HIDding in plain sight
 

I've been mucking about with a HID bixenon kit for a while, and I've finally got it to the point where I've got some results and pics...

DISCLAIMER: These are totally illegal for road use, and outright unsafe if not used properly. Blind someone coming the other way and they're fairly likely to drive straight through you. So if you decide to do this, be very careful, remember your results may vary. All of my comparisons are with Osram Nightbreakers, considered by many to be the best standard headlight bulb there is just now.

Anyway, first of all, the parts. I used a HIDS Direct Ultra 6000K H4 bixenon kit, which is a direct bolt-in swap using the stock reflectors etc, and retains both main and dip beam. The kit costs around £140 usually- you can find similiar kits for much less but they're a fairly reputable dealer. Mine cost me somewhere around £100 on Ebay. The wiring is very nicely put together, all braided, good waterproof sockets. Not ideally built for bikes, since it assumes it's going in an engine bay, but not bad at all. It proved easy enough to find a place to put everything, of which more later.

Second, the results... Here I have to sit a little on the fence, as my left headlight is a little damaged and kicks over to the right on low beam no matter what I do. I've managed to adjust it to a point where it doesn't present a risk, by aiming it low, but that also reduces the effectiveness. The right hand headlight points in the right direction though. On both dip and main there are a few hot and cold spots in the spread but the cold spots are still brighter than the Nightbreakers, and the hot spots are all aimed at the ground so no real glare risk.

If I can get a second loom and relay box for the kit, I might go back to one HID and one Nightbreaker, since the left headlight isn't very effective anyway, and sell the "spare". Still not decided about that but it'd tie in with some other plans I have. One headlight alone, incidentally, is still more effective than the duals with Nightbreakers.

They're much brighter than the Osrams- most obvious up close, which I gather is a common trait of HIDs. Night riding without street lights is just a much more enjoyable experience, I've never really been comfortable riding unlit roads at night til now. I really was on the fence about the HID retrofits as they can give very variable results, but I'm very pleased with this.

Dip beam is much more effective than the Osrams at short range, but also has a lot more reach. I don't need to focus nearly as much attention on interpreting details. The inefficiency of the beam pattern is pretty obvious on dips, that's where the hotspots are most obvious, as well as the left headlight being much less effective than it should. Still, a solid upgrade, similiar or greater to the difference between standard bulbs and a good halogen.

Main beam is pretty fantastic... I'm quite sparing with it, not because it's unreasonably glary but just because it's very bright, you get the same with OEM HIDS as you'll probably have noticed yourselves sometimes. Main beam is for distance now, simple as that, the low beam is effective enough that I'd never need to use it for typical riding. But fast roads and motorways really bring it out. I absolutely hate riding unlit motorways at speed, the reach of the headlights always leaves me wondering what's just out of range... So, absolutely delighted with the extra power here. The headlights have a little more range but they're much more effective right out to the edge of their reach, where normal headlights seem a little washed out. Really eases my nighttime nerves, and increases the safe speed.

So yes, very pleased with the results. I've tried doing a little video to show this but my camera's light resolution is too weak sadly. I took some "before" photos but my "afters" were a bit spoiled by the fact that I, yes, used the flash. I am a fool. So, I'll try and sort that at some point, maybe on monday.

Next, fitment. Oh yes, and if this hadn't worked out at all the topic would have been "HIDding to nothing". I amuse myself sometimes.

Re: HIDding in plain sight
 

Fitment... You basically get 3 parts to deal with in this kit... The capsules mount exactly like standard lamps. They then attach to their ballasts, which are about the size of a fag packet. Lastly, there's a wiring loom including the relays which has to run to the battery.

Finding a place to stash the ballasts was my first concern- I didn't really want to have them too far from the headlights as the standard wiring isn't long. So, somewhere up front. Experimentation found that though they'd nearly fit attached to the front subframe, there was a bit of frame in the way, but that was definately an ideal location. So I looked further, and found that the bit of frame wasn't essential structurally, and chopped it off:

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i2...howingbits.jpg

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i2...tyoucutoff.jpg

It probably does weaken the structure, but not enough to cause a problem in general use. I did bend the frame in a crash shortly after but it straightened easily enough, in fact removing this brace might actually make it survive accidents more intact :scratch: The front frame is very overengineered IMO. This also saved about 300 grams :wink:

Got rid of some rust while I was at it and resprayed with chassis black. Lovely.

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i2...edsubframe.jpg

Re: HIDding in plain sight
 

So, ballasts in place:

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i2...w-ballasts.jpg

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i2...w-ballasts.jpg

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i2...lastsfront.jpg

The wiring all sticks out the front, and they're attached to the subframe with sticky backed tape, with a cable tie or two as insurance.

Re: HIDding in plain sight
 

Next, wiring. The sign of a good mod is a tidy and efficient wiring job. Brace yourselves :rolleyes: At this point, I decided it was all going too well, and decided to set the bike on fire:

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i2.../HIDs/fire.jpg

Amazing how much smoke they can fit in one wire. This was one of the extensions I added as the standard loom won't reach the battery. I'd disconnected it from the battery but unfortunately it fell back onto the terminal at a later point, and the other end was touching the tank bracket. The fuse was after that point in the loom. ZZZAP! So, don't do that. This was a temporary measure so I hadn't bothered to fuse it. I have now.

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i2...IDs/wiring.jpg

As well as the ballasts there's also a control box, and a vast quantity of wire. I found that it all fits in here, behind the sidelight, and in front of the clocks. I don't have a sidelight but it would probably fit anyway, the SV cockpit is very spacious. Alternatively, I could have removed probably about 10 feet of wire, but I decided not to amend the loom at all to keep things straightforward for future mods.

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i2.../squarepeg.jpg

All back together. Can you tell the difference? Parked up, the only sign is the backs of the capsules and the ballasts, you could stealth this mod if you wanted. Returning to standard lamps for MOT or rectifier purposes would take me about 5 minutes, of which the first 3 would be remembering where I'd put the bulbs.

(and yes, my bike is wider than my garage door. This causes no end of early morning hilarity.)

Re: HIDding in plain sight
 

So all in all, a good mod I think. I used a 6000k kit, which is a bit whiter than it needs to be. I'd sooner have used something in the 4000 range but this was cheaper. It's not blue though, so not as attention-grabbing. I still need to do a bit of finetuning, and with the damaged left headlight I'll probably go back to a halogen there, one bixenon HID seems a very good compromise. While it's totally illegal it's not particularily blatant- especially on dips- so I don't expect it to get me in any trouble. And I'm personally convinced it's completely safe, which was my big concern.

The wiring will remain how it is, it's a total bodge but rewiring it all would commit me a wee bit to the bike's current layout, which is going to change next year so I've kept it simple.

Re: HIDding in plain sight
 

I is thick. What am I looking at :?: What does it do :?:

Re: HIDding in plain sight
 

I have 2 questions about this.
Firstly why is fitting this HID conversion illegal?
and secondly what would you have to do to fit a HID conversion legally?
en4rab

Re: HIDding in plain sight
 

Because they're very bright, and can dazzle.

Figure out a way to make them self levelling.



Andy, I've seen on some of the HID conversion sites that their bulbs draw 35W, is this at the bulb, or the total draw?

Would you be able to measure this? :D

Re: HIDding in plain sight
 

A much brighter headlight, basically, it works sort of like a welding arc. You know when you get some BMW, merc or porsche behind you and you notice that you can see better by their headlights than by your own? That's a proper factory fit HID at work.

Trouble is, it doesnt work as well without the proper reflectors, quite inefficient and it can shine in all the wrong directions, which is what they usually call glare- I've seen one of these in a Mk 3 Golf and it was diabolical. So, if you've ever had some hot hatch coming the other way blind you with inexplicably bright purple headlights, that's HID done badly. But as it turns out, it works pretty well in the SV.

Like Chris says, legal HIDS are suppose to have self-levelling kits so they don't have any risk of blinding people as a car or bike rolls around. We can work round that and just aim it so that can't happen, at a cost of making them less effective, but the law doesn't have any way of recognising a safe bodge-in HID kit.

This really is a bodge y'see, just a good one- HID capsules and halogens really need totally different reflectors to work properly, HID uses something more like a point source than halogens so they use reflectors that are almost parabolic- much like projector beam halogens in fact, so if you had a projector- Ducati 999, KTM Duke 2, euro SV650 carbed model- it'd be much more effective, assuming the capsule fits. But this works, for now.

Re: HIDding in plain sight
 

Total draw per bulb, so less than stock. Which is nice