Best HID kit?
 

Hey all...I'm looking at an HID conversion as my next major mod. I'd like to go w/ a catback, but that just increases my need for a PFC or another ECU, so I guess I'd rather get something that's functional and doesn't lead me into that modding cycle.

That said, who here has HIDs? I suppose there would be two categories...1) Flip-ups w/ HIDs, and 2) Sleek lights w/ HIDs. I'm interested in either/both, but want feedback on a few things:

1. Quality of workmanship - Is it a well made product? Did it fry your harnesses? Would you recommend?

2. Quality of lighting - Is it worth the money for the increased visibility? How much better is it?

3. Cost - What's the range of prices for these kits?

4. Difficulty of installation - Was it a bitch to put in or what?

...I guess I'm a demanding guy, but these questions need to be (and probably have been, but I couldn't find them when searching) asked. This would be for the good of the many, as it were.

TIA,

I have the Phillips HID kit on my Integra. The quality is excellent. The ballast boxes are pretty much universal, but the wire to the OEM harness and the bulb base are what is changed from kit to kit. The bulb base must be tailored to each car so that the HID bulb sits the proper depth into the headlight housing. The wire that goes from the ballast to the OEM harness has to have the OEM plug adapter, obviously.

I'm VERY satisfied with the light output on these things. They cast extremely pure white on objects, but look like BMW HID's when looked at from another vehicle -- blue'ish white.

For the RX-7 I'd recommend going with the sleek light kit because I don't think they make an application for H4. Plus since it's a single "filiment" (if you want to call it that), you'll lose your high beam capability. So by seperating high/low beams, as in the sleek light kit, you can still keep your high beams while having HID's as your main lamp.

I got my Phillips kit for $400 in a group by from VisualDynamics.com

They make a HID kit for the H4 bulbs which is in are Rx7's. There is one on ebay right now. it has phillips componets and looks pretty high quality. For the sleek light kits there is not a HID kit availible for the 93-95 Rx-7 that I am aware of. I am seriousley considering the C-west sleek light kit but it is far from HID. The bulbs in the kit are H1 and a 12 V halogen. Im not sure what bulbs come with the RE kit or the other new sleek kit? Does anyone know what bulbs these kits come with? Any HID availible sleek light kits for the 7's?

I heard Mazdaspeed has a sleek light conversion w/ HID but cost something like 2000-2500 for the conversion

Hey, I was thinking of the same thing...
 

First, i'd get a sleek head light kit because you can retain the high beam capability. also, you shouldn't worry about frying your harness because hid lights run off of 35 watts. much less than stock.

So this is what i would do if i had the money...

east bear headlight kit. 640$

http://www.east-bear.co.jp/aeroparts...d3s/index.html
http://www.east-bear.co.jp/aeroparts...s/h-light.html

This is cheeper than the RE kit by large, and probably has a better light beam. others have complained about the pattern of the RE kit. If you do a search on this, i think Jimlab was trying to do a group buy on these, ask him how it turned out. if i recall, he was trying to get 5-10 togeteher to reduce the price to around 500$ shipped.

Second, i'd get these hid lights:

http://www.procarparts.com/store/dis...al%20HID%20Kit

they are real hid, from phillips. H4 style. i'm not sure what the east bear uses, but this place has an assortment of hid lights. they have the lowest price on HID bulbs i've found. around 435$ a kit which comes with 2 bulbs, 2 ballast.

personally i'd use a set of HID for low and another for high beams. that way you can blind everyone on the road. :) and even if you did, it would still come out around the same as a single RE kit.
435+435+640(less if u get in with a group buy)= 1510
RE kit= 1477 (http://www.rxecret7.com/sleekligcon.html)
plus u get way better lighting.

the instillation shouldn't be a problem. just know your basic electronics and you'll be fine. it woun't fry your wires even with two kits. 35+35 watts= 70 watts. currently i'm using piaa super whites 80/100 watts and it's not a problem. 70 should be fine.

as for the quality... well quality is a subjective score. really though, phillips is a wll known company. As for east bear, well you could ask jimlab. see what he thinks. e-mail east-bear for more info, and if i remember correctly, they understand english, and do respond.

hid is hid. If you've seen the new bmw's, mercedes, some audi's and lexus' you should know what they are. they provide an almost pure white beam which is far superior to those ricey 20 dollar blue tinted bulbs, or those cool but illegal purple "piaa Super plasma's" If you want the best, then settle for nothing but the best, HID all the way. only thing is the best comes with a price.

About the c-west, it too cost way too much and comes with high/low beam and a fog light. so unless u plan to sub the foglight for your high beam and use the primary for your hid low, then look for another kit. if you want to stick with pop up's, u could look into the knight conversion. that has 2 bulbs so u can use one for high and the other for low.

that's about all the kits i know of...
hope this was helpful... peace

All sleek light kits use H3 bulbs, as that they use driving/fog lamps. I am positive on the C-West kits (they use Catz driving/fog lamps). 99% sure on the East Bear. Ask jimlab, who was organinzing a buy for East Bear. He also had a RE amem and a C-West kit, so he can confirm the bubl sizes for those.

You have two problems with this:

1. None of the sleek light kits available use a reflector/lenses assembly designed as the 'main' lamps of a car. A car's headlamps are designed to disperse light in a particular mainlamps beam pattern. Foglamps/driving lamps are not, which is basically what all sleek light kits use.

THere are actually laws for each individual country (I'm sure the European Union has just one standard) for how the light is dispersed (beam pattern). That is why you hear of E-code lamp assemblies (european) that offer better beam pattern, but is officially illegal to use in the US (like as if most of your folks at the vehicle inspection station is smart enough to look for that).

So, what ever kind of bulb you put in there, it will never have the razor sharp cut-off and beam pattern of a GS430.

2. H3 bulb size is MUCH smaller then a D2R/D2S HID bulb. I did a write up a few months back, and took pictures of my HID bulbs/wire/ballast and a pic of an H3 bulb. The write up was wiped out though, when the Forum went down.

Not only do you have the problem of fitting a larger bulb in place of a smaller one, it complicates part 1. above. You can not simply drop in a bulb into any lamp assembly, because each lamp assembly was designed to reflect light from the bulb at a precise angle (I think this was lost on the FD lamp designers, ehhe)

A bulb is designed to be located in a precise position in relationship to the reflector assembly, to have a specific kind of beam pattern. How important is the reflector? Place you head light bulb outside the lense assembly, then plug it into the harness. See how much light is output onto the ground. Same thing with a flash light. The bulb is useless without the reflector behind it.

If you put a larger bulb in, it is difficult to position it so that the bulb/reflector relationship is the same as the original bulb.

So, not only do you not have a correct beam patttern to begin with, adding a different sized bulb complicates the matter further.

That is what basically all HID conversion kits seek to do - reposition the HID bulb within the lamp assembly so that it offers about the same beam pattern as the original bulb/reflector combo.

You can also solve some of the bulb positioning problem by building light shields over portions of the longer bulb, to keep light from that portion from striking the reflector. Obviously though, this is best left to professionals.

There are H3 HID conversion kits, but they are rare, and I cannot tell you if they satisfactorly solve the problems above. I guess I'll be the guine pig one of these days...

Not trying to discourage anyone here from doing (I'm going to do an HID conversionto a Knightsport kit myself), but wanted everyone to understand the issues involving such a conversion.

One other thing about using real HID system for highs - it takes approximately 1/2 second to one second for the bulbs to 'spool' up. Therefore, flashing to pass is difficult. That is why you do not see HID highs on US spec cars (at least up to last model year).

I am sure the manucaturers are working on this, and I know the current solution on some cars in Europe was creating a lamp assembly with a bulb that moved forward and aft in the lamp assembly fast enough where it can be used as high and lows.

Again, the reflector reflects light at different angles depending on the bulb position - one position of highs and one for lows.

I think the cwest housing and lens cover with HID would look nice as hell.
But it'd probably be too damn expensive with all things considered .

Re: Best HID kit?
 

Why? Admittedly the RX's headlights are a week link, but it's nothing that a set of $9 80/100 watt H4s from JCWhitney couldn't fix. I was afraid to drive my car at night before I switched to these.

I have the CWEST kit and am considering doing a HID conversion...one question on the HID: do they put out more or less heat than Halogen?

TIA

Re: Re: Best HID kit?
 

See, the thing is that I've done the JC Whitney route before (on my 89 Pathfinder) and the higher wattage bulbs fried one of my wiring harnesses. That's not something I'll repeat with my FD, and given that I'm already fed up with how weak the lighting is, and I don't want to have to go with a new ECU for another go-fast mod, this seems like a good route to go.

I was concerned about overheating the electrical lighting system as well, but I posted the question to the big list some time back and NOBODY had any problems with the 80/100 watt lights. Some people did have some issues with the 100/130 watt lights though, so I stayed away from these. In any case, the 80/100 have worked great for me for the last year.