Grey Ghost

http://www.intellexual.net/hid.html#bulbs

saw a recent thread about changing the stock temperature HID bulbs to aftermarket and decided to reply and make a new thread about this for those individuals who are even considering installing an "HID Kit" in their non-hid equipped cars/ early 350z's


this really does educate about the myths and truths about HID and basically tells us that any temperature higher than 4300-4800k/higher than OE HID is useless and actually performs less than OE systems

Will_Evo

Good information but its way to opion based . This article states that purple and blue lights are less bright than the 4100K, and is true, but they are still way brighter, use less energy, last longer, and look better than halogens. Personally if i were buying HID's I wouldn't worry to much about how bright they are, especially if every color temperature avaliable are still at least 3 times brighter than halogens. All in all what Im saying is, who cares if the driver is looking for a purple bulb I doubt they are concerned about differences within the HID spectrum rather the difference between that specific bulb and stock/halogens.

redlude97

iTrader: (11)

More BS uneducated information. Can you explain how these magical blue and purple bulbs put out 3 times the output a halogen bulb puts out when a stock 4100k bulb puts out ~3200 lumens, and a Halogen bulb puts out 1500 lumens? Thats barely more than double the halogens output, so your blue and purple bulbs must be putting out 4500+ lumens of output. AMAZING!

stylett9

iTrader: (9)

i think his point was that alot of people that buy aftermarket HID kits/bulbs do it for the looks, not the technical output. But in general, even if you get a blue or purple color HID, its still brighter then stock. maybe not by much.

redlude97

iTrader: (11)

Well most of the Z's came WITH HID's, so changing those bulbs out for blue/purple ones are significantly dimmer than stock, to the point that they are as bad a halogen.

Zivman

iTrader: (19)

As true and as informative as the article is, it is all but lost on the majority of the members in this forum. If they want blue lights, no information you can post will persuade them otherwise.

Will_Evo

Numbers were wrong but the point of what i was stayin still stands, A buyer could care less about how the change from white to blue or purple HIDS brightness are if they are still going to look and perform better than the halogen they had before. And if you are changing from HID to HID, then you already know how effective they are, suffer a small amount of birghtness to complete the over all look of your car? not that big a deal if you ask me.

Im not trying to get under your skin bro, just sayin the article has good info, no doubt it'll educate anyone on how HID's work and what they are, but what you posted saying that anything over 4800K is useless just isn't accurate according to the article you posted right above your comment. An HID is still an HID no matter what color temp you choose and will still perform better in every aspect including brightness than a halogen. And switching from HID to HID....its still HID and serves its purpose while giving the driver the desired effect.

usmanasif

iTrader: (4)

That is your problem right there. You believe that no matter what the Kelvin rating of an HID bulb, it would still be brighter than halogen. How about you look up how much light a 12K HID bulb puts out in lumens, compare it to a cheap halogen, and then get back to us.

stylett9

iTrader: (9)

Sorry i guess i should have been more specific. Aftermarket HID kit compared to NON HID headlights. I thought that was assumed since that's what the article was comparing.

stylett9

iTrader: (9)

while what you say is true, like a few others have said. People that buy aftermarket HID kits typically do it for the looks. Not for the performance. And most cases people are buying between 6-8k which is still better then halogen. Under extreme cases of a few people that buy 12k, I'm pretty sure they are well aware of waht they are doing before buying that color.

anyhow, i love my stock HID's. Sometimes i wish they were a little bit more blue but i know on days that it rains, it's already hard enough trying to see the wet road with factory HID's.

Nexx

iTrader: (41)

sounds like people are trying to justify their rice... i would never sacrifice light output for a pretty color.

Acree

iTrader: (29)

I love how you're forgetting the effect that a blue or purple bulb has in bad weather. White/yellow light helps pierce through fog, rain snow, etc. Try driving through a heavy rain with 8k bulbs in, and tell me that's better than halogens.

The facts are simple. The reason cars started using HID technology is better lighting, and more efficiency. To maximize the output of an HID system, the bulbs need to be rated 4100k to 4300k to produce the whitest light possible. Anything over that, and you get diminished light output with increasingly poor weather visibility.

-Acree

Ziggyrama

iTrader: (15)

Interesting article. The truth about the HIDs has been known around the enthusiast circles for some time now. I think if you're serious about lighting, you know that anything above 5K will significantly compromise your visibility on the road. The biggest problem I have with people slapping the retro kits on their cars is the blinding effect. There's a lot of glare to the oncoming traffic which is very unsafe. If you guys want some more very good reading, check out this website (very good source of lighting knowledge):

http://www.danielsternlighting.com/

Go to the Tech section and read up on some stuff. Worth the time.

I am myself a Base owner and I don't have HIDs. Given the fact that we have H7 projectors in the Base Z makes me want to consider doing a retrofit. The H7 design is as good as it will get for HID retrofit and because it's a projector, the cutoff beam will not be a problem so I won't be blinding anybody. I guess the only question left is the light patter distribution. How much foreground light will I get with the kit and if I will have hot spots on the light projection. If those are reasonable, it may be worth considering.

I find it interesting that the guy in the article mentioned did no comparison of the HID kit in a decent projector housing against an OEM HID projector. I'd be curious to see how the H7 projector compares. I know it won't be the same but the design of the H7 is as favorable for this as it gets.

Will_Evo

Your still beating around the bush but I didn't come on these forums to argue, so agree to disagree. To each his own.

350zDex

iTrader: (12)

I just ordered some 6k hids from hid sin i have an 05 base model Z and i hate the stock lights so i wanted hids. I dont really care for the color but it looks nice too i just wanted brighter lights so 6k gives out good light output i dont really like the 4300k stock hid output so i just went for 6k something a little different ive had hids before i like them no matter what anyone else thinks my opinion..

Biochem7

iTrader: (8)

Output with the retrofit will be much better than the H7 halogens. However, you will have hotspots and a not so great beam pattern.

Changvi

iTrader: (66)

LOL....i was trying to understand what justifies you to purchase 6k HID versus 4300k HID since there were no grammar. So basically you just like the color, not functionality? Typical rice burner mentality....

SOLO-350Z

iTrader: (26)

Actually the highest you can go is 5k-5500k for HID before it starts losing the brightness. Any higher than that, then yes it does NOT produce as much light as the stock 4800k.

SOLO-350Z

iTrader: (26)

A lot of people are confused because they are misinformed. A lot of people are using the color temperature as a marketing gimmick. Now, I'll state it very clearly:

The color temperature is measured in Kelvin(K)
The brightness is measured in lumens
The intensity is measured in Candela

Now, a lot of mechanics suggest an 8000K HID, claiming that it is brighter. Theoretically, they are trying to get you to think that the higher the K, the brighter the HID. WRONG! Kelvin is used to measure color temperature, NOT brightness.

The 4300K HID which is used in OEM vehicles is slightly yellowish. The 6000K HID produces a brilliant white color with a slight hair of blue. The light produced is brilliant white. The 8000K HID is bluish color. The 10000K HID is greenish blue and the 12000K HID is purplish. So bear in mind, KELVIN = COLOR. The color temperature also in NO WAY indicates how hot the HID is operating at.

Now, some people might ask, then, which HID is brighter? Research and development has shown that the 4300K produces the best light output which is about 3200 lumens. That is why OEM cars utilize the 4300K HIDs. The 6000K HID produces about 2800 lumens of light. As you can see, all factors remaining constant, the higher the color temperature, the lower the brightness.

There really are only 2 good HID brands out there, namely, Philips and Osram. Hella and Bosch ballasts are not bad as well. The bulbs are basically by Philips or Osram. Philips is the pioneer of the HID technology. The bulbs are produced with state of the art machine and meant for long durability. Some sellers claim to be selling 8000K Philips HID, but that's a FAKE. For your information, Philips HID is only rated up to 5800K which is marketed as the Philips 6000K Ultinon.

Why is it that they don't produce bulbs with higher Kelvin? It defeats the purpose of HIDs because anything higher would require a blue coat filter to achieve the color effect. By doing that, brightness will be reduced dramatically and we might as well just stay on with the conventional halogen, as there is not much improvement.

As for people who has a 6000K HID coated with blue coating, they probably bought some cheap HID where the manufacturer does not have the technology to produce proper HIDs. By right, 6000K should still be achievable without coating.

Another thing to consider is, get a high quality HID bulb as the bulbs retrofitted into your headlights must have the same point as your halogens so that the lights will reflect off the reflectors at the same point as the original halogens. Screw this part up and you will get uneven light distribution which oncoming traffic will then consider as glare.

For those who use the Halogen bulbs with HID looks, a.k.a "blue bulbs". NO, THOSE ARE NOT HID. A lot of people are under the impression that those bulbs are HID. So I am going to say it again, those are just normal halogen bulbs which are just coated blue to filter off the yellow spectrum and thereby giving you the whitish bluish effect. Yes, you might get the looks but definitely not the brightness and the intensity.

I hope this post of mine here will help many of you out there in answering you questions and clearing your doubts. I love HID, and I am never going back to halogens. Some people might say HID is blinding. The fact is they don't know the benefits of HID and also their perception came from those who were irresponsible enough to not adjust their headlamps to ensure the beam shines the road and NOT oncoming traffic. The same goes to those halogen users who changed their bulbs but screwed up the reflected beam.

Those who have yet to adjust their headlamps, please go out, lower yourself to a seating level and look at your headlights. If you think they are a sore to your eyes, do humanity a favor, and please readjust your headlamps.

phreaktor

iTrader: (22)

+1 for my 8000K