Hi, sorry to be obtuse but are they priced as a pair? If they are, seems to be great value.
I have fitted the "Osram" blue 60-55 w blue halogen bulbs in my Bruiser, certainly better than they were but still like candles compared with newer type headlights( on newer cars) , local garage set up the beams on the MOT apparatus, ( no charge) and to be fair all our cars which are older, seem to have dim headlights in comparison to the new type. Is it a big deal to fit the HID lights people are mentioning?
best regards, Bill Westley
Hi Bill, I can only offer advice based on my experience, so here goes.
First, mine were priced as a pair and they were cheap to buy (paid a fortune for shipping, but that's another story
).
AFAIK, my 1995 truck was standard when I got it in 2006 - lights sort of OK but not brilliant. I noted that on dipped beam, 2 of the 4 headlamps were used, then when switched to main I had dipped and main on together (4 lamps). I take it this is the standard 80 set-up.
Later I found the standard bulbs to be too dim for comfort, so what to do?
At that time LEDs were not even considered for anything much more than replacement side lights, so the only real alternative was HIDs. I invested in a pair for the dipped beam and they were brilliant, that is to say, bright! Beyond comprehension actually, but the downside was twofold.
(i) warm-up time - between 15 seconds and some have reported 20 seconds, presumably depending on brand, colour (yes there's a choice) and output;
(ii) beam scatter - dreadful on mine, I didn't have a very good projection on the standard bulbs, but with the HIDs being so much brighter, the scatter was much more noticeable, all over the place in fact, and dangerous IMO, especially for oncoming traffic.
That was what attracted me to the Angel Eye projectors.
Got my hands on a pair (with eternal thanks to Shayne acting as my procurement specialist
) and wow, what a difference. Bright light and a clean cut-off beam line, just about at the level of the rear screen of the car in front. Perfect. Yet, there was still a downside...
Warm-up time again. With the dipped beam, there's no problem, jump in the truck switch on the lights, seat belt on, ready to go. The problem is how the main beams are wired. The dipped and mains are separate on the Angel Eyes. No problem you think, it just means that you wire the mains up to run off the dipped live. Not so easy, I'm no electrician, so I can't explain too well, but I'll try.w
The first thing is when driving on dipped, all is well. Then you continue out of town and switch on the mains, the dipped go out and you're left with cold mains taking up to 20 seconds to illuminate because the mains don't have projector lenses. You're in the darh for that time, not nice at all, in fact unusable.
OK, so we'll wire the mains in such a way as they continue to power the dipped beams, that way, while the mains are warming up, the dipped keep you illuminated. All is well, except to actually get it to work, you will need individual relays on each HID (and you have 4 remember) then you may find all sorts of strange things happening, flashing lights in differing and random fashion, very odd. I couldn't find an explanation for that at all, even with an 'expert' advising me.
To shorten the story, we introduced some capacitors and I don't know what, and I'm very pleased with the set-up, works really well.
The other and overriding downside of HIDs is they're generally illegal. I can't comment more on that, I'm not sure whether the law knows what's legal or not, but it's a potential problem depending on where you live and use them.
My personal advice would be to use the Angel Eyes with LED 'bulbs'. I'm told they are almost as bright as HIDs, they are more legal (whatever that means) and you don't have any issues with warm-up time, they are instant on/off.
That's it mate, oh and one last thing, the Angel Eye units wrap around to include the side light. For me that's a good thing, they're really neat, but there's a but. I have a gap between the surround of the unit and the body aperture for the side light. It's not big, maybe 5mm max, but it's there. I could close it with some black plastic trim, but I haven't and I don't see it anymore, but it's there. Just to let you know, and it will probably vary truck to truck.
Hope this helps.
keep us posted on the fitting Clive !!!
