Headlight Bulbs

[steventon95]

The nights are drawing in and it's time to start thinking about upgrading the headlight bulbs. What is the best for the old girl? I don't want to melt the plastic.

[sgould]

Presumably you have halogen bulbs all round?  If so, try some Osram Nightbreakers or Philips Vision Plus.

If you have Xenon bulbs, just fitting new ones will be a lot brighter.

[Audax]

Presumably you have halogen bulbs all round?  If so, try some Osram Nightbreakers or Philips Vision Plus.

^^^ That, I recall that the Philips were brighter and possibly lasted longer but were more expensive in the first place (well, they weren't as I found them on clearance in a DIY store for £3) and the Osrams are cheaper, nearly as bright but fail more often. Either way, buy from a reputable dealer and not the cheapest on ebay as there are plenty of fakes around.

[steventon95]

I shall have a look around. I do believe I need 4 x H7 and IIRC it's a skinned knuckle job 

[sgould]

Can be tight, but it helps to remove the battery cover, slacken the clamp and push the battery back as far as possible - possibly a whole quarter of an inch, but it makes a difference.

Driver's side is OK if you are brutal with the inlet hose, but you could take it off if it's really too tight.

[Audax]

I shall have a look around. I do believe I need 4 x H7 and IIRC it's a skinned knuckle job 

Never had a problem with skinned knuckles doing this and although my hands aren't like spades they're not tiny either. Anyhow, I'd suggest not bothering with upgraded bulbs in the high beams, they don't make so much of a difference there. If you do put upgraded bulbs in the high beams then swap the bulbs from the low to high in a year or so so you wear them all at the same rate, this means when you have to buy new bulbs you can buy a single pair for the low beam and keep using the older ones as spares for high beam.

[steventon95]

I might as well do the lot while I have the bonnet open .... 

[Geoff1951]

The common consensus for halogen upgrading is either Osram Nightbreakers or Philips Vision Plus - The Philips website also shows "X-treme Vision" bulbs. Does anyone have experience of these?

[Audax]

The common consensus for halogen upgrading is either Osram Nightbreakers or Philips Vision Plus - The Philips website also shows "X-treme Vision" bulbs. Does anyone have experience of these?

I believe I once had a set of these and they were quite good but burned out in a single winter. I've found with decent headlamp bulbs that the benefit is typically a curve where you find diminishing returns as you move towards the right hand side of it, the more you pay then the very slight benefit you get. I'd suggest going for either the Osram Nightbreakers or Philips Vision Plus and not bothering with better as even if you go for better bulbs they will be minimally better and not last quite as long. The main place you notice the difference will be in the cost.

[Mark B]

I have used Osram Nightbreaker and Philips X-treme Vision headlight bulbs and there's not a great deal to choose between them.  Price and availability are probably the deciding factors.

I also use Philips Vision Plus tail, stop and indicators bulbs.  It's always worth checking your tail light bulbs as the glass darkens with use.

[Audax]

It's always worth checking your tail light bulbs as the glass darkens with use.

Check your indicators are orange too, it should be an MOT fail when the coating peels off as they glow yellow but most MOT testers don't check. Some plod if they are unhappy with you and pull you for other reasons but can't find anything they will use it as a way of getting a defect notification, it also looks rubbish!