Brightest bulbs?
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Grand HDF Member
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Brightest bulbs?
I passed a guy on the road yesterday that had the brightest bulbs I've ever seen. It made his Harley almost impossible to miss. I think this would be a safety advantage as well as being very cool. It looked like a Heritage or another big bike. It had a factory light bar. All three were crazy bright and seem to have a slight blue tint to them. Has anyone changed there bulbs? Can they support Zenon bulbs? I have an 05 Heritage...
Thanks,
Ryan
Thanks,
Ryan
Road Warrior
Joined: Feb 2005
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RE: Brightest bulbs?
There has been a lot of talk about "brighter" bulbs on the BMW forum I check into. Some guy actually did a scientific test using a light meter and other equipment and found that the tinted variety might actually look pretty neat, but, gave off less light. Anytime you filter the light, it'll have less lumens. The gov't limits the wattage of our headlamps to 55 watts and the wiring that supplies the lamp will only support that plus a little. HID lighting works much better and only pulls 35 watts due to the way light is generated (an electric arc). However, unless you want to install HID, we should probably stick with the factory halogen bulb. The real advance in lighting has come from the re-designed reflectors that concentrate the available light where we need it. I burn all lighting during the day from the passing lights as well as the headlamp. We could also install more auxillary lighting on the crash bars. But, I wouldn't buy those expensive replacement lamps that have the tint - a lot of hype imho.
Road Warrior
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RE: Brightest bulbs?
When I ordered my Super Glide, I had the auxialiary light kit put on (labor free w/ the new bike). I was leaning toward the dark smoke for the auxialiary bulbs, gut the parts guy told me that they actually looked more greenish than smoke, so I went ahead and ordered the halogen bulbs. With the new halogen headlight and these bulbs. it should be bright! I'll let you know.
RE: Brightest bulbs?
ORIGINAL: grumpygit
I dunno about bright - it seems OK, but you can fry eggs on my headlight. [
]
Is it normal for them to get so hot? I worry about things melting in there!
I dunno about bright - it seems OK, but you can fry eggs on my headlight. [
]Is it normal for them to get so hot? I worry about things melting in there!
Never noticed mine getting that hot......overeasy please
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Road Warrior
Joined: Feb 2005
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RE: Brightest bulbs?
Halogen bulbs operate at very high temperatures - the idea being that as the filament evaporates, the glass envelope will be too hot for the tungsten to condense on it, and, with the help of iodine or some other halogen, the tungsten vapor will find its way back to the filament and "heal" the area from which it came. That way, you'll never notice a blacking of a halogen bulb as you would in a normal light bulb. The brightness stays almost constant over the life of the bulb. Pretty neat, huh?
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Grand HDF Member
Joined: Sep 2004
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RE: Brightest bulbs?
ORIGINAL: Retired_Ted
There has been a lot of talk about "brighter" bulbs on the BMW forum I check into. Some guy actually did a scientific test using a light meter and other equipment and found that the tinted variety might actually look pretty neat, but, gave off less light. Anytime you filter the light, it'll have less lumens. The gov't limits the wattage of our headlamps to 55 watts and the wiring that supplies the lamp will only support that plus a little. HID lighting works much better and only pulls 35 watts due to the way light is generated (an electric arc). However, unless you want to install HID, we should probably stick with the factory halogen bulb. The real advance in lighting has come from the re-designed reflectors that concentrate the available light where we need it. I burn all lighting during the day from the passing lights as well as the headlamp. We could also install more auxillary lighting on the crash bars. But, I wouldn't buy those expensive replacement lamps that have the tint - a lot of hype imho.
There has been a lot of talk about "brighter" bulbs on the BMW forum I check into. Some guy actually did a scientific test using a light meter and other equipment and found that the tinted variety might actually look pretty neat, but, gave off less light. Anytime you filter the light, it'll have less lumens. The gov't limits the wattage of our headlamps to 55 watts and the wiring that supplies the lamp will only support that plus a little. HID lighting works much better and only pulls 35 watts due to the way light is generated (an electric arc). However, unless you want to install HID, we should probably stick with the factory halogen bulb. The real advance in lighting has come from the re-designed reflectors that concentrate the available light where we need it. I burn all lighting during the day from the passing lights as well as the headlamp. We could also install more auxillary lighting on the crash bars. But, I wouldn't buy those expensive replacement lamps that have the tint - a lot of hype imho.
How big of a hassle is it to change to HID or to jump to the 110 watt European set-ups? I rarely ride at night because my lights suck. I would love to make them much brighter...
Thanks,
Ryan
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Joined: Dec 2004
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From: Texas! Ya mean there's someplace else?
RE: Brightest bulbs?
ORIGINAL: Lovetoride
Hey Ted!
How big of a hassle is it to change to HID or to jump to the 110 watt European set-ups? I rarely ride at night because my lights suck. I would love to make them much brighter...
Thanks,
Ryan
ORIGINAL: Retired_Ted
There has been a lot of talk about "brighter" bulbs on the BMW forum I check into. Some guy actually did a scientific test using a light meter and other equipment and found that the tinted variety might actually look pretty neat, but, gave off less light. Anytime you filter the light, it'll have less lumens. The gov't limits the wattage of our headlamps to 55 watts and the wiring that supplies the lamp will only support that plus a little. HID lighting works much better and only pulls 35 watts due to the way light is generated (an electric arc). However, unless you want to install HID, we should probably stick with the factory halogen bulb. The real advance in lighting has come from the re-designed reflectors that concentrate the available light where we need it. I burn all lighting during the day from the passing lights as well as the headlamp. We could also install more auxillary lighting on the crash bars. But, I wouldn't buy those expensive replacement lamps that have the tint - a lot of hype imho.
There has been a lot of talk about "brighter" bulbs on the BMW forum I check into. Some guy actually did a scientific test using a light meter and other equipment and found that the tinted variety might actually look pretty neat, but, gave off less light. Anytime you filter the light, it'll have less lumens. The gov't limits the wattage of our headlamps to 55 watts and the wiring that supplies the lamp will only support that plus a little. HID lighting works much better and only pulls 35 watts due to the way light is generated (an electric arc). However, unless you want to install HID, we should probably stick with the factory halogen bulb. The real advance in lighting has come from the re-designed reflectors that concentrate the available light where we need it. I burn all lighting during the day from the passing lights as well as the headlamp. We could also install more auxillary lighting on the crash bars. But, I wouldn't buy those expensive replacement lamps that have the tint - a lot of hype imho.
How big of a hassle is it to change to HID or to jump to the 110 watt European set-ups? I rarely ride at night because my lights suck. I would love to make them much brighter...
Thanks,
Ryan
They also have PIAA H4 bulbs that are similar in light output to HID lamps, but use less power.