HID questions

From what I've read, most of the ballasts and what not are made by all the same companies anyway. I've known about ddmtuning for awhile, and I just was on their site exploring. Apparently they have a new version of their lights and now offer a lifetime warranty.

http://www.ddmtuning.com/Products/Apexcone-Raptor-HID-Kit

What would I need to get to install those in my wagon? I know the headlights now are 9004's, but it mentions paying extra for a dual-in/dual-out harness. Do I need this? My initial guess is no, but I'd like to defer to the experts first.

Did you read this yet?

Take it from a guy who has done EVERYTHING for lighting on these cars.

The most cost effective way to get decent lighting from our cars is very simple.

Get a pair of reproduction headlights from eBay (with brackets and corners) for about $75 shipped. (Or polish your stockers clear again for free)

Get a set of $29 HID's for 9004 from ddmtuning.com

Install on car.

Done.

All that for less than $110 bucks with ALL NEW parts. Not bad. Those are more than adequate for daily driving. Not all the light is usable, but it is a LOT brighter and wider than stock. I have this setup on my Impala. They really do rock for the money. And I don't get flashed. Never once.

Projectors. The great debate... I have projectors on my truck, and have had a couple sets on my wagon, and they are just not worth the effort to me anymore. I actually miss being able to read street signs and mailboxes with them. They don't light up high at all. NOTHING above the cutoff. Which sucks if you're looking for a street at night and you've never been there before... I only have them on my truck because the lights were busted when I bought it and the projectors for those were dirt cheap. No options like that for our cars...

On the marshmallow I have a set of the tinted clear lights from Street Trends (or eBay) that you can usually get for about $150 shipped and a set of the 4500K HID's from ddmtuning.com. They rock. Very happy with them. They look killer during the day, and at night... And I never get flashed.

Don't waste your money on the high beam HID's. The cheap ones suck. You will NEVER use the high beams, and won't have a need for them if you don't have projectors with the HID's anyways. If you need them for inspection purposes, just swap in stock bulbs for your inspection and swap the HID's back in after you get your sticker.

All that said, the best lighting I ever had on my cars was a set of BMW projectors from an old 5 series with regular Halogen Silverstars in them and a kickass non-projector high beam. You coulda landed a a jet with those, and they were a factory light! The SStreetlights (that are no longer produced) really rock the house, too, but they are biiiiiig money and not worth it, unless you want it for style points.

That's my $.02, HTH!

I bought several kits off ebay for my cars and they do make a big improvement over stock lighting. I bought a set of 9004 dual beam HIDs for my 9C1, and a kit for one of my wagons that I still need to install. The light pattern is scattered, but still lights the road great. I prefer the 4300k lights, the color is close to factory HIDs. 5000k looks ok too, but any more than that looks too ricey to me ). One good thing about these kits I have been buying is they bypass the factory harness and only plug into one of the original light sockets to turn on a rely (like the harness innovative wiring sells to upgrade the factory light harness). I have 3 of these kits running and so far no issues with them. For the high beams they use a solenoid to move the HID lamp in and out which works well, dual lamp HIDs don't work so well because you have to wait for the lamp to warm up. Here's the ones I bought: http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/HID-KIT-Bi-Xenon-BIXENON-H-L-9003-H4-9004-9007-H13-_W0QQcmdZViewItemQQhashZitem3cb01eabffQQitemZ260652837887QQptZMotorsQ5fCarQ5fTruckQ5fPartsQ5fAccessories

How about these here?
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/1991-1996-CHEVY-CAPRICE-SMOKE-HEADLIGHTS-CORNER-91-96-_W0QQcmdZViewItemQQfitsZModelQ3aCapriceQQhashZitem2561103f9dQQitemZ160542244765QQptZMotorsQ5fCarQ5fTruckQ5fPartsQ5fAccessories

Those are the capsules I have in the marshmallow... Did you read what I wrote? All that time I took for you...

So those are good.


Noted. Money-saving is go! (Although, if I don't end up buying stuff at Daytona... well... much stuff. I'll get them right after)

They suck with stock or silverstar bulbs though. You will need HID's with them.

And you can get them for $150 shipped at streettrends.com

And, buy clear! No offense, of course, Bill. Why buy new capsules and then limit the amount of light with tinted lenses?

toomanytoyz wrote:

And you can get them for $150 shipped at streettrends.com

How can you get them for 150?

http://www.streettrendsinc.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=BBODY&Product_Code=11991&Category_Code=LGHT

I gotta say I really like the look of the tinted lenses. Crovo's got it nailed.

For real dude. Bill has MORE than exhausted himself on the subject - using everything from BMW - to Mitsuboogie - to plastic tubs from Wallmaht.

If he tells you what's the best way to go, it's because he figured it out the hard way - then did it differently again - then went back to what he told you - several times over.

As an aside - I'll never forget a couple years ago when Bill had titnted lights, and swapped in a clear one (or vice versa). Anyway, there were a bunch of spectators, and the question was asked regarding the newly swapped in light - since one was dark and one was clear, "What do you think about the way it looks"

And an answer came from the crowd, "I think it looks like the bitch didn't listen!"

And that's the dirtiest headlight joke I ever heard.

HAHAHAHA That is nothing short of epic.

I kinda like the smokes lenses on the darker cars.



Stock lights with silverlight bulbs



Tinted lenses with same bulbs:

I love your grille. Looks great. The lenses really compliment the look of the car too.

Thanks, I just need to lose the hood ornament to complete the look.

I love hood ornaments. I want to replace mine with something more exotic though. Maybe like a 50's Chevy airplane hood ornament or something. I don't know.

jayoldschool wrote:

And, buy clear! No offense, of course, Bill. Why buy new capsules and then limit the amount of light with tinted lenses?

That's what I thought, too... But I have two reasons. One - They look a Hell of a lot cooler. And the clear ones are some of the UGLIEST lights I have ever seen produced for any car. EVER. So the top reason is purely aesthetic - for me. And TWO - they would be way too bright with the HID's and you would blind oncoming traffic, no matter how low you aimed them. There is really no light control on these aftermarket lights, and it goes EVERYWHERE.

Yeah, I think the dark look will compliment my blacked out grille and hood stripe anyway. Can't go wrong there.

Time to resurrect this thread.

I'm seriously thinking of buying the HID conversion kit from DDM tuning. If/when I do I'll get the new euro style reflector in the back clear lens in the front head light assemblies. My question is should I get the assembly with that little bulb cover/deflector in the front or one without it? I want to get better light exposure on the road and hopefully get rid of, or minimize, the spotlight affect the factory headlights produce.

Has anyone got HID's in the clear assemblies with the deflector?
How is the light spread on the road?
How does that compare to the assemblies without the deflector?
Is it better with or without the deflector?

Oh and on a side note the quick search function does not display any results for HID. And when I did a search for Headlights it did not return any threads about the HID stuff either. And I know the word headlight was in the title of some of the threads I found relating to HID headlights.

Clear, with reflector (called a Casper Shield). Get the ones with the Casper Shield, it makes the light output more focused. I still like clear, even on a black car... lol

X2 on everything J said.

I don't have HIDs, I have a battery, and head light harnesses from Innovative Wiring, clear lenses w/the casper shield, and 55w low beam, 100w high beam bulbs. This was a night and day difference, but more expensive than the HID set up, as you don't need the wiring harnesses to run the HIDs.

Mike

any opinions on which ballast is better? a DC Ballast or AC Ballast?