Thread: Driving lights/roo blinders!!

LightForce, the artificial sun, KC Daylighters are good too or if you have bucks to spend get a couple of them gas exon ones at $750 each or the truckies favourite the big Bosch bull light, comes in 7 and 8 inch diameter. Stay away from the el chepo out of SuperCheap auto or areoplane landing lights.

Traveling from the Pilbara at night to Perth requires your vehicle to have good lights and an upgraded alternator to run the excess amperage that each spot draws. I use to run KC Daylighters x2 and 1 Bosch bull light plus the standard quartz lights fitted to the vehicle, then moved to Hella Ralleye 2000, changed bullbars and changed to LightForce as I was impressed with the hand held spotlight that I used for shooting, also the LightForce beams are adjustable for either spread or straight beam. If you go the expensive lights make sure you devise a system where they cannot be unbolted easily and removed like a friend of mine lost his.

D D

I have driven behind a lot of driving lights, Lucas, Hella, Cibie, aircraft landing lights (useless) Marchal, Bosch, Wipac etc. Of those the all out best are Cibie Super Oscars with 130W globes in them. I arrived at the fruit checking station going from NSW to SA one night and the bloke came out wearing his sunglasses as he reckoned they were the brightest thing he had ever seen on a car or truck. I had 4 Super Oscars and 4 Cibie headlights in that car. As for theft proofing use the special bolts you can buy today with centre pins. Drill a hole through the mounting stem under the nut and tap a thread for one of them into it. Just don't lose the special key for the fastener. I have been told the Lightforce can be a problem when a globe blows as they are a special globe and can be difficult to get the installation just right, is this right? It put me off buying a set to try as I liked the idea of the adjustable beam.

No probs at all with Lightforce globes, I replaced one and found it wasn't the bulb anyway. It was a minor wiring problem. So in hundreds of thousands of Kms all up I have never blown a globe in a LIght Force...
I have trashed Cibie Super Oscars a few times when they took hits that wouldn't have phased the Light Force polycarb ones. Having said trhat, Oscars are a brilliant light!! (pun intended)

In 35 years of using Cibie lights I've lost one due to a bird strike. Ripped it clean off the front of the car, left the mounting bolt and riveted tab. Lucky it was a Porsche 911 otherwise it would have ended up in the radiator. Made us duck as it went past!

Never had one stolen but mine are difficult to get off (and adjust) so have been safe.

I run a 160amp alternator so I can go for a while before things get grim.

I have af ew mates who love Lightforce and with good reason, they are reasonably priced and give good light output.

Cibie Oscars have been available in a dippable version for ever.

In the seventies when I was playing with fast cars on dark roads I had a pair of Oscars set up in front of the headlights and four Super Oscars to provide the light! Had a supercharger on the R8 just to cope with the reverse thrust from the light beams!

Here's a link to a pommie catalogue if you don't believe me!

Cheers,

P

Just thought I'd report on my experience with the cheapie HID retrofittable bulb kits you can now get via eBay from China.

I'm moving to Tassie with the wife for a few months after Christmas but when we were down there a few months ago we did the drive from Hobart to Bicheno in a hire car after dark. Normally during the day it's a nice solid 2 hour drive but as we left Hobart at 7pm and it was already dark it took closer to 3 hours thanks to knocking 20-30 kph off the speed due to the incredible amount of wildlife we found wandering all over the Tasman highway. No wonder the road sides are littered with roadkill ! Wow. It was an experience I'll never forget ! I'm a city boy who isn't used to all that wildlife plus I was in a tiny little hire car so I didn't want to push it and end up totalling the cheap Korean panels by hitting a bush rat scampering across the road :)

Anyhoo, I instantly went into action planning a couple of spotties to fit to the front of our Corolla (the car we'll be taking down). I went straight for the Lightforce 140/170s as so many people swear by them plus they're Aussie designed & Manufactured so it was a no brainer for me. I was all ready to buy them along with one of those bar thingys to mount them on for a total of about $350-$400 when I remembered seeing relatively cheap HID kits on eBay designed to replace the bulbs in your standard headlights. We're lucky enough to have separate high beam bulbs on the Corolla (don't want HIDs for low beam anyway) so I found the type required (HB3), selected the 'colour' I wanted (6000K which is a very white 'blue' colour ... and apparently still legal for low beam use) and went ahead with the order. They cost $98 including shipping and arrived just over a week later ! I opted for the 55W version however there are slightly cheaper 35W ones available too along with a whole range of colours (low number is yellow/white up to the higher numbers that are very blue (& illegal)).

Installation was a breeze as the small ballast boxes that come with them use the same format plugs & sockets as the ones found in most new cars (our Corolla was the first of the 'dorky' looking models released in Dec 2001) so it was just a matter of replacing the bulbs (literally took seconds), plugging the original headlight plug into the ballast lead (another few seconds) and mounting the ballast boxes (I've just cable tied them to nearby hoses etc. as I wasn't sure how they'd go & didn't want to commit by drilling holes just yet). You can easily cut the plugs off and connect them directly to your cars wiring if need be, no probs there and only basic skills would be required.

Well, although I haven't really used them properly yet I decided to take them for a rip around a local mountain road just to see how well they worked. I'm still (nearly) speechless with the results ! The light output from these is insane and even though I know they'll never throw as far as real spotlights due to the reflector parabola & lens design differences I think these will be enough for our purposes in Tassie. Hey, if they're not I can always go out and buy a pair of Lightforce spotties as well but if they are good enough I've just saved hundreds of dollars and effort with spotlight installation too. An added benefit is that these are a lot more difficult to steal compared to external spotlights.

My only concern now is of course how long they will actually last. They're only cheapie Chinese junk things so I'm not expecting more than 6 months out of them (hey, I'm a realist) but hey, still worth the $98 risk in my book plus 6 months will cover our time in Tassie so that still works out kinda OK too. If they last longer then I'll be very impressed but if not I'll just buy real spotties instead.

Even still, I highly recommend them however just a warning, your eyes can take a long time to re-adjust to low beams after having the HIDs on so be careful. I have been told that anyone fitting HIDs for their high beams should also review their low beam bulbs too and possibly upgrade them to brighter & whiter filament versions (not HIDs) so there's less of a difference. I might look into these closer to Christmas once I know these cheapie HIDs have lasted another month or two.

On a side note ... I have since bought another pair of HIDs and have managed to retro fit one (including the ballast) into one of those 10 million candlepower rechargable spotlights you can now buy from places like Repco, Jaycar, Supercheap etc. The torch cost $80 and I got mine from Repco ('cause it was black & rubberised instead of yellow & plasticy) so by adding the $49 HID to it I've made myself an insanely bright rechargable torch for less than $130 plus due to the wattage being less for HID it's not only heaps whiter & brighter it also lasts approx. twice as long too (about 2 hours on a full charge). Jaycar are about to start selling a cheap HID spotlight similar to this however it's $150 and is only 35W. You make your own version as I have done with only limited electrical skills & in under an hour. Easy peasy !

If anyone wants any more info or details on any of the above please let me know and I'll post up a 'how to' here inc. pictures ... or I might just do it anyway :)

Hi.

It's been just over a year since I posted my previous blurb above and thought I'd report back with an update.

Well, the cheapie Chinese HIDs in the Corolla were priceless during our time in Tasmania and I consider them to be an essential low-cost high-beam (not low-beam) upgrade for any car if required to drive out in the sticks at night.

We bought another cheapie car to leave in Tasmania for future return visits and one of the first things I did was order some retro-fittable headlights (so I could get separate high beam bulbs) and fit them with 55W HIDs. Again, an absolute life saver on those dark windy roads full of wildlife. Definitely worth the money.

Both sets of HIDs are still going strong even though I didn't have much faith in them initially. They do take a good 20-30 seconds to 'warm up' to the correct colour temperature (ie. super bright white) however once they've been on for a while you can turn them off and turn them back on without the wait, handy for whenever cars approach & pass.

My DIY HID torch is still going strong too however I purchased a 'Maglight' style HID torch recently for around AU$200 to replace my aging (& dying) 6-cell Maglight. It's great and comes with Li-Ion rechargable battery and the works.

So, to summarise ... all my cheapie Chinese HID purchases have turned out really well. I hope this is enough to convince some of you to do the same BUT please don't be a fool and use HIDs in your low beams. They should only be classed as 'spotlight' alternatives in your high-beams as they are incredibly bright and will temporarily blind oncoming drivers !

Have fun !