I have an ’’03 VDP, potentially with original 7/2002 build H-7s and most certainly not replaced in my 5.5 years of ownership. It’s a well-worn tale: aging eyes at 76 years, probably dimming existing H-7s and being surrounded by vehicles with largely blinding and poorly placed LEDs, especially on DC’s Beltway where half the cars can be seen from the Space Shuttle and the other half are fools thinking because the dash is lit by the running lights mean they actually have headlights on or lightless Civics with loud mufflers playing zoom-zoom no signals dodgem across 4 lanes..

So: not wishing to spoil the classic look of the 308, I see the usual H-7 brands (Sylvania and Phillips) but I also see something called Osram which in one video seemed to outperform even LEDs. (EDIT: A stop at a Pep Boys reveals Osram is parent company to Sylvania, and there is a Sylvania-branded “gold, ZXE” H-7 bulb that bills itself as brighter but a shorter lifespan, though a 1-year warranty, than other Sylvania bulbs. I think it uses the words Xenon-charged” in the packaging. https://shop.advanceautoparts.com/p/...4aAsm5EALw_wcB

The above bulb is roughly $75 for two. I’m guessing as with all things you get what you pay for, but with a brighter bulb in an H-7 housing that brightness comes with a shorter lifespan.

I don’t see much discussion here on standard H-7s other than a few folks opting for LEDs, Angel Eyes, etc., which aren’t really for me. Is there a consensus brand or brand specific model (ultra, superduper, night stalker or whatever) that folks tend to prefer?

And now, I withdraw back into the dim light of a winter’s day in a deep and dark December, (extra points for catching the reference) and will take my 50 mile drive into the country tonight to play holiday tunes, then 50 miles back, with a great leap of faith.

Holiday greetings and cheers from Annandale-on-Beltway, VA

 

My last replacement bulbs were standard Hella H7’s, replacing previously fitted OSRAMs which are unavailable here. They compare favourably “in the real world” to my similarly old eyes. I have never been happy with the short life and no better performance of some of the higher end Sylvania options etc. and, as a bonus, the Hellas are surprisingly inexpensive. I opted for the standard bulb and not their long life option as the output is nominally higher and the light noticeably whiter.

 

I've been using a variety of extra-bright bulbs, including the Sylvania Silverstars, the Hella Performance 50+ and High Performance 2.0, and Philips VisionPlus, CrystalVision Platinum, Nighthawk, Nightguide Platinum, which are claimed to be up to 130% brighter than standard H7 bulbs. The Phillips VisionPlus I currently have are rated as 60% brighter than normal.

The downside is that the extra-bright bulbs only last 1 to 2 years, but to me it's well worth the significantly improved night vision.

I purchase these bulbs from Rock Auto, where prices are much lower than from local auto parts stores. For example, the Philips Nightguide Platinum H7 bulbs are $16.00 each plus tax and shipping.

Cheers,

Don

 

In my climate the supposed extra bright didn’t even last that long, probably because she gets parked indoors and that can be a 30C/80F temperature swing in the winter that’s really hard on the thinner filaments and/or the extra differential between their operating temperature and outside temperatures here.

 

Gents: as I head off into the darkness to pretend I know my way around my mandolin and bluff my way through holiday tunes, I thank you one and all for your responses and observations. Tomorrow I’ll work on the “let there be light” thing!

p.s. no one bit at the buried Paul Simon lyric to I Am A Rock!

To slightly close the book on this, I just ordered 4 of the brighter Hella H-7s and 4 regular Hellas plus 4 (to be safe) of the peanut bulbs for the pilot light. Figure I’ll start with the brighter ones and have the regulars in reserve. Our temps are not as severe as those in Edmonton. However, without a garage I am at the mercy of warmer temps to change these myself. My alternative is to take it to my Indy mechanic joint and pay them to replace the bulbs, first carefully warming the 23-plus-year-old sockets to make them pliable! Thanks again to everyone. (Oh, including shipping the Rock Auto bill was a whopping $40 USD.)

 

To totally close this out, we had a rare mid ‘50s degree day so I plunged in and was able to replace all 4 headlights and one of the peanut-like daytime running lights. I could not extract the DRL on the right(pax) side as there was a reasonably stiff and thick bit of cabling through the access hole complicating the right side. The new DRL on the left looked noticeably brighter than the one still on the right side. It was hard to tell in the daylight if the Hella H7P50s that were on Don B’s list of bulbs are markedly brighter than the old bulbs. I’ll find out come darkness! I have the regular Hella H7s recommended by Ken held in reserve.

A couple of the sockets released with squeezing by my hands. On two others depending on the location I used a channel lock or a set of long pliers with a 90-degree bend in the “tongs” near the end. .

FYI, I think there’s a good chance the bulbs I took out are originals. They are marked as Osram 64210. Given that Osram’s in Germany, I would think that increases the likelihood they suppled the OEM bulbs. This vehicle has accumulated ~56,000 in the 23 years since it was put into service and it likely hasn’t seen all that much nighttime driving.

One casualty: an LLBean Wicked Good flannel shirt onto which I bled reasonably profusely from a skin tear. Now I know why I nearly always saw my now-retired Indy mechanic with his sleeves buttoned up. The aging process totally sucks, but I’m still ahead of what I’d have paid to have this done.

Thanks again for the advice, gents.

 

I used AUTOONE GF series H7 LED lights for the main driving lights and Sylvania's brightest halogen H7s for the high beams. Both snapped right into good recepticals. But I had to go to Dave for newer light holders; the retaining plastic pieces all crumbled as I removed the old bulbs (as I have said before, yellow plastic is an olde English word for powder). But on my first, I replaced a bulb in the summer of 2002, easy peezie, popped right out and snapped in in seconds -- time is tough on these plastic pieces.

But I understand the damage to arms and back of hands; on my previous (2001), I gave blood replacing the water pump, thermostat and belt. The engineers who designed these must have had little paws . . .

 

Well, I gathered it all in a bright bunch of heather. I believe I used
a Sylvania H7, then noticed some disparency in the brightness, so installed
another.

 

I installed a set of fanless 6000k H7 LED bulbs in my high and low beams in early 2023 to replace the halogens. Light output is significantly better, I never get flashed by other drivers and they've lasted me about 40,000+ miles so far, no failures and no flickers. I also replaced the fog light bulbs with the same color LED as well as the little chicklet running lights that go in the high beam housings, so its all the same color. Working great, and they were inexpensive and I didn't have to do anything to modify the anchor points to get them to sit securely in the housings. First photo is LED high beams, halogen lows, second photo is all lamps replaced.

 

Ellot: I am unable to answer your message via this forum: send me your regular email address. Dave is shop.everydayXJ.com

jhartz@***.net

 

Wow, impressive. What brand were those? Thanks.

 

If you prefer light that is closer to pure white, look for bulbs with a color temperature in the 4000K to 4500K range. Bulbs with higher color temperatures are more blue to purple ("cool"), and bulbs with lower temperatures are more yellow to red ("warm"). For the HID lamps used in the X350, Jaguar chose 4200K.

 

The Duchess enjoys the two color option, and it seems attractive.
The inner light is sort of a bright yellow, while the outer headlight
is a brilliant white. Individuals have commented on how it seems to
make a "statement" going down the road. What that really means,
I have no idea....but it looks good to me.

 

I think LEDs must use a different scale or something. The ones I have are listed as 6000k, which if I were using HID lights would be well into purple (i had a set of HID bulbs in a VW that were 5000k and they had a blue hue to them when looking at the car, but the light on the road was pretty white), these are white as can be, not a hint of color to the bulbs or the light on the road. Its weird and doesn't make much sense to me, but seems to be accurate, at least in my limited firsthand experience.

 

My understanding is that the color-temperature scale in kelvins is the same for all visible light-emitting sources, but different standards of what constitutes "white" do exist. For example, "D50 is scientific shorthand for a standard illuminant: the daylight spectrum at a correlated color temperature of 5000 K." (Wikipedia)

My assessment is that various vendors of incandescent, LED and HID bulbs are not scientifically accurate in the ratings the ascribe to their devices, because I've had 5000K bulbs that were very blue and 5000K bulbs that were close to white (to my eyes).

Also, human beings perceive light differently from one person to another. For example, in the photos you posted, to my eye, the high beams are many shades more blue than the low beams, which are significantly more yellow. But capturing emitted light in photos is difficult, so what you see on your car in real life is likely very different from what we see in your photos.

I personally like all of the front lights on my cars to be similar in perceived color temperature, which has required some experimentation with different bulbs for low & high beams and fog lamps. I think my X308 currently has the Philips VisionPlus extra-bright halogen bulbs rated at 4200K. The fog lamps are LEDs rated at 5000K, and do appear very slightly blue compared to the headlamps, but they're the closest I could find to the headlamp color.

Philips literature states that color temperature will vary from bulb to bulb.