Pilot HID Kits........just £125 !

[mart0398]

Never mind, I will keep playing with my kit until I get board, or the rozzers pull me over and tell me to change them.

I have found a very interesting site though:

http://faqlight.carpassion.info/index.html

They have some pictures and info about retrofitting projector units.

I am going to see what difference shielding the lamp and painting the end of it makes.

[Roadrunner]

Would be cool to have four HID bulbs across the front for that real GET OUT MY WAY look..

Like this?

H7 and H1 HID kits fitted today Ooh, these are bright!

Top Left: 4 HIDs

Top right: 4 HIDs

Middle left: Halogen dip

Middle right: Halogen main

Bottom left: HID dip

Bottom right: HID main (end of the road is 500m away )

[soapy1978]

they look cool one to add to the list of todo jobs

[Spirit]

Looks excellent Brian....what a difference

[wirdy]

Excuse the pun, but I see you guys have finally seen the light!! Makes night-driving a breeze (especially as some of our older members eyes will be getting less good at night )

My HIDs are still going strong after nearly three years.

To answer Isaac's point - compared to a filament bulb the HID arc from a standard HID bulb (H2S) is okay horizontally but is 1mm higher in the vertical plane. To get the beam pattern correct (and to satisfy a strict MOT tester / prevent dazzle to oncoming traffic) this has to be corrected by offsetting the bulb by 1mm vertically. There is also no locating ring on a standard HID bulb to prevent rotation, so the bulb has to be held in very tightly.

Of course Mitsubishi are awkward by having a separate bulbholder that plugs onto the bulb and then goes into the headlight ,which has to be removed on conversion and the retaining wire bent to hold the slimmer bulb.

Without seeing the kits you guys have bought, I'd hope that the newer upgrade kits have this offset already built-in and have solved the retaining problem with a proper moulded base that mimics the standard bulb?

£110 is a bargain price BTW. An excellent upgrade.

[Kieran]

Bloody hell fire, just read this thread and seen the difference!

Think that's a very safe way to spend £110 on these cars!

[I-S]

Nigel - even if you get it in the "right" place, it still gives the wrong beam pattern because the arc is curved and a quite different shape to the filament of a bulb.

You can clearly see in H7's photos that the beam pattern is way off... the old bulbs have a markedly extended beam into the verge on the left, and strongly cut away at the offside. After the HIDs are put in the beam extends almost as high on the offside as it does on the nearside verge, and that will dazzle oncoming drivers badly.

No argument at all with the effectiveness of the main-beam upgrade and obviously other drivers would be dazzled by main beam anyway. However, I do not think that they are appropriate for dip-beam use.

[wirdy]

Yeah, I did all the research before I bought my HID's and knew it would be somewhat of a gamble and that they'd take a lot of setting-up to get a beam pattern that was acceptable to me, but more importantly didn't dazzle oncoming drivers.

It did take me about 4 or 5 nights and about 15 adjustments to get the lights correct (needs a lot of patience). It wasn't just up/down that needed adjusting, it was also left/right that needed some of the peripheral bright spots dialling-out.

If my eyesight is getting worse as I get older then you'll have to forgive me, however I know I can see much better at night with my HID's and this is without dazzling other drivers. You'd have laughed if you'd seen me down a quiet road on my estate with bonnet up and walking backwards / forwards, left/ right at up to 150 feet away bobbing my head up and down into and out of the beam whilst doing these adjustments!!

ATEOTD I think we'd all admit that according to EU regulations - HID bulbs should not be fitted to halogen headlamps. Those who wish to comply with the EU laws should quite rightly look down upon and scoff at us lowlife law breakers.

P.S - Cibie do a projector headlight conversion for the 8G - but it's V expensive & ugly as sin.

[Roadrunner]

You can clearly see in H7's photos that the beam pattern is way off... the old bulbs have a markedly extended beam into the verge on the left, and strongly cut away at the offside. After the HIDs are put in the beam extends almost as high on the offside as it does on the nearside verge, and that will dazzle oncoming drivers badly.

Sorry, but you're wrong there, Isaac. The beam cut-off is exactly the same with the HIDs as it was with the Halogen bulbs, but the light emitted is substantially greater. If I was dazzling oncoming traffic, they'd let me know, and they haven't! I read all the articles before I went ahead with the purchase and, as with a lot of similar things, technical people argue the theory more than the practice. In practice, these lights are awesome even if, in theory, they're supposed not to be ...

I ain't going back to the dark ages ...

[Spirit]

Must admit I have not really had chance to drive ours much at night, however we drove about an hour in the dark to Mallory and no-one flashed me. I also asked Jimbo, Heath etc if they got any dazzle on track when I had them on and they said not.

[Roadrunner]

Just discovered an added benefit from the HIDs They don't produce as much heat as the halogen lamps so, when driving in traffic on wet or damp roads (particularly at this time of year when the gritters are out), the road grime doesn't get baked on to the headlamp glass and the lights stay much cleaner

[n13l pm]

Just posting my photos of my HID kit. I installed it a few weeks before this Pilot HID kit theard was posted up. I got them from ebay imported from Hong Kong, it came to £100 after VAT and other taxes I paid at customs.

Unbelievable difference!! £100 Well spent!

[Spirit]

Mine passed it's MOT today, so they must have been happy with the beam pattern

[d i c k i e s]

very nice indeed both of you.

[K9NG]

Just bought some of these thanks for the heads up Pete
Am impressed with the quality of them for the price..

[Spirit]

Hey, well done Paul - for which car, the Audi ?

[K9NG]

Hey, well done Paul - for which car, the Audi ?

I bought them for the Pulsar, the Audi has factory xenons.

[pezza]

HIDs are def. the way to go! Best non power-up mod I think

Brian, the both H1 and H7 kits???

Looks good..Am rapidly running out of space to mount stuff in the engine bay??? I also wonder how anything survives for more than a week
in there due to heat???

[Eurospec]

Never saw this post before, but i just clicked the e-bay link and realised the supplier is Rice Rocket.

He is very very good, great reputation in the FTO community and if you have a problem with something he supplied he will sort it out. The guys name is David.

I bet he would do a group buy for you if there was interest.

Cheers,

Ben.

[Turbo_Steve]

You guys who are doing the main beam as well as the dipped, what are you doing about "flashing"? running the HIDs for brief periods of time is supposed to massively shorten their life Whether this is true or not, I don't know.
IIRC, though, Cars with factory HIDs seem to have Halogen main beams, I assume for this reason?