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The Final Headlight Replacement - HID and Accent Bulb

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  #21  
Old 04-23-2012, 07:51 PM
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Ar15fonsi, may I recommend against doing the 55W low beams. My main reason: do you get pissed when people drive towards you and have their high beams on? If so, think about this, with you using the 55W HID bulbs in your low beams, that would be like them having 4 sets of high beams on driving at you. It is the same amount of lumen (measure of light output). I am not saying not to, but at the same time, think about your fellow drivers. If you are familiar with the "bug bright light effect", then that is something that should really scare you.
 
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  #22  
Old 04-23-2012, 08:13 PM
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Originally Posted by Thermo
Ar15fonsi, may I recommend against doing the 55W low beams. My main reason: do you get pissed when people drive towards you and have their high beams on? If so, think about this, with you using the 55W HID bulbs in your low beams, that would be like them having 4 sets of high beams on driving at you. It is the same amount of lumen (measure of light output). I am not saying not to, but at the same time, think about your fellow drivers. If you are familiar with the "bug bright light effect", then that is something that should really scare you.
Thanks again Thermo, I didn't know that and I hate when drivers have their High beam when they shouldn't, So I wouldn't want to have other drivers experience that specially if its coming from me.

Ill keep it as it is, but I will definitely fix the adjusters its driving me crazy having such poor HL alignment. Have you done this btw?
 
  #23  
Old 04-24-2012, 06:56 AM
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Ar15fonsi, I have epoxy'ed the posts back together,but I have not replaced the adjusters. But, it should be pretty straight forward. The big thing will be getting the headlights back out. From there, as long as you don't have gorilla hands, you should be golden. Probably a good idea to remove the bulbs to free up that last little bit of space.
 
  #24  
Old 05-08-2012, 11:18 AM
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Originally Posted by spyderman
hello all,

well i decided not to wait for the forum to give any advice.

I took photos of this 2.5 hr project.

Yes you have to take off bumper, here are a few reasons why:
  • there really is not enough room to efficiently get your hands and eyes to the back of the light unit.
  • there are bolts behind the bumper to get the unit out.

here we go:
  1. here is a forum thread that has complete bumper removal. removing-front-bumper
  2. unplug fog light connector
  3. unbolt the 2 additional 10mm bolts under the light unit
  4. take off back covers to exposing the bulbs
  5. install new hid bulbs h1 style
  6. the metal clips will hold the bulb in place... The low beam is manufactured with less tolerance so i place a small zip tie around the metal clips once installed to ensure not to accidentally pop off.
  7. the brown wire is the negative - this is very helpful
  8. in the back of housings you will need to drill 7/8-1" diameter hole to allow wires to fit through. With the kit i got it came with a nice weatherproof grommet. ** note don't go any bigger the grommet will be too loose. If you need any extra room dremel out a relief for the connector to pass through
  9. once this complete connect ballasts for both lights.
  10. there is very little good spots to secure the ballasts behind the unit go this is something that is a pain
  11. reassemble in reverse order
  12. time spent: 2.5 hours, that included testing so now that i have done this you can save that time.



spyderman
awesome!!! Thanks!!!
 
  #25  
Old 05-09-2012, 02:11 PM
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  #26  
Old 05-09-2012, 02:41 PM
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Ar15fonsi, that kit is designed around feeding the HID bulbs the maximum voltage possible. When you deal with a vehicle like a Ford, they feed the headlights through a lot of wiring and are fed directly from the headlight switch. THis leads to a significant voltage drop. For some vehicles, this can lead to short HID bulb life. IN the case of our cars, the headlights are already powered from a relay, ensuring maximum voltage to the headlights, therefore maximum brightness.

So, do not worry about this kit. You car will be just fine without it.
 
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  #27  
Old 05-09-2012, 06:30 PM
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Originally Posted by Thermo
Ar15fonsi, that kit is designed around feeding the HID bulbs the maximum voltage possible. When you deal with a vehicle like a Ford, they feed the headlights through a lot of wiring and are fed directly from the headlight switch. THis leads to a significant voltage drop. For some vehicles, this can lead to short HID bulb life. IN the case of our cars, the headlights are already powered from a relay, ensuring maximum voltage to the headlights, therefore maximum brightness.

So, do not worry about this kit. You car will be just fine without it.
Like always Thermo thanks a lot for all your help.
 
  #28  
Old 05-13-2012, 05:46 PM
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Well the Ebay adjusters came in on Saturday, but since its Mothers day weekend here I was not able to work on it, hopefully next week, Ill take everything down and finally be able to place the HID kit on the Fogs.

Thermo Im going to send you a PM if you don't mind sir.
 
  #29  
Old 05-13-2012, 06:20 PM
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Not a problem and an answer has been sent back.
 
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  #30  
Old 05-18-2012, 08:31 AM
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WOWZA! this looks fantastic! I'm new to this forum, and now i've got waaay too many ideas for my car...
 
  #31  
Old 05-18-2012, 06:06 PM
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Well It has started, I received my headlight adjusters fix from Ebay this week, and I got my fog HIDs, going to be doing this over the weekend.

Here are some pics.

And BTW like always I wanna thank everyone for their help and support but Specially Mr. Thermo.

Thanks

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More to come when Im done with all
 
  #32  
Old 05-19-2012, 09:52 AM
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WOW FML real hard, the two new ballasts that came in for the FOG kit are bad, what r the odds of that?!?!?

I put the other ballasts in and they work.
 
  #33  
Old 05-19-2012, 12:46 PM
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Well luckily I found a local audio shop here where they sell HID kits, and they had an H11 kit that was fully plug n play, no need to drill no need to cut wires (but I already did cut my wire harness) I didn't even know they had those, anyway its really nice the bulb fits in the fog assembly just like the stock bulb.

It only cost me 80.00
 
  #34  
Old 05-19-2012, 02:29 PM
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hi,

installed a h1 6000k hid kit today - highbeams.

was very easy and looks good.

cheers.
 
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  #35  
Old 05-19-2012, 04:55 PM
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Ok so after all I'm done, I might change the fog bulbs later on (I already ordered them) for a set of 3000K bulbs, I wish I did find the local guy before I cut my fog OEM wire harness, It really don't matter, guess if i want to go stock again (don't think ill ever do that) I will have to splice the OEM connectors back on.

The only one problem I'm having, which is no big thing what so ever is the fact that my accent lights don't work now that Ive put an LED on it, the OEM bulbs worked but this ones will not turn on.

Aside from that Im fully converted, Fogs, LB & HB. All (6000K)

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  #36  
Old 06-03-2012, 05:35 PM
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Nice work!
I have a question about the lights. Can I just buy xenon bulbs and put them in the low-beam slots? Or will this cause problems, or even damage my car?
 
  #37  
Old 06-03-2012, 05:59 PM
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OrsonWelles, HID bulbs are completely different than your standard halogen bulbs. That would be like asking if you can put a jet engine into a car. yes you can, but there are modifications that need to be done. In the case of the HID bulbs into a non-HID car, you have to add a "ballast" piece between the car's wiring and the bulb. The car runs on 12 VDC where the HID bulbs run on 85 VDC. you would apply power, but you are not going to get the bulb to light up unless you install the ballast to do the voltage conversion for you.

Please keep in mind that I am specific when I talk about HID bulbs and non-HID bulbs. There are some xenon standard bulbs. In that case, yes, they can be directly plugged in. In short, if the new bulb plugs directly into the factory harness without any sort of modifications, then you will be fine. If you are having to cut off plugs to make things work, you are facing a chance of things not going good for you.

If you need more information about this, let me know. I have done a lot of vehicles where I have converted over the lighting to something new. On my Jag, I have converted some of the lighting over to 10MM LED bulbs which output a lot more light than even some of the multi-LED bulbs out there. You tell me what you are thinking and I will tell you how to get it done.
 
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Old 06-03-2012, 06:12 PM
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My suggestion would be to do all at once. As the amount of work to do it again is worth all at once. These dont hurt your car.
 
  #39  
Old 06-03-2012, 06:57 PM
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Thanks Thermo,
I just didn't understand why you put so much work into headlights. Now it makes much more sense!
I never use my high beams, so I would really only modify the low beams, and I would just prefer to put the best candle power into my car as I can. Furthermore, I don't have any mechanical back ground, so the removal of bumper and clamping ballasts down and all the labor you did seems overwhelming for my level of technical ability and lack of tools. Yet, I would attempt to convert my car into a model as you've done if you think it's actually not terribly technical and more so just time consuming and percisional work. I'd hate to buy bulbs that just aren't worth the trouble for little affect.
 
  #40  
Old 06-04-2012, 05:11 AM
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Orson, if you are near the DC area, let me know. I will have you come over and I can help you get it done. This is really a very easy modification. Just have to have a little bit of faith in what you can accomplish. There are some new options out there now so doing something like the fog lights has become much easier. But, the removal of the bumper cover is still a must for ease. Atleast with our cars, they are already wired to handle the HID bulbs. That can not be said about all cars.

Just to give you an idea of what difference we are talking about here, imagine this: A standard halogen bulb outputs roughly 1300 lumens of light (a lumen is a measure of light intensity), a 4300K HID bulb outputs 3300 lumen. Please keep in mind that the lumen output varies based on the color of the HID bulb. You can determine the color of the HID bulb by the temperature rating (the number followed by a "K"). 4300K is a almost white light with a little bit of a yellow halo to it. Not a perfect white, but still much whiter than a halogen bulb. You get step up to say a 6000K HID bulb, that will give you a snow white light, but you loose 200 lumen of light. If you step up to say 8000K bulbs, these now start to verge on a blue light and you loose another 200 lumen of light. It is all a matter of what you want out of your car. Since you seem to indicate you are after maximum light, you want to stick with the 4300K bulbs. Also, when looking at HID bulbs, the only DOT approved bulbs are the 35 watt HID bulbs. These are the ones that I was referring to above with the lumen output. Yes, they sell 50W/55W HID bulbs, but those are not DOT approved, so, installing them opens you up for the cops pulling you over.

Again, if you need any information, let me know. I will teach you everything that you would care to know about this.
 


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