Protege5Lava

My best friend (owns a Benz C43) and I are about to get some REAL H7 Hella HIDs!! He ordered his already and I'm about to order mine today, possibly before 2:00 pm LA time. They can install it on Monday!!!!!! What do you guys think? I don't know much about them, except that they are freaking bright. I think it's the 6000k or something around there. It's not a cheap investment, $450.00 installed... One guy on the forum installed it himself, but didn't like it... anyone else with this problem? I'm about to take the plunge, but want some good suggestions as to whether I should do it or not, is it a fair price, and can I remove it when I sell my P5? Thanks

Zombiefreak

You don't want a conversion.

Our housings aren't made for HID conversions, ie. replacing the bulbs, ballasts, etc. If you do this, you end up with dark and bright spots in the beam and you could blind on comming traffic even with proper aiming.

What you have to look for is a retrofit. Retrofits take the housings, bulbs and ballats off another vehicle, and retrofit them to our housings to make sure we don't have dark and blind spots.

The only bad part about a retrofit vs a conversion is the price. Conversions cost about $300 bucks on the average, where as retrofits cost around $1400. But the benifts of a retrofit are more than those of a conversion.

Someone posted a site once that does retrofits. They'll take your stock housing and retrofit...bad part is, you have to send it to them. But if you wanted to, they'd get you a new set of lights to retrofit.

StuttersC

Retrofit, yes....Rplacement bulbs, no. That is a bad idea.

Protege5Lava

I really appreciate all your advice. I wasn't going to get it before getting back to this thread, and now I'm convinced that I'm not going to get it. I'm not very pleased with my low beams, especially after lowering the car, but I got the Cool Blues which helped with widening the beams, but the lighting distance is still cut by at least 1/3 compared to before lowering! But I got these Angel Eyes that are actually Angel Eyes with low beams, so I actually have 2 sets of low beams, I adjusted the Angel eyes low beams so that they are about the same distance as the factory low beams. It helped a lot!!! Thanks again for all your help, it could have been a costly investment that didn't turn out well!

02p5

I have a HID conversion my my MP5. The light output is very good, compaired to most cars. It's so much brighter than halogen bulbs and look very good as well. There is'nt too much glare as well.

saided18

angel eye head lights? please explain and tell us where you got them.

Protege5Lava

I got the Angel Eyes low beams made by Hella from Pep Boys (a local autoparts store). 3 options on the switch, 1) Angel Eyes on only, 2) all off, 3) Low beams on only. It looks awesome! I get compliments all the time and many want to get it too... but I wanted to be the very few to have these I think toucan.com and APC has some. The APC comes with 7 colors for the angel eyes, the package comes with a push-button switch that allows for 7 color changes, also low beams too. The APC ones are smaller than Hella'sPost pics when you get yours!!!! I'm very new to this, I just got a scanner and I have pics of my car but don't know how to post it. Anyone help me...

Protege5Lava

What brand did you get? How many "K's"? Did you install it yourself? Any problems encountered while installing? Sorry for the million questions, but you seem to be the very few that either recommend HID's or installed it right! Thanks

saided18

if you want email your pics to me. my email is saided18@aol.com.

Protege5Lava

I'll send you pics soon, Juno isn't allowing me to send such a big picture

02p5

I got the ballast and ignitors off of a BMW E46 M3, they are made by Osram and bought the h7 D2R off of the internet. I installed it myself and ran into no problems, actually the hardest thing was to find the place to stick the ballasts and ignitors. It's is 6000K bulbs and the light is just pure white, no color, so it looks somewhat like the Acura TL 3.2's HID's.

Everyone from my club( www.mpsport.net ) says the HID's look really good and look real like the car came with it cause there is no glare like other cars. The headlight casing for the MP5 is excellent for HID conversions and the light output is almost perfect, comparable to the TL as well. Just have to aim it properly then you are all set. Also no problem with the cops or anything so far and no electrical problems at all. I've used it for about 1 1/2 already. The only thing is you have to disable your DRL or it won't start properly. HID's run at 35w but takes more than that to start it up.

02p5

No pictures of the HID's but here are some pics of my MP5
http://www.mpsport.net/images/p5.html