great white
Retirement countdown!
- Joined
- Jan 21, 2012
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I have stock housings with no issues never had to re-aim them either. But the problem is the new lenses are crystal clear. Our stock lenses have ridges and such inside that break up the light beams so its not as intense. The aftermarket ones don't have that. I don't know if I should even care or not. I probably won't.
Actually, no.
The fluted lenses on the oem housings are the problem as much as the reflector surface thats designed for a halogen bulb. They don't "lessen" the light they scatter it, which is the problem.
The flutes are one of the reasons you end up with light above what could be considered a "cutoff line".
The lens in the OEM housings are part of the light "focusing" scheme and when you throw a brighter light source behind it you end up with light in places it was not supposed to be.
IOW: glare.
Glare in oem housings is very hard to address because of those lenses. The problem isn't the hid capsule, its the oem housings. "Glare caps" that shield the top (part facing forward) of the capsule are marginally effective because they only shield the capsule when the housing is the problem. Cut off shields are better but you still have the problem of the fluting on the lens scatting the light as it passes through.
OEM hid housings have clear lenses because all the light management is done inside the projector housing. The lens's only function is to keep weather out so it's made to be "optically neutral" to the light.
Hid's in oem applications were a win-win for engineering and design branches: engineering was happy because they could produce better light output and design was happy because they could shrink/shape the housing however they wanted as the "guts" were contained in a relatively small projector.
The only way to do hid's in older vehicles and gain all the advantages of them (without a drop in kits disadvantages) is to retrofit a set of oem hid projectors into housings with clear lenses.
Im not pointing fingers anyone here as i know people will just keep dropping hids in housings not designed for them anyways.
Just trying to get the whole story out there so people can make an informed decision...
One last thing: drop in kits or retrofits are all (by the letter of the law) illegal. It's just the way the laws are written.
But you're far less likely to have trouble with a retrofit than a drop in.
Thing is, you're not going to get a retrofit for 30 bucks off eBay. Do it yourself and you're looking at around 300-500 bucks (depending on how good a scrounger you are). Pay someone to build you a set and you're looking at more like 500-700 smackers....
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