Guys,

Been looking at the cheap HID kits on eBay. Apologies if this has been done to death, but are they any good? Specifically do they have decent cutoff in the Superb's headlights? I know they're a v bad idea in traditional headlamps but are they worth considering in the Superb's projector style lamps?

I know they're a technical MOT fail without the self-levelling and wipers, but if they're bright and don't dazzle, I'm tempted.

Hard to wire in?

Seen these

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/XENON-HID-CONVERSION-KIT-H7-H7R-VW-PASSAT-B5-5-B6-B7-/300378950681#ht_3143wt_1139

and

http://cgi.ebay.ie/HID-XENON-CONVERSION-KIT-H1-H3-H4L-H7-H9-H11-HB4-HB3-H8-/280630495233?pt=UK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item4156e18801#ht_4033wt_931

How does main beam/headlights work on these - are they dual mode?

Edited 20 February, 201115 yr by landwomble

HID upgrade works very well in Superb's projector light housings.

Read here on details.

The 2 kits you indicated are quite bulky, for the same or even 10%-20% lower price you can find slim kits on Ebay that are half the size and half the heat loss (95% efficient vs 90%). My suggestion is to search for hid h7 slim and pick the ones you like.

I have been using the slim ballasts for last 3 years, currently 4 in use and no failures/problems so far. If anything, they are much more undervoltage tolerant than the previous generation. Also got 2 of them off Ebay.

I have to warn you though that lately the Ebay sourced HID bulbs seem to get worse in quality - I have had a delivery where one of the bulb bases got coated in epoxy resin (they use it under the bulb to keep it in plastic base). Thankfully I noticed that and got a replacement, or the headlamp reflector would have been fouled up after some time.

By the way, there are ceramic base H7 HID bulb replacements out there, but much more expensive and only make sense in 75W/100W range.

By the way, the kits you showed have metal attachment clips which are useful, but you can take the metal clips off stock housings (this is best, but you then have to dismantle hid bulb plugs to put them on so it is more effort) or buy them separately for under stlg5.

By the way, the kits you showed have metal attachment clips which are useful, but you can take the metal clips off stock housings (this is best, but you then have to dismantle hid bulb plugs to put them on so it is more effort) or buy them separately for under stlg5.

Great. So I don't need to worry about dim/dip etc - any kit should do the job?

E.g. http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/HID-XENON-Ultra-SLIM-BALLAST-KIT-H1-H7-9004-h4-h3-6000K-/310297273167?pt=UK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item483f28a34f

Also been reading some horror stories about cheap HIDs burning out wiper motors (specifically on Audis) as they share the same LIN bus. Have you come across this?

Cheers

No burning problems, no dim/dip, the high beam (H3) comes on in addition to low beam (H7), stock Superb halogen headlight wiring is good for 15A and the kit only connects inside headlight (need to drill a hole via a replaceable cap). The aftermarket slim ballasts are limited to 10A or so anyway, so it is hard to burn anything, and you never get headlight failure warning (I tried 35W and 70W kits, but 50W will also work).

The only thing you might want to do is to remove fog lights relay (#110?) and bridge the connections (3 with 4?) - don't remember exactly, but the relay is switching fogs off when high beam is on. I prefer to keep low beam on and turn the adjuster dial down in the fog. You need 2x 6mm blade connectors and about 2in of wire.

I don't want to comment on particular vendor kits, but the one you showed has blue bulbs which is suspicious. I only ever order 4300K and 3000K kits (visibility in fog) as other colours are mostly for looks. The 4300k (OEM white) kits have fully transparent bulb glass. Looks like the kits in picture have blue glass. Best would be to find a kit with Philips or Osram burners, ballasts are cheap anyway but if the burner explodes it'll ruin your headlamp.

No burning problems, no dim/dip, the high beam (H3) comes on in addition to low beam (H7), stock Superb halogen headlight wiring is good for 15A and the kit only connects inside headlight (need to drill a hole via a replaceable cap). The aftermarket slim ballasts are limited to 10A or so anyway, so it is hard to burn anything, and you never get headlight failure warning (I tried 35W and 70W kits, but 50W will also work).

The only thing you might want to do is to remove fog lights relay (#110?) and bridge the connections (3 with 4?) - don't remember exactly, but the relay is switching fogs off when high beam is on. I prefer to keep low beam on and turn the adjuster dial down in the fog. You need 2x 6mm blade connectors and about 2in of wire.

I don't want to comment on particular vendor kits, but the one you showed has blue bulbs which is suspicious. I only ever order 4300K and 3000K kits (visibility in fog) as other colours are mostly for looks. The 4300k (OEM white) kits have fully transparent bulb glass. Looks like the kits in picture have blue glass. Best would be to find a kit with Philips or Osram burners, ballasts are cheap anyway but if the burner explodes it'll ruin your headlamp.

Cheers. Have found HID-direct who seem to know what they're talking about and are local. Do the ballasts need to be bolted to the car to make electrical contact or just tucked/cable tied securely away? Is this a bumper-off job?

Seems almost too good to be true, will be very pleased to get better lighting in.

Ballasts do not need to be connected to metal, they only need solid ground connection on 12V feed.

By far the best place for ballasts is under the bumper (or under headlight if you manage to mount them, but you need to remove bumper cover anyway to do that).

If you want to avoid removing the bumper you can put them inside the bumper beam or above bumper beam in front of radiator, but you might need a kit with longer cables to do that. Under the bumper, immediately below headlight is better because it is a relatively dry place with good cooling and the cable run is shorter. In the space below bumper cover under each headlight you can fit 3 slim ballasts on each side, or 1 slim and 1 old style ballast per side. For a while I had the latter, because I had stock fogs converted to HID. I put bulbs back in when I added aux fogs in the bottom grille, they work much better under the fog there.

I currently have 4 slim ballasts (70W each) and 2 gen3 ballasts (50W each) on the car, 2 under bumper cover for low beam, and 4 just above the bumper beam for the aux lights. The space inside the bumper beam is where the aux lights are mounted and the cables run.

I've been using after market HID for about 230K miles and i would highly recommend that you think about weather conditions vs the ballasts. In the years i have been driving i've had to change my ballasts 2 times because of rust and water leakage. My solution for this has been silicone. Buy a tube and apply it to cables, connectors and plugs in the areas where you connect the things together. Trust me on this, salt in the winter and heat in the summer will cause some serious damage to these ballasts. My next summer project is to put the ballasts in a sealed container or wrap them in thick plastic in order to keep water and salt away.

Edited 22 February, 201115 yr by Cown

Where are your ballasts located?

At least the slim ones I've been using for 2+ yrs now have no sign of corrosion etc when located under the bumper cover under headlights. Very little/no salt nor heat there as they are away from engine bay and get vented via slots in intercooler covers.

Ballasts in engine bay / inside bumper beam are another story, hence my question on where you put yours.

Where are your ballasts located?

At least the slim ones I've been using for 2+ yrs now have no sign of corrosion etc when located under the bumper cover under headlights. Very little/no salt nor heat there as they are away from engine bay and get vented via slots in intercooler covers.

Ballasts in engine bay / inside bumper beam are another story, hence my question on where you put yours.

Which retard decided it'd be a good idea to build a car where the front bumper has to be removed to change a bulb? Someone who gets a cut of garage hourly rates?!?

Just ordered a 50W HID kit, some H3 Osram nightbreakers for the high beams and some bright, white sidelight bulbs. Job for the weekend...

Which retard decided it'd be a good idea to build a car where the front bumper has to be removed to change a bulb? Someone who gets a cut of garage hourly rates?!?

Just ordered a 50W HID kit, some H3 Osram nightbreakers for the high beams and some bright, white sidelight bulbs. Job for the weekend...

OK, got the kit now. For wiring, +ve comes off where the current H7 bulb gets its power from. For the -ve terminal, did you just screw it to something metallic in the enginebay? The H7 bulb appears earthed through its base, not by a separate connector...

EDIT: Phew! Just got in from fitting. Removing bumper and headlights and fitting it all with only a head torch for company was quite something. The lights are *excellent* though!

2 questions:

1) how the hell do you replace sidelight bulbs on the Superb!

and

2)how do you align the lights? Is alignment just by using the mounting bolts or is there a more sophisticated method?

Edited 28 February, 201115 yr by landwomble

Theoretically, you can replace sidelight bulbs through access panels (holes) in the wheel well liners. I have extra sound damping liner there, so not really possible.

To adjust headlight height:

On each headlight, there are 3 white nylon screws at the back. With adjuster dial set to 0 (-), using a hex 6mm key, you need to adjust outermost screws (the ones closest to indicators) anti-clockwise (left). Don't overdo it or you'll be blinding everyone, a couple turns is already a lot.

For future reference: outermost screws are low beam, middle screws are low beam left/right, and innermost screws are high beam adjustment. You adjust fogs by positioning headlamps (there are separate adjusters on rear and side mounting screws), and front mount under the bumper allows to adjust the gap to bumper etc.

You can also make the in-cabin adjuster more precise (finer adjustment steps) by fitting 2.2k-4.7k resistor between the 2 non-ground pins (behind the adjuster dial, not the light dimmer dial). I have mine set to -0.5deg on an unloaded car and dial at (-) going to -1.5deg at (3).

So sidelights are replaced by going in from under the car to the bottom of the headlight unit, rather than through the rear access panel on the headlight? That might make sense as the access panel gives access to every bulb *apart* from the sidelight - I can see the holder but no way I can get my fingers round it!

And the adjusters are on the *rear* of the headlight unit for the halogen, non-self-levelling ones? So it's a bumper-off job again? Not that it was that tricky a job or anything, just want to make sure I'm tweaking the right thing.

Don't suppose you've any pics of the adjustment nuts?

Thanks for all your help with this. I'm very pleased with my converted lights.

On a sidenote - I was wondering if the high beams could be converted, but then thought that as they're reflector lights this wouldn't have any cut off and so would blind people. Then I thought, do any high beams have a cut off? All high beams blind people, that's why you dip them. Is it a stupid idea converting the high beams to halogen too?

Cheers

Ric

Adjustment screws are behind the headlamp, no need to take off bumper.

Sorry, no photos, but open bonnet and look at each headlamp from top, use your torch you will see the adjustment screws - they are white/cream colour, hex head, 6mm hex hole. The ones you want to adjust are the highest, and are just behind/to the side of the low beam caps.

High beams do not have cut off, in fact are focused at centerline. I do not recommend HIDs in these on Superb for 2 reasons:

1. H3 bulbs have transverse filament, HID inserts have longitudinal arc. Converting H3 to HID results in poorer focus of the reflector lamp (more light close to you, far less light away from you), which is what you want to avoid for high beam. I found that even 70W HIDs were darker in the distance than good halogen bulbs (Osram Nightbreakers). Of course, close by the HID high beams were excellent, but you have your new HID low beams putting light there anyway.

2. HID lamps are much dimmer than halogen bulbs for the first second or so after switching on. This makes flashing your high beams in traffic far less visible.

I was going to address both points whenever 100W HID ballasts are available in slim package (currently I only see the bulky and non-waterproof 100W kits on Internet). With 6000lm+ light output (4x stock H1) there will be enough light to address both issues at any distance /switch on time.

But generally, the perfect bulb for high beam HID retrofit is the H1 bulb as found in the high beam of Audis, Golfs and Octavias. If you convert H1, you get tons of light in the distance, and much improved peripheral lighting

as a bonus.

So unless you can get hold of 100W ballasts / are prepared to live with limitations, I recommend getting a couple of Osram Nightbreakers in H3 guise. They are really making a difference compared to stock or even +30% bulbs. Downside is 50% shorter life but it does not matter so much in high beams, in fact after 2 years I have yet to replace one.

Thanks. I already have the nightbreakers, happily - good to know these were a decent choice.

Sidelight bulb access thru the bottom of the fitting?

Sidelights can be accessed from top/back through high beam cover caps, remove air intake duct and plastic power steering pump cover (at least on V6). Can be done without tools, though quite fiddly.

Not sure about access via wheel well holes, have never used it.

BTW, LEDs in the sidelights are a bad idea unless they're fully metal front-ceramic back design. Plastic mount LEDs (even ones with metal ring around them) will heat up from high beam and over time will foul up the high beam reflector. I noticed in time (about 1mm x 4mm strip of matt reflector just above sidelight) and changed back to bulbs.

Thanks. Couldn't get my fat fingers round the sidelights, will try again

Is it a bayonet or push fit?

Good tip re leds. I have some light blue tint 501 replacement conventional bulbs to go in.

Thanks

push fit, 2 tabs to press together I think, but it can be yanked out as long as it is done with some feel so that the headlamp stays intact.

Hi chaps. Does anyone know if the insurance company needs to be informed about installing HID kit? It is a modification.