Dipped Beam Lights (Again)

[mikeyc123]

Hi,

First thing, I have searched and read so many topics on here about dipped beams and how to enhance them. You will have to excuse my ignorance with these questions, I'm not really a petrol head or anything like that.

I bought the car 3 months ago, light nights so not really been doing much driving in the dark. In the last few weeks it has only just dawned on me how poor the dipped beam is. Now I have read about upgrading to HID lights, getting better bulbs, but be careful not to burn bulb holders, a warranty item to replace plastic holders with metal ones, legalities of HID's etc etc.

In short I'm probably even more confused now than I was. All I know is the dipped beam is so poor and I live down country lanes and dont feel very safe driving it at night without the use of full beam, obviously not always possible.

The lights on the front are the sort of moulded roundy ones for the dipped beam, I dont really know how to have a look at what sort of bulbs are in there, lots of moudling in the bonnet, but when I have a feel around it feels like the bulb housing is plastic.

Replacing bulbs to philips or ring or ones that boast more light, apart from it sounding like a nightmare to get in there and replace the bulbs do they actually throw the light any further forward, or just make the 5cm in front that you can see brighter ?

I have heard about having HID units installed (I dont think I have them) the lights are self levelling, but no washers. Are these worth installing and legal ?

I bought the car on finance and plan to go back to toyota tomorrow and say look it's just not safe can you look at these lights/ They'll probably come back and say they are set fine nothing we can do.

I just wanted to ask peoples opinions please, I have to do something about it, but preferrable something that doesnt invalidate warranty, wont cost a bomb, wont melt plastic holders, is legal and most importantly allow me to see what might be in the middle of the road at more than 5cm notice !!

Thanks

Mike

[duncanda]

Hi. You are correct about the very poor dipped beam. Toyota will say that they meet UK regulations. I fitted a HID kit which made a huge difference, but technically they were illegal (no self-levelling and washer) and come MOT time it would fail, unless I refitted the normal bulbs. Therefore because of the hassle of fitting bulbs and because my MOT was due I decided to fit Osram Night Breaker bulbs. I haven't used the car at night yet and so can't vouch for there brightness.

[Heidfirst]

.

I bought the car 3 months ago, light nights so not really been doing much driving in the dark. In the last few weeks it has only just dawned on me how poor the dipped beam is. Now I have read about upgrading to HID lights, getting better bulbs, but be careful not to burn bulb holders, a warranty item to replace plastic holders with metal ones, legalities of HID's etc etc.

In short I'm probably even more confused now than I was. All I know is the dipped beam is so poor and I live down country lanes and dont feel very safe driving it at night without the use of full beam, obviously not always possible.

The lights on the front are the sort of moulded roundy ones for the dipped beam, I dont really know how to have a look at what sort of bulbs are in there, lots of moudling in the bonnet, but when I have a feel around it feels like the bulb housing is plastic.

Replacing bulbs to philips or ring or ones that boast more light, apart from it sounding like a nightmare to get in there and replace the bulbs do they actually throw the light any further forward, or just make the 5cm in front that you can see brighter ?

I have heard about having HID units installed (I dont think I have them) the lights are self levelling, but no washers. Are these worth installing and legal ?

your profile says that it's a 2008 T180 in which case afaik it doesn't have the melting bulb holders (that was a few years earlier).

Similarly I don't think that the lights are self-levelling - they have an electric level adjuster that is manually operated from the cabin?

As for good upgraded bulbs my experience is:

a) that changing them is a pain

b ) they really do make a significant difference but only within the existing beam pattern (pretty sure that it's a lens design issue). However, whereas with the oem bulbs probably only 1/2 of the existing beam pattern for the dipped was acceptable now it is all definitely usable. i.e it's brighter to the edge of the pattern whereas previously it was dim by the edge.

My experience of swapping full beams is pretty similar.

certainly with upgraded bulbs imo it's perfectly acceptable (& I drive on unlit stretches of motorway & country lanes etc.).

[mikeyc123]

Hi Guys,

Thanks for the replies and patience thus far. I have been looking in the manual today and at the car, the dipped beam sit in kind of an eyelet type lense, you know, the glass looks like milk bottle glasses the poor kid had at school . is this whats called a projector lense ? Is this a nornal lense for the 08 AVensis ? I only ask becasue looking on some HID convsersion sites it talks about getting converters so I just wondered if it had them already ?

Also in the manual under the lightbulb section (page 383) is says

Headlights (low)

DIscharge bulbs 35w d4s discharge bulbs

Halogen bulbs 55w h7 halogen bulbs.

Now I know it's a silly question but does that mean the vehicle can take discharge bulbs without any mods ? (I'm guessing the answer is no, but I just wondered why its listed in the bulb section) ?

Heidfirst you are right, I have a control switch int he cabin for the dip. For some reason I thought I had self levelling/adjusting too as its referenced in the manual, I'm sure Iv seen that message come up before on the trip computer screen when I've turned the car on before, maybe Im just rememberreing reading the manual that talks about it. lol

I decided to have a look today, only took a couple mins to get each bulb out, the ones in there are OSRAM H7 55w model 64210L I think that's jsut the standard factory bulb and it's not the night breakers (from my googling).

I have spoken to a few firms today and the people at hids-direct recommend this product http://www.hids-direct.co.uk/hid-conversion-kits-canbuspro/h1h3h7h1190059006-hid-kits/single-beam-35w-canbus-pro-hid-conversion-kit-p-453.html

Any opinions/ tips welcome. To be honest I was dead agaianst the idea but having just hadthe bulbs out and back in in 5 mins(using long nose pliers) , it doesnt seem like a massive job, a 25 mm hole in the back of the seal unit runa couple of wires and self tap the igniter/ballast somewhere under the bonnet Come MOT time replace bulb with normal ones and swap back over after eh voila ?? or am I being too simplistic ?

On that note if I wanted to get 2x spare seals for the headlight unit if ever going back to standard lights again whenre is the cheapest place to get these please ?

Thanks

Mike