[MadMax]

Yesterday, I had my 12,000 mi. service done at Ventura BMW and I also had them put in the Philips xenon HID low beam kit for my bike.

The light color is incredible, but I'd have to say that the stock K12S headlight system covered the road almost as well as this kit does. The BIG difference is, you get NOTICED by the cages. I had to split traffic on Hwy. 1 and the 405 Fwy. back home and it was already dark.

The cages seemed to part for me faster and many more seemed to move over to give me space to split traffic. I believe that the intensity and color of the light grabs people's attention.

I rode next to some high end BMW cars and my headlight color was identical to the car's HID lights. So the quality of the lighting seems to be up to par with the car headlights.


Price: almost $500.00 USD after the labor charges.
Another downside: The light draws a different amount of voltage so the "bulb out" icon on the computer display remains on.

I'm working night shift for 3 months, so if this attention getting light saves my bacon just once while commuting, then it will have been worth it.

 

[allenclarkson]

HID focus problem?

What you say makes me wonder if the HID bulb is not being focused right by the reflector. For the reflector to work well, the light produced by the bulb must be at the exact point the reflector was designed for. Some HID replacements don't accomplish this.

One reason to suspect focus is that HID bulbs put out a whole lot more light than halogen bulbs and therefore should cover the road better.

Antoher reason is the response of cars. If the light isn't focused well, it's probably scattering up and into the eyes of drivers - kinda like hitting them with a high beam, or worse.

 

[MadMax]

Focus issues

Thanks for the insight on the focusing issues.

I do know that the level of light hits the average sedan about 3/4 of the way up the trunk/bumper area. So, the beam height doesn't hit the rearview mirror level as I was coming up behind traffic. I had alot of low speed time behind alot of traffic, so I'm confident that the level of the beam isn't blinding drivers, like when the high beam is on. I tried the high beams and it is much higher on the road and the cars ahead.

 

[Catatafish]

I was always under the impression that HID for vehicles was only a different Kelvin, not more lumens. In other words, although it's farther "blue" on the spectrum, and closer to daylight, it doesn't necessarily mean more lumens, which is the measure of how much light is being projected.

My G35 has HID and looks like daylight. My former BMW and Audi both had conventional lighting. The BMW 3 series was like having an incandescent sun in front of me. Best "lumens" in a car I've ever had. Although the HID is more daylightish, I miss the conventional lighting on my old 3 series as it covered the road farther forward than the G does.

On the KS, I just drive at night with the brights on and I haven't been flashed once yet. This after about 1000 miles of mostly divided highway and some non-divided highway riding.

The HID will definitely get you noticed more at night. But I'm still on the fence as to whether or not it's more noticeable in the day time, given that the projection is closer to daylight on the Kelvin scale.

 

[BMTrevR]

A HID system will produce higher lumens at different Kelvins over halogen. Bigger bang per watt. See :-http://www.halcyon.net/dir/faq_07.shtml for a quick over view.

Cheers
Trevor

 

[Catatafish]

Nice link. But I'm confused a bit. It says "makes it appear brighter to the eye". And it also speaks of efficiency per watt.

When I go to Home Depot and look at T5 bulbs for my flourescent shop lamp, there are 35W bulbs. One 35W bulb has a 6500K with 1850 lumens and another has 5000K with 2000 lumens. What gives? I understand that the bluer light will "appear" brighter but then why do my plants grow faster with more lumens?

In any case, I'd just like to know how to get my light beam farther ahead of me. I'm more concerned with hitting a deer than anything when it comes to night time riding. I can "see and avoid" the Excursion trying to run me down but a deer doesn't usually have his lights on. This 20 foot light beam at 70 mph business blows!

 

[kkugel]

I have the Phillips HID low and two extreme whites for the highs, and the result is very satisfactory. No flashes from on coming cars yet at night. and the high beams work VERY well.

 

[BMTrevR]

Here is a link to a post with pics of a HID upgrade on a CBR XX.

http://www.sport-touring.net/forums/showthread.php?t=73208

Cheers
Trevor

 

[atomic80]

Just curious where your shop put the huge Philips ballast for the HID bulb? I got the HID kit myself and it was tough finding a suitable location. Me and a buddy finally found a suitable location under the left rear fairing by the seating. We had to wire it over there but unfortunately the longer wire has caused some resistance issues which in turn has made it somewhat sporadic in working. We discovered that in order to get it to work, we have to hold down the starter button for about 5-8 seconds after starting for the HID bulb to even come on. This is because when the system detects a non-normal flow of voltage to the lowbeams which you'd get from a busted bulb or in my case, the ballast, then the low beam bulb indicator would come on. One of the possible solutions suggested by the folks where I bought the HID kit from is to put in a resistor which will fool the electronics into thinking that the circuits are normal and to keep the line energized AND not giving me an error low beam bulb indicator message too. I'm going to try putting in the resistor and see what happens.

 

[rubbert]

Hella Optilux less $

I have three 100w hella bulbs in and they do a pretty good job. about $25.00 for two including shipping.