Are the 55w raptor ballasts from ddmtuning a lot brighter than the 35w? enough to get me pulled over?

 

if aimed properly in a set of decent projectors they will be fine. yes they are bright as heck, but if aimed right, they are great. granted i would never put HID anything in a non projector system. its a waste and a hazard to oncoming drivers regardless how you aim them.

 

55w hids are illegal in most states. a friend of mine had them in a set of projector lenses, in his jeep at stock heighth and got pulled over and a big fine for obsessive lighting, or sumthing like that. 35w hids r plenty bright enough if u get a 6000k bulb.

 

Yea I got 6k, I had ordered them and then someone said they might be so I was double checking. I'm just gonna send back the 55w low beams and get 35 lows, and keep 55w highs. But what's wrong with putting hids. In none projector lens? I ordered the euro style headlights along with my hids

 

there is NO beam control with HID in non HID specific housings. among other issues the filament in a standard bulb is a straight line (coiled, but straight...), where as a HID bulb the Filament isnt a coil, its a curved arc. this means that from the jump the light source inside the bulb is NOT aligned as a standard bulb's is and therefore the way the reflector housing is shaped will not be optimum.

Here is a set of HID bulbs swapped into a set of stock housings on my mustang... Notice the light that is reflected above the "Hot Spot"? regardles of how I aim these, this light is going to go up and into oncoming drivers eyes causing glare and blinding them.


Halogen projectors with halogen bulbs... Note the cut off is a lot better. there is way less light that is going up, granted you dont have the nice pure white with just a touch of blue you would have with the HID set up..


Halogen projectors with HID bulbs in them... still pretty good, but the HID bulb is over powering the cutoff shields a bit and burning out the center of the cut off.


and finally my mustang with HID specific projectors and 55w HID bulbs... Notice the nice flat cut off, no light being reflected up. I have this aimed so it is on the level of the rear bumper of most cars. never had any issues with being pulled over and this is all with the 55W Raptor ballasts and 5000K D2S bulbs.


In that last pic I was in the process of centering and aiming the beams after doing a projector retrofit. the inverted T is where the bulb is when I pulled the nose up to the wall. I then back the car straight back 25 feet, and make a line 3 inches below the origional T marks. this is the level I set my cut offs so that when on the road the light is NOT going up and blinding other drivers.


I could go an and on, but I hate internet preachers and I really try to NOT be one. Retrofitting projectors is really not the hard, and the price really isn't bad. the out put however is ungodly! well worth the time and expense. if you already have aftermarket housings, and your HID setup, all you really need is to drop about another 120 on projectors and you can really have outstanding and unique headlights.

 

Is there anyway I can keep the after market housing and just add projector lens or something of the sort? If so can you give me a link to it? And would you recomend sending back the 55w lights if I don't have projectors and just getting the 35w?

These are my aftermarket headlight casings
http://www.ebay.com/itm/300631226633...84.m1497.l2648
Will these be good

 

those housings are the ones I was wanting to get for my Jimmy, but I cant find out for sure if they would fit... as to retrofitting Projectors into them, shouldnt be to difficult. here is a link to my writeup for the ones that I made for my Mustang... Retrofit link the basics would be the same to put projectors into your housings.

as to sending back the 55W... if you want to retrofit projectors in I would keep them. as long as you use good projectors and aim them properly 55W should not give you any issues. No guarantees....

 

Is there any point into doing retro fitting for the highs beams to?

I think I'm just going to send back the 55w and get 35w for my lows and keep the 55w for my highs and not do the retro fitting.

 

well the projectors that I use are Bi-xenon so they have the high beams in them.

 

Thanks for the help