I can vouch for this. I've got the hella h4 lows, and kept the sealed highs because they really aren't that bad. anyway, I bought some HID look alike halogens... just waiting for my regular bulbs to burn out to put them in ;)
--Mike
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I suggest Hella or Cibie glass headlights to replace sealed beams, plug and play. NEVER had a problem seeing, and I'm rather picky about light on the road. Of course I use the halogen lamps the headlight is designed for, H1 or H3 or H4, as needed.
Not against HID, just against poor quality misaligned HID lamps. Reflector Headlights are very sensitive to filament position.
Glass headlights with headlight protection film are VERY resistant to damage; I had a pickup truck bumper bck into my headlight, completely bent the headlight bucket - lights were in the treetops, but no breakage. I'm a believer.
I suggest Hella or Cibie with high output standard wattage bulbs, clear glass of course. No re-engineering needed. Ask for pics, prices if interested.Leave a comment:
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DEPO are Junk
I was using the Bosch H4/H1 conversion since 2006 and couldnt have been happier with them. About a year ago i swapped in PIAA 4000K H4/H1 halogen bulbs, visibilty was great. unfortunaly it became time for new lenses in january. thinking it was a good time to update the look of the lenses I purchased a new set of DEPO euro smilies with 6000K H1 HID (lows) from Stealthauto. The headlight adjusters were of very poor quality, half broke during the initial aiming of the lights after installation. The DEPO's seem to put out a much wider and brighter inital low beam pattern, however I was extremly disappointed to find that the DOPO HID projector low beams cut off was about half that of my old Bosch lenses with PIAA bulbs. I reused my PIAA H1 bulbs for the DEPO hign beams. The range was decent, the beam pattern was very similar spot lamps, however the light output was again a disappointment from my Bosch lenses. After about 6 weeks of the DEPO`s installed in my car both low beam projector leses cracked a day apart. i went out the first morning swept the snow off and started my car to let it warm up leaving the lights on. when i returned to leave for work i was shocked to see the passenger low beam lens split in a complete circle around the out side of the lens. the very next morning warmed the car again with the lights on, came out to leave and found the drivers low beam lens spidered into about 8 pieces. Overall i was extremly disappointed by the DEPO lights: field of vision, quality and durability. I called and emailed STEALTHAUTO about the quality and durability of the lights. Noone has been bothered to return my calls or emails in over 2 weeks now. In conclusion I CAN NOT reccomend the DEPO headlight Brand to anyone or dealing with STEALTHAUTO.Leave a comment:
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WAIT. I really hope you haven't done anything yet because I really want to see someone try these.
HIR bulbs. Supposed to be the nest best thing to the best HID's and you literally don't need to do anything except buy them and put them in your existing 9005 and 9006 sockets. Please try it.
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Politics and Religion
Just posting from personal experience. MANY others have HID's as well (for 5+ years) and have no complaints. Never have I been "flashed." I don't see what the problem is. They are a great improvement over stock that don't require a ton of work.Leave a comment:
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Ya go HID cause they are legit...................
Plus then you can help feed a kid in China as sweat shops pay good.Leave a comment:
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Depo smilies (I have the smoked version) with DDM tuning 55w ballasts and bulbs. 5000k low, 6000k high. Both 55w. They work excellent. They light up the road extremely well and haven't given me any issues in the almost 2 years that I've had them. I also jumped a relay so the highs and lows stay on at the same time. It was a VERY simple installation.
Old stuff out (had sealed beams too)
New headlights in
HID kit:
Take the black/blue wire out of the suction cup thing and seal up the holes
Hook up the ballast like this:
Drill a hole in the headlight cap (1 inch)
Put bulb in
Take apart the sealed beam connector: (you don't need to do this, you can use Something Like This and plugs into the stock sealed beam connector.)
Figure out which wire is power and which is ground (brown). There should be three wires (low beam). One is the power, one is ground, and the other you won't be needing.
Hook up the black wire to ground and the blue wire to the power wire
Hook up the rest of the headlight/ballast
The other wire (blue/white) is the one you won't be needing...go ahead and use a wire nut on the end of it for protection
Both low beams on
For the high beams I'm running the same HID kit. The wiring is the same procedure (the only difference is that there will only be 2 wires that plugged into the original sealed beam....one is ground, brown, and the other is power)
I also jumped the relay (#30) so that I could run the high beam and the low beam at the same time
Adjusting the cutoff:
All done and cleaned up
Last edited by jaywood; 03-02-2013, 05:59 PM.Leave a comment:
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Headlight upgrade
Ditto on sealed beams, they are not useful.
Amber is the color for turns, but yellow is common for headlights. May be a fine distinction, but still, you might want to consider yellow tinted headlight film ($12 a pair, perfect size for 146mm (5-3/4") lights. If you don' like the color, you can apply two for more, or peel it off and be back to clear. Any color will reduce output, and my experience on the 101, you need more rather than less light- lows are in use most of the time. The majority of cars that I see with yellow headlights are highs, not lows.
BMW did a really good headlight design with Hella back in the 80's for the e30, it's called the BiFocal, and it is fantastic. It's a low beam, ALL low beam. It uses an H1 bulb, it's metal, and has a city light option if you like that sort of thing. Made for the Euro market, they never made it over here until now.
They are around $96 each, but boy do they make light! If you can afford them, you can play with bulbs and film to make them as bright and /or as yellow as you like, do you know if there's an HID for H1 lights???
Let me know if you want pics or technical data on them, I have these available on short notice if you want.
There are several good and relatively cheap High beam options, I like the Cibie flat face H1 highs, also available on short notice.
BTW, that's a French Yellow Cibie CSR in my profile pic, sorry, they are NLA.Leave a comment:
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I recently installed the DEPO smileys on my '91 318is and couldn't be happier. There are many people who will decry the Taiwanese replicas as garbage and unworthy, but the fact of the matter is that they are new ellipsoid projectors for $125 shipped. The look identical to the real ones. And I do speak from experience as I had Hella smoked smileys on my M3 - I promise you there is not much difference after they're installed, but you do have to be gentle as the plastic frames aren't as hefty as the Hella/Bosch pieces. If the DEPOs collect moisture - fine, reseal or vent them. No big deal. They work great and I'd recommend them.
I will say that if I was updating a nice, low-mileage E30 M3 then I would spring for factory parts, but why would I buy a set of headlights that are worth 10% the market value of my car?Leave a comment:
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