I said what up with the head lights he said thay have always been like that and blamed the lights. so on the way back it hit me what was going on I told him to park the car a few meters pointing at the fence anyhow there was no lights projecting on the fence turns out both head lights with pointin up well high we adjusted the head light and focused the light on the fence we went back out down the lanes anyhow he was amazed just how good they were so all it was the head lights pointing way to high yet no now had worked it out and was driving like that for years even the mot place didn't even pic this issue up. so before you start pulling them all to bit try the fence test make sure you are a good 10 meters away and see if they are lightin the fence up or not then then just tweek them

As Simon as said 4300k is perfect and should or will give you plenty more light than halogen, 5000k and 6000k is also good.

 

I will presume you do have H3 ?

 

Cleanliness is an issue but it's more likely as you imply they are abysmal that either you have not seated the bulbs correctly, this is easy done as you're doing it blind and/or your adjusters are broken - incredibly common.

 

I am yet to notice any difference between ac or dc type hid lights, the ac ones have a chunky transformer in line, which is another thing to tuck away.

 

EDIT: And also you state driving in the country, so you'll have your main beam on and this'll give you all the light you'll need ? As if you haven't modded this flicks the dipped off.

Edited November 26, 201411 yr by phutumsch

How long have you been running your HID's? Wasn't overly impressed with mine to start with, and that was with replacing the entire headlight assembly for a perfect pair of fittings from a '97. I was advised that over time- say a week of driving, illumination will significantly improve- turned out to be the case for me.

I've converted all of mine to 35W 6000k HIDs, driving lights included (with new Coz fittings as well). Difference between those and conventional halogens is without comparison really, especially on the driving/ fog lights.

 

Also, not 100% on wiring for the UK specs, but if the same as J-spec, a much easier method of performing the constant low with high beam mod is to cut the spade connector from the 12V ballast '-'ve wire and replace it with a lug (round hole). Bolt the lug to the chassis (ensuring you have a good connection to ground) and you're done.

 

Cheers

Michael

there is one thing that could be going on here same issue as in my mates evo he had hid lights in in it we was driving one night on the county lanes and I said what up with the head lights he said thay have always been like that and blamed the lights. so on the way back it hit me what was going on I told him to park the car a few meters pointing at the fence anyhow there was no lights projecting on the fence turns out both head lights with pointin up well high we adjusted the head light and focused the light on the fence we went back out down the lanes anyhow he was amazed just how good they were so all it was the head lights pointing way to high yet no now had worked it out and was driving like that for years even the mot place didn't even pic this issue up. so before you start pulling them all to bit try the fence test make sure you are a good 10 meters away and see if they are lightin the fence up or not then then just tweek them

 

Have adjusted headlights roughly to not far away from where they should be, but going to get them done properly when I have time (doing kitchen renovations and fixing a dishwasher for my mum right now and training for strongman/powerlifting competitons so not much spare time!)

 

As Simon as said 4300k is perfect and should or will give you plenty more light than halogen, 5000k and 6000k is also good.

 

I will presume you do have H3 ?

 

Cleanliness is an issue but it's more likely as you imply they are abysmal that either you have not seated the bulbs correctly, this is easy done as you're doing it blind and/or your adjusters are broken - incredibly common.

 

I am yet to notice any difference between ac or dc type hid lights, the ac ones have a chunky transformer in line, which is another thing to tuck away.

 

EDIT: And also you state driving in the country, so you'll have your main beam on and this'll give you all the light you'll need ? As if you haven't modded this flicks the dipped off.

 

Adjuster are a bit iffy but can get them roughly in place, did wonder if they werent seated correctly but not tried moving them around yet. And yes I do a lot of country driving, but so does everyone here, its mainly country raods so constantly meeting cars and therefore hardly ever using main beam, hence why i wanted to brighter low beams :) And they are H3 yes.

 

How long have you been running your HID's? Wasn't overly impressed with mine to start with, and that was with replacing the entire headlight assembly for a perfect pair of fittings from a '97. I was advised that over time- say a week of driving, illumination will significantly improve- turned out to be the case for me.

I've converted all of mine to 35W 6000k HIDs, driving lights included (with new Coz fittings as well). Difference between those and conventional halogens is without comparison really, especially on the driving/ fog lights.

 

Also, not 100% on wiring for the UK specs, but if the same as J-spec, a much easier method of performing the constant low with high beam mod is to cut the spade connector from the 12V ballast '-'ve wire and replace it with a lug (round hole). Bolt the lug to the chassis (ensuring you have a good connection to ground) and you're done.

 

Cheers

Michael

 

I have read about them taking a while to start working properly, might see if it improves over time as well. Also earthed the -ve for constant low beam at the same time :thumbup1:

If yours is a Japanese spec, you should have H3C, H3 is UK spec.

Have adjusted headlights roughly to not far away from where they should be, but going to get them done properly when I have time (doing kitchen renovations and fixing a dishwasher for my mum right now and training for strongman/powerlifting competitons so not much spare time!)

 

 

 

Adjuster are a bit iffy but can get them roughly in place, did wonder if they werent seated correctly but not tried moving them around yet. And yes I do a lot of country driving, but so does everyone here, its mainly country raods so constantly meeting cars and therefore hardly ever using main beam, hence why i wanted to brighter low beams :) And they are H3 yes.

 

 

 

I have read about them taking a while to start working properly, might see if it improves over time as well. Also earthed the -ve for constant low beam at the same time :thumbup1:

 

strong man and power lifting hay I use power lifting often am more in to the body building side of things. tho I do the big 2 dead lifts squats once a week if I train to hard I burn out fast so have to go from compound work then to isolation training light hi reps for a while. what training you doing now ?

If yours is a Japanese spec, you should have H3C, H3 is UK spec.

 

Although correct Simon, you could be implying and worrying him that his current H3 HID's are causing his problem and that will not be the case at all.

 

I too have HID H3c's bulbs to go in mine when i finish building my next headlights - will i notice a difference.....we'll see.

I wasn't really suggesting he would, but as you know, the bulb will seat in the correct position with the bulb further out. It was merely a comment on correct bulb type. I've got H3 in mine, but I'll go H3C eventually. I want to ditch my 6000k for 4300k.

If yours is a Japanese spec, you should have H3C, H3 is UK spec.

 

Car is UK spec, triple checked before buying since got confused as spent a lot of time lurking on the american forums and saw the 9006 (iirc) mentioned first of all, then H3c for jap and all that.

 

 

strong man and power lifting hay I use power lifting often am more in to the body building side of things. tho I do the big 2 dead lifts squats once a week if I train to hard I burn out fast so have to go from compound work then to isolation training light hi reps for a while. what training you doing now ?

 

Cool! I love it personally, just finished doing a 5x5 and now doing 2 4 week cycles of 5/3/1 before a little friendly gym powerlifting competition, hoping for the 500kg combined lift.

 

Will be doing something along the lines of the cube method with strong man in the new year, so more focus on pressing and event training :) Only started properly training around March/April time but coming on leaps and bounds so far!

I personally seem to do best training nearly every day, i'm minimum 5 days a week but when i start the cube method will likely end up 6 days

How dim are they? And what was the wattage of the kit. The K rating short for kelvin is a measurement of the colour and heat if you like of light rather it's intensity. Different colour wavelengths have different penetration abilities, for example red light doesn't travel very far or penetrate water particularly well, blue on the other hand penetrates extremely well, the offset is though that it takes more power to achieve the same PAR or intensity as the colour temperature goes up. 6.5k is roughly daylight on a bright sunny day.

 

Hid works by exciting crystals with electricity which causes the light emission. Is everything defiantly hooked up correctly? If they arn't getting sufficient power, or the earth is bad ie the circuit is poor they won't illuminate properly. LEDs do the same quite often if you wire them up backwards you get a dim glow rather than an intense light source.

 

If they are a dimmer than the halogens then they are either faulty, fitted incorrectly or the lense is filthy however if the lense was that bad your halogens would have been less than useless, they are poor but they do work as headlights sort of.

If they are a dimmer than the halogens then they are either faulty, fitted incorrectly or the lense is filthy however if the lense was that bad your halogens would have been less than useless, they are poor but they do work as headlights sort of.

 

Not necessarily. As you stated above, the wavelengths are different. In this instance, the yellowish light that the halogens emit could potentially be more penetrating than the focused beam of bright light through contaminated refraction surfaces.

Fair comment Si, yeah the stock colour temp would have a better ability to penetrate. It is more focused but it's still a discharge style lamp rather than point source like LED AFAIK.

Actually hold on, that might be *****x. Yellow is close to red in the spectrum it's a long way from blue. So the stock should be worse as it's a lower K with less ability to penetrate, have to look that up.

Too close to make a proper difference from what I can see. Ie merely changing the k rating is unlikely to effect the total light passing the dirt.

How dim are they? And what was the wattage of the kit. The K rating short for kelvin is a measurement of the colour and heat if you like of light rather it's intensity. Different colour wavelengths have different penetration abilities, for example red light doesn't travel very far or penetrate water particularly well, blue on the other hand penetrates extremely well, the offset is though that it takes more power to achieve the same PAR or intensity as the colour temperature goes up. 6.5k is roughly daylight on a bright sunny day.

 

Hid works by exciting crystals with electricity which causes the light emission. Is everything defiantly hooked up correctly? If they arn't getting sufficient power, or the earth is bad ie the circuit is poor they won't illuminate properly. LEDs do the same quite often if you wire them up backwards you get a dim glow rather than an intense light source.

 

If they are a dimmer than the halogens then they are either faulty, fitted incorrectly or the lense is filthy however if the lense was that bad your halogens would have been less than useless, they are poor but they do work as headlights sort of.

 

They are 35w, and well dim enough that i can actually barely see where the light is shining, kinda hard to properly describe how dim but dim enough to make me feel extremely uneasy driving with them. I can't think i fitted them incorrectly, unless I've been an utter moron, everything clicked into place and checked to make sure they weren't rattling loose? Maybe is just faulty. I have mailed the company on ebay to see what they have to say.

Yeah same as mine, should be much brighter. I think if after a double check there's still nothing obvious then I'd say you've received a duff, just seems odd there both dim.