HID conversion kit

[dazza]

Hello foccers, just fitted a HID conversion kit and am not happy with the way the light is thrown out. On dipped lights there seems to be a dark patch in the middle and main beam seems too low. Has anyone else had these issues and is it just a matter of adjusting the lamps. Don't know if the 50 mm fork drop has compounded  this. What do you think foccers.  Before and after photos attached both showing high beam.

[BBROWN1664]

The top pic does not look like HIDs.
The bottom one just looks like you need to adjust the level

[Fazerider]

I'd guess it's due to the arc not being in exactly the same position as the high beam filament was. Sounds like you need to experiment, it might be possible to improve things by using either a spacer to move the bulb back a bit in the reflector or (if you can think of a way of doing it) trimming the mount so that it's deeper into the reflector. It'd probably be best to optimise the low beam pattern and just hope that high beam turns out OK.

[ogri48]

That's not good mate. I've bought a kit for me cb, not fitted it yet, the bulb doesn't seem as well built as I had hoped, but if guess I gotta give it a go. Don't think I'll get one for the fz1, stock lights seem pretty good, though I'll get brighter bulbs and uprate the fuse accordingly

[dazza]

Well, adjusted the lights and it all seems much better. Only one thing that is on my mind is that I had to extend the power cable so it would reach the battery and used a couple of plastic connector blocks shown in the bottom picture. And  because there is a sticker on the ballasts that says these are AC and run at 23 000 volts  :eek  are there any electrical gurus on here that can tell me these are adequate, or will I need to solder the joints together and insulate with heatshrink. I now have excellent lights but a little feeling it could all end in misery and flames. :lol 

[alan sherman]

The connector is only coming off the battery isn't it? So will be std 12V.  If it fails you lose your lights.  Shouldn't set fire to anything.

The lights are the worst thing about the boxeye bikes :o(

[Punkstig]

I've never had an HID kit that needs a direct connection from the battery, my horn does though!

[Gingernutz]

Looks like you have old tech HIDs - the direct feed to the battery is presumably for the magnet to move the filament forward on high beam? I have the same set up on my foxeye but my brother in law's CBR600 set up came with the magnet getting the power from the standard fitting block at the back of the bulb - and for a one bulb setup came to £20 from China. Much easier to fit and looks good. Can't find the original listing but it looked like this one:
        [img height=388 width=388]http://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/thumbnails.inkfrog.com/pix/supereshop2050/LD62-2.jpg/450/0[/img]
Ebay item 290892977252 if you are wondering £15.09 - no idea how they can make any money

[dazza]

To be honest I was surprised it needed a direct feed to the battery because it also uses  a headlamp connector as well, only one of them though which I thought was odd, still it seems to work OK  and for £ 25, cheaper than putting some ordinary lamps in it from my local dealer at £15 a pop. I'll see if I can put up a link.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/310695758635?s...1497.l2649

[Fazerider]

I can't see why it should need an independent feed from the battery either, all the power it needs is available at the front of the bike already.
However, if you do hook up extra wires to the battery it's important that they include a fuse as near to the battery as possible. Without that, if the cable gets pinched or chafed and shorts to ground somewhere, there is nothing to limit the current, the wire gets hot and you have a fire under the petrol tank. Admittedly, you seem to have extra sleeving protecting at least some of the cable, but an in-line fuse is always good practice.

[dazza]

Good point Fazerider, there is an inline fuse fitted but where I had to extend the cable it now sits just under the tank.