Trying to find a reasonable HID light output that doesn't blind people, without retrofitting the lenses it self.

Note:
*** If you have an opinion please keep it in topic
*** This thread is not what color HID's or what looks cooler.
*** Money is not an object when it comes to quality.

Victim:
****** 99 civic headlights



Debating between:
H4 REBASED D2S HID BULBS




Their claim:
"These adapter plates allow standard D2S/D2R HID bulbs to be used on standard H4 headlamp housings, such as motorcycle or aftermarket automotive style housing. Has correct beam alignment shield to project light from the HID lamp to the road, eliminating upward glare. Perfect low beam disbursement is achieved with a clean cut-off point.

The HID bulbs are made in Germany and these are the bulbs installed OE in many HID headlamps today. They come with standard 4300K color temperature only and these are the only legal HID bulbs color temperature under DOT/ECE regulations."


VS

Philips H4 X-treme


http://autolamps-online.com/pr...e.htm

Claim:
H-T review:

https://honda-tech.com/zerothread/1888068

Regards,
Vick

 

For me personally im gona be going with the philips x-treme. Only reason is because ive herd great reviews about them, and its just a simple bulb swap.
But that h4 rebased d2s seems pretty legit, and if i remember correctly gives a pretty decent cut off, lets get some more opinons in here!

 

bumppp

 

does the seller have any pictures of the cutoff, the phillips are by far the nicest bulb i have ever used, but a nice HID setup looks sweet

 

Via focal plain + Reflector style housings, the Phillips would be your choice, IMO. It will increase your visible light output, and put the light where you want it to go, without wasting it on the eyes of oncoming traffic.

I would only really agree with HID's if you had some projectors to go in there, but that's my opinion. I've seen plenty of HID plug n play kits on reflector style housings that just look like they're brighter, but never has one dangerously blinded me like everyone blurts out.

 

whatever you do, post pics

 

any other opinions, or experience?

 

HID's in almost any halogen housing, even a halogen projector (except for only a couple) are junk. Go with the replacement halogen bulbs.

 

It seems that no1 had experience with the first setup.

 

The first set up is actually D2R bulbs using a Casper shield to fit into the H4 housing. On Hidplanet this is the only recommended way to do HID plug n play into H4 housings. I personally don't have any experience with this set up but it does allow you the one thing that if you do plan on a future retrofit it lets you use the equipment you already have (beyond swapping the bulb to a D2S or carving a new tab in the bulb base to fit). Big down side is the set up doesn't have an option for a highbeam output in any flavor... so if you use flash to pass or your safety needs high beams I'd either stick with halogens or if you do want HID's than get PNP units with a shield and either a halogen high bulb or moving bulb kit....

 

A buddy of mine got that exact same kit and the lighting was still horrible...light went everywhere except for the road.

For once and for all: Its not the HID kit that causes glare and blinding light, its the housing of which its in..! 96-00 Headlights suck at handling HID light, Period.

 

Genuine Rolla where u been !!! I was waiting for a response from people that had experience with this hid kit.
** Keep em coming***



Modified by viskii420 at 6:56 AM 11/1/2007

 

right now i have that exact setup that u want and its horrible. Now i'm in the process of retrofitting tsx projectors into my housings, huge difference. Don't waste your money on casper shields, if money is no object have someone retrofit a set for you, its well worth it

 

the reflector housing was never meant to be used for HID application...
the retro is not your option in your case, get Philips H4 X-treme and call it a day...
at least you are not looking into $75 hid kit...

 

If you're gonna do a retro, just buy the simple replacement bulbs and save your money for the retro.


Frankly I'd say don't even bother with expensive halogen bulbs since in the end they still lose output/brightness and will need to be replaced and at 45+ a bulb it gets costly quick....

And DON"T LISTEN TO ME.... I've gotten them under 100 buck hid kits with out issue (have one set working for over two years with out issue)...

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by gSIr &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">right now i have that exact setup that u want and its horrible. Now i'm in the process of retrofitting tsx projectors into my housings, huge difference. Don't waste your money on casper shields, if money is no object have someone retrofit a set for you, its well worth it</TD></TR></TABLE>

if money is not an object when it comes to quality to you, then i would have to agree with him. i have seen many hid setups and non projectors are worthless. the light output is terrible. the beam is awful. halogen housing were never designed to handle the light output from hids.

 

Here are two pics that compare your setup, the casper shields on hid bulbs vs. retrofit. I got these pictures from http://www.hidplanet.com, so these are borrowed from someone else's thread.

Casper shields
http://i214.photobucket.com/al...6.jpg

Retro fit

http://i214.photobucket.com/al...0.jpg

Notice the two pics are shot in the same location.

Pics borrowed from striker_1818 of http://www.hidplanet.com

 

the best setup and cheapest setup would be to go with the D2S/casper setup.. i am using this setup on my gf's civic now until i decide to swap in some projectors.. you cant go wrong with this setup, plus its cheap.. roughly $60 for 2 D2S bulbs brand new, roughly $55 or $60 for the caspers adapters.. and ballasts run anywhere from $185 to $300..

your best bet would definately be to spend the extra money and do a projector retro.. i did s2000 projectors on my 240sx like 4 years ago.. i posted pics on here a long time ago.. we also did RX330 projectors on my dads tacoma.. you cant come close to the quality of an OE HID projector..

 

oh SNAP it's MTK! I wondered how long it would be before you popped into this forum

 

haha yeah im still around man.. ive kinda shifted my 100% interest these days from HID to detailing.. although i did put some 9006 4300K philips into the fogs on the m3

 

*gasp* blasphemy!!!

Do they even make a difference? My amber H3 projector fogs aren't even really visible when you turn them on w/ my HID's also on, since the HID beam pattern is so wide even directly in front of the car.

 

yeah mine are very visible.. they use 9006 bulbs.. its mostly a lot of foreground light though.. another thing i did was put brand new philips bulbs in my low beams to get rid of those crappy osram ones that came with the car.. WOW what a difference.. just puttng in the philips bulbs was night and day..





just fogs here


oh and to keep on topic.. here are a couple retros i did back in like 03/04

01 tacoma RX330 projectors.. some home depot plumbing things for bezels.











and my old 97 240SX w/ s2000 projectors









and this is one that the amazing larry from littodevil performance lighting did for my ex gf's altima.. s2000 projectors, audi a4 bezels.







and one of my favorite pics.. this proves 6000K = waste of money crap..



thank you for your time.. your ORIGINAL local resident carbon fiber and anything above 4300K HID hater..

 

haha I remember the carbon fiber hating days

 

from what i have seen just hid in stock housing does not blind anybody. i have seen hid's on the subaru with round headlights and an sentra with hid's in stock housing. I've even seen i truck with hid's same thing. THey don't blind anybody. If they did blind people they would not be selling hid's for stock housings.

Now a retrofit will make the light output better and more cleaner though.



Modified by verycleanhatch at 10:54 AM 11/4/2007

 

yes, it does blind people, and no they are not street legal. All the kits you see will say "For Show or Offroad Use Only" for that very reason, so that they can sell the stuff without getting in trouble.

There was a crackdown a few years ago on aftermarket HID kits here in the US with hefty fines imposed on anyone selling them in this country. I don't know whatever happened with that, but it's because HID kits in halogen projectors are crap with terrible optics that make it unsafe for oncoming drivers.