Lightbulbs !

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H2o-uk

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I want to get some brighter bulbs for my A4 and did purchase some of the cheap H7 Xenon Gas replacement bulbs on ebay. The bulbs although E Marked do look a little on the blue side and dont appear to be any brighter that the standard phillips halogen ones that were in there in the first place. I have been looking around and after a visit to Halfords I found some Super Bright bulbs, but I noticed they are 100w instead of the usual 55w. I've found a seller on Ebay doing the same ones at a third of the price :

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=250352367427

What do you guys think, are these things worth a look, would they be ok to replace the stock bulbs.

Thanks as always for your help
 
what tends to ahppen with these, is the wiring cant cope with the extra current draw and the voltage drops, so they end up no brighter than before, and run the possibility of setting fire to your wiring loom.

If you install nice beasty relay switched feeds directly to the headlights then it will likely be brighter though,
 
yer, I thought as much, I'm not gonna bother. I'll probably just upgrade to a set of facelift headlamps at some stage with projector lenses.
 
where is the best place to buy a HID kit?

my facelift projector lights a *****! light output is really weak. power from battery is good and i have some phillips bulbs but still don't get much light output.

whould a set of HID's make a diff?
 
yer the HID's will help

Just remember its a bit of a legal dodgy area...

Legally you require washer jets and auto levelling if you fit HID's, and while these features are available from HID equipped A4's i'm not sure how easy it would be to retrofit them to the older cars.
 
you being for real?

I thought it was just plug and play.
 
washer jets? really. how stupid.

By bizarre coincidence my 100w bulbs from autobulbs direct arrived today!
I bought some phillips +80% 55w super burn your eyeballs bright blue chavvy ones for £30... (except the bright blue bit) and should have listened to my inner voice.

they are not brighter than the poxy £8 halogen ones that were in! not even a little.
So I spent £12 on some 100W which I have fitted one of to the low beam projector on one side this afternoon.
not a huge difference if any in late afternoon daylight but I will take a picture tonight (when I fix my brakelight!).

I know mini's with poxy lucas wiring had burn up problems with people running bigger light bulbs but will give em a go. if the car burns up I am well insured!

What I would though is Autobulbsdirect do a nice line in free gift, side light bulbs in blue which look really white instead of yellow.
nice touch.
 
osram night breakers 90% brighter! £18 delivered from powerbulbs
 
bet they are not 90% brighter! if my 80%'s are anything to go by!

been outside and my 100W's are defo brighter but not 200% as the wattage would suggest. would need to drive it to see but can't be ***** tonight.
road test later!
 
try and invest in HID's best thing ive done to the car i would only recommend on facelift though
 
Yaa got mine from ebay for £50 well worth it for the OEM look 4300k is a must
 
jcb: the audi wiring will be unlikely to go on fire, but it could still have enough resistance to cause voltage drop, which will impede the brightness of the bulbs. I'd test the voltage to the back of the bulb itself with the engine running to see how much drop your getting compared with the 55w bulb and if its significant it might be worth beefing up the supply to improve the brightness further.

and yes, legally HID's need high pressure washers and auto levellers, i'm also sure most MOT stations have been issued notes from VOSA to fail cars that have been retrofitted with HID's without these parts fitted.
 
i'll have to make time and nip down to my local MOT station to find out.
 
legally HID's need high pressure washers and auto levellers, i'm also sure most MOT stations have been issued notes from VOSA to fail cars that have been retrofitted with HID's without these parts fitted
Click to expand...

Because there are so many makes of car that have an HID swappable headlight as an option on facelifted models (Audi / Rover / Vauxhall) It is my understanding that the MOT centres are incredibly hot on this !!
 
There is a document on the DfT website. The basic jist is any retrofitted HID kit must be in a lense designed to work with HID lamps and must have self levelling suspension and high pressure headlight washers. If any of these points aren't ahered to then the conversion is illegal
 
Izzy1 said:
you got a link to that?
Click to expand...

i cant seem to find it now bought them a while ago now ill keep looking i managed to save on postage as i collected it from s/e london
 
interesting, do you think my S4 bumper with fixed headlight washer covers would fool the MOT centre!?
no space behind it as the intercooler takes up all available space!
 
When I had the MOT done on my A4 just over 4 weeks ago I gave the tester a good grilling over HID kits and whether the VOSA would in future instruct test centres to fail any cars with such kits fitted???
The reply came that they weren't aware this was in the offing, and that at present my particular MOT place would pass any vehicle that had an HID kit fitted, as long as the headlight alignment was correct etc at the time of the test.....
Based on that reply I gambled £40 on a 4300K set of Xenons with thin digital ballasts via Ebay and fitted them and have to say they are great!
If they do get banned then they will be very easy to swap back to the PIAA bulbs I had fitted before, in the meantime will just enjoy the fact that I can actually see where I'm going at night now,lol.......................
 
was that second hand? I would gamble £40! thats a great deal, did the ballasts fit ok? in the OEM slot?
 
Izzy1 said:
you got a link to that?
Click to expand...

rasA4 said:
i cant seem to find it now bought them a while ago now ill keep looking i managed to save on postage as i collected it from s/e london
Click to expand...

FOUND IT! Here

i collected mine to save £10 on postage

LOCAL PICK UP

item can be collected from London or Kent, i only accept cash on collection, no cheques please.
£49.99 FOR ALL BUYER WHO WISH TO ARRANGE A PICK UP.

one thing i would say they do have slim ballast however there is another block which is a bit bulky i have a pic of my install of which i will dig out
 
so he didn;t charge you £50 to collect it then?
 
£60 posted or £50 collected, yes i got them for £50 collected
 
I'm currently addressing the issues on the legality on retro-fitted HID:

1) Plug-and-play auto-levelling, for pre-facelift B5, quattro and FWD.
2) Plug-and-play auto-levelling, for post-facelift B5, quattro and FWD.
3) Plug-and-play auto-levelling, for B6 / B7, quattro and FWD.
4) Plug-and-play headlamp washer system, all models.

The headlamp washer system will be an issue on B5 cars not fitted with either S4 bumpers, or regular A4 bumpers that have the washer jets already in place.

I have fitted the first levelling kit to Outlaw, and will be replacing the OEM manual level control in the centre console with a blank.

My headlamp washer jets are already fully operational.
 
If anyone's worried about headlight washers being an issue, I might be selling my S4 bumper soon.
 
what is a levelling kit? I thought they all came with the headlamp remote adjust by the steering wheel.
Do HID's do it autmatically? how does that work?
 
Theres a little sensor thing attached to the NSF and i think NSR wheel arch and attaches to the suspension arm, so it knows the pitch of the car, and works out the motor position from that.
 
i wondered how they are affected by lowering the car?

Does it just calculate the difference front-rear and use that?
 
^^^ The bracket that holds the sensors has slotted bolt holes, and if the car is lowered, the sensor has to be moved by a comparable amount +/-
 
sounds like a right ball ache to fit aftermarket ones.
does it constantly adjust the HID angle?
 
why does it have to have washers? seems strange.
 
ian52 said:
why does it have to have washers? seems strange.
Click to expand...

Because dirty lanses actually dazzle oncoming drivers worse than clean ones.
It's to do with the combination of the projector, and HID lighting, add dirt, and it has a dazzling effect.
 
jcb said:
was that second hand? I would gamble £40! thats a great deal, did the ballasts fit ok? in the OEM slot?
Click to expand...

No brand new......
I was going to remove the headlamps and fit the (very thin!) digital ballasts to the underneath of the OE Valeo headlamps but chickened out (didn't want to risk scratching the paint when removing headlamps) and so cable-tied the ballasts to suitable points in the engine bay......
HID kit was £27 buy it now plus £16 carriage from Hong Kong on Ebay and am very happy so far, no OBC errors and cheaper than a set of PIAA bulbs................
 
I too would take the HID gamble, the set i fitted to the A3 originally cost £32 posted, but we chose 6000k and i didnt like the light output so opted for some 50W 4300k replacements and they are great, how the lights should be IMHO. I have taken the time to adjust them properly so as not to dazzle oncoming traffic but still allow us to see.

My A4 has a HID kit fitted too, and i fitted the ballast in the OE space so the headlight is a self contained plug in unit, i also used a 4300k setup but 35w was sufficient for the A4s facelift lights. I have an S4 bumper with working washers, i would just need to splice the self leveling system into the manual wiring to fully comply, howewver she has past the past 3 mots with them fitted

In the high beam on both we have Osram Silver stars, the only bulb i have used in ages that actually does what it says on the tin, great light output and so far good life
 
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