Suzuki 4WD Club of Victoria

I think we need a tech topic to cover HID's including choosing and installing them in our vehicles for off-road use.

As Ross has mentioned in another thread the advantages of HID's are lower draw, lower wattage and lower temperature. One of the benefits is that they don't require a loom upgrade. On the down side they are illegal on the road if they are not a Factory fitment.

They come in a range of colours and wattages. I have considered the 35W or 55W and 4200K to 4500K H4 Hi/Low for my application. There is another option to consider that may help on the road and that is a HID high/halogen low combo. I don't know if this overcomes the legal side of things by having the low beam halogen as I haven't checked the regs but it would not attract attention like a HID low beam would. Of course you do reduce the advantages of being completely HID.

Ok, from what i can tell so far it appears that HID low beams require the self-levelling and cleaning system and that high beams and driving lights are free of those sorts of restrictions. If you know otherwise please correct me.

If you were to stay HID low then the 35W kit in a 4200K - 4500K would probably be the least obvious and it would pay to make sure that your lights are clean and correctly adjusted as well to reduce the impact on other road users.

Another issue to consider is the design of the headlight that they are going into as this has a major impact on the pattern of light projected. The wrong design could throw light all over the place which includes oncoming traffic which is not cool.

As my Sierra has a 7" round sealed beam I would need to purchase new lights for this installation. Any suggestions out there on what or what not to use?

Important note..... HID's DO NOT like frequent starts. This makes them unsuitable for applications where they are turned on and off frequently - and thats high beam. They include a forced restart mechanism but the electrical stress placed on the lamp is significant so should be avoided for "normal operation".

Apart from the life issue they take time to come up to operating output and that also is a problem with high beam. Any HID mechanism needs to have the lamp operating all the time and the optical properties changed to form the required Hi/LOW beam pattern. Driving lights operate under the same rules but because they are aux. lamps the issues of starting/warmup are less objectionable.

To get around this the applied options are......

Some of the "technologies" used in aftermarket lamps ( a summary only - would take 50 pages of me rambeling on to cover fully )

Linear Magnetic sliding shutter - an electromagnet moves an optical shutter under the discharge tube. The shutter is de-energised on low beam.

Linear Magnetic sliding lamp - in this case the mountain moves rather than...... less preferred as the HT connection must flex.

Halogen Hi - a halogen lamp is placed next to the diascharge tube ( sometimes just glued on ). This is VERY unsatisfactory... blow the high bean and the whole lamps u/s, the halogen isn't in the correct optical position etc etc...

Vertical magnetic or stepper shutter - the OEM way... a vertical "blade" style shutter is used to control beam formation. this really only works with factory projection optics and requires substantial depth so is suspect for retrofit.

Projection HID low seperate Halogen HI - ie two lamps. Once again this is a factory option as the reflector design for the HID low needs to be optomised.

In all cases of a lamp assembly being fitted into a standard "H" lamped headlight there are challenges that are technicaly an issue. The most significant is the the effective optical length and discharge intensity profile of the discharge lamp differs significantly from that of an incandescent lamp. This means that the reflector desigh is WRONG for an HID and so pattern will also be wrong. No combination of shutter / lamp etc can overcome this basic desigh difference in an effective manner.

So cj! the operating realities of HID really require them to be the low beam or combined low/hi source.
A halogen high significantly reduces the appeal of the system IMO.

And a "general purpose" downside of powerfull lights - in the wet / fog / dust etc the extra light output works against you. having multiple lamps/patterns mitigates this if they are selected appropriately. My spread beams cover almost 180 deg and project a pattern that's about 750mm high at 5m, making them less of a PITA in the wet. The mid range tend to creat a wall of light that's not great in the wet.

I kneel before the font of all knowledge

We have now crossed HID high/halogen low of the list.

It appears that it's between a 35W 4200K low or an upgraded loom and an upgraded H4 like the 90/130W with an as yet to be determined headlight or Quartz halogen sealed beam. As you know, it is not a daily driver but I do need to travel through town to get to the tracks and that may mean returning in the dark. I'm also keen on night drives and there will be additional driving lights that could conceivably be converted to HID.

Is there any headlight that is the best of a bad bunch when considering an option for the HID's?

Thoughts?

cj! wrote:I kneel before the font of all knowledge

I'm not certain how to take that cj!....... that's the risk of asking questions - you may
get a detailed answer, backed by informaton and then of course you get opinons, rumors,
urban legends and recomendations based on "I bought" so it must be good......

Still I have access to information that may be more technical that is commonly available,
and I certainly have used a headlight alligner / pattern checker so the amount of
speculation is minimal.

Of course its up to the reader to assess its accuracy and worth to them.

For what its worth CJ I really think that for a toy vehicle I would go HID High and Low Beam kit.

It means no mucking around with the loom, a single globe with a centred focal point giving an even spread beam ( you can even play with the focal point by fabbing a spacer for the globe to get the best light from the headlight - But i'd do this after testing the standard fitment - normally most people are happy with the improved light output of HID). Adjusting the headlight to not blind oncoming traffic should be easy enough and as the vehicle will only be driven occasionally I really don't think you will have to worry about the cyclic rate life of the HID globe. At the moment we replace HID Hi/Low globes for $46 retail. These will become cheaper in the future.

We sell the plain "focal" lense which has metal body and glass lens which I think is the best upgrade light that we deal with. The magnified lens version I haven't used myself. I am going to test the light patterns of both headlights soon so I will pass on the results.

a link to the "focal" lens I deal with: http://www.4h.com.au/prod337.htm
A link to the "magnified" lens I deal with: http://www.4h.com.au/prod212.htm
HID Hi/Low Beam kits 55w: http://www.4h.com.au/prod336.htm
HID Hi/Low Beam kits 35w: http://www.4h.com.au/prod335.htm

I can supply a kit to you if you need one at better than prices indicated. Maybe we can chat at the next club meeting.

Cheers
Dan