Need Suggestions for Headlight/Foglight Bulb Selection

[Jason]

What is the general consensus re: best bulb for replacement of stock US spec headlight and foglight bulbs? I would defininately like more illumination, but I don't want to change them all the time (I've read in other posts that certain bulbs burn out quicker than others). You comments, as always, are appreciated.

Thanks,
Jason

[jplacson]

Same question, except for Euro spec (H1) bulb...

What's better? An H1+30, clear... or an H1+50 with a cap? What's the cap for? I'm planning to stick with Hella... but how are Bosch and Osram?

[Phil M]

I just did the Sylvania Cool Blue 9005 conversion. (procedure found on bmwe34.net) and this only works if you have the ellipsoids. As you will read from brunos site, the 9005's are not capped like the stock 9006's and have a little more wattage. The cap is to reduce glare to oncoming traffic but the ellipsoids have built in glare reducers already so no cap is needed. Problem is that they get about half the life of stock bulbs but for the price I think its worth it.

Better bulbs (9011/9012's) are availiable and are brighter and last a lot longer. In addition to the light produced by the filament, they use wasted infrared light (heat) to produce more light w/o effecting the filament. This increases bulb life a bit and brightness A LOT. There was a thread about this here about a week ago. Read about it here (http://www.bimmer.info/forum/showthread.php?t=1312&highlight=bulb).

Taken from bmwz.org/articles/lighting/0506trick/:

"These new bulbs are not some tinted, overwattage or otherwise "tarted up" version of 9005 and 9006, but rather employ a relatively new technology called HIR, Halogen Infrared. The mechanical dimensions of the bulb are all virtually identical to the 9005 and 9006 bulbs, but the bulb glass is spherical instead of tubular, with the sphere centered around the filament. There is a Durable IR Reflective coating on the spherical glass. All filament bulbs produce more heat than light, and heat = infrared. The coating causes heat to be reflected back to the filament at the center of the sphere. This causes the filament to become much hotter (producing more light) than it can by passing electricity through it, without the shorter life or greater heat production that comes with overwattage bulbs (to say nothing of overwattage bulbs' incompatibility with stock wiring.)"


Same question, except for Euro spec (H1) bulb...

What's better? An H1+30, clear... or an H1+50 with a cap? What's the cap for? I'm planning to stick with Hella... but how are Bosch and Osram?

[Jon K]

My opinion:

SilverStars for 9005 modified to fit into 9006 housings for both US Ellipsoid and US non ellipsoid. Used these for fogs and lows and highs, worked well.

As far as the Euros w/ H1. I couldn't find SilverStars in H1 any where local. Ordered a set of SPP H1 "5300k" bulbs. Work very well. Saw them in a friends car and ordered them based on that. They also have a 1-year warranty. Here is a picture.

http://www.orbitalinternet.net/euro/5300/2.jpg

http://www.orbitalinternet.net/euro/5300/1.jpg

[Paul in NZ]

for what it is worth daniel stern recomended that i try to find philips or osram h1 bulbs for my euro spec car He said that hella did not actually make their own bulbs.
So if I can i am going for h1 +30.I have never heard of h1 +50 with cap.The h1r bulbs mentioned above do not fit euro ellipsoids.I have heard good thing about Narva
H1 "uprated" bulbs but would never go for any kinfd of tint or colour as it must decrease actual output

[Brandon J]

You might want to check here http://www.powerbulbs.com/index.htm for the Osram or Philips bulbs for the euro spec headlights. I bought bulbs from this place for my e39 and their prices as well as shipping time is very good. They shipped from England and I got it within a week over here in Chicago.

[Tiger]

If you haven't noticed from Daniel's website... the H1 bulb but out almost 50% more light than 9006, H4, or any other bulbs. So it really just a matter of buying quality bulb.

Then again, nothing beats HID bulbs. I kinda disagree on Danial's comment about it... yes, there are chances of bad aiming for normal reflector bulb... but that is nothing in projector setup like we have... the projector control that aspect very well.

[jplacson]

HIR is different from H1.

Anyway, I've seen a few Osram H1 bulbs over here that have a cap on the end and was wondering if it reduces output. I plan to change all my bulbs and wanted to know if the cap affects beam pattern or output in anyway.