I know a lot of people, myself included, are springing for aftermarket headlight bulbs because they want a brighter, more white light from their headlights.

I bought a set of aftermarket bulbs from Supreme Power Parts (one of the early advertisers on scionlife and one of the first companies to offer a special deal to scion owners) for $25 shipped about 2 years ago. They put out a much whiter light than stocks and definitely looked cool.

I was exceedingly careful not to touch the glass on the bulbs, so they ended up lasting about 26 months before one burned out. I don't know how long stockers last, but that seemed like a pretty good run.

I was happy with the bulbs when I had them. They looked cool when they were on and cast a cool blue tint on the inside of my headlights when they were off.

However, I noticed something profound when I put my stock headlight bulbs back in: I could see everything so much better! I don't know how to say it other than to just say that stocks were much brighter and threw light wider and farther than the aftermarket bulbs had.

I went looking for objective tests with a light-meter and apparently Overboost.com tested a bunch of aftermarket headlight bulbs, from $25 cheapies to $90 PIAAs and found that stock performed better. Read about it here: http://www.overboost.com/story.asp?id=102 .

I guess the bottom line is that aftermarket bulbs certainly look really cool, but you sacrifice performance and safety when you use them. Those who want the best light output should stick with stocks or install some real HID projectors.

 

Thanks a lot for that post! I was just about to dump $80 on some "high-end" PIAAs (Super Plasma GT-X) but now I don't think that I'll be doing that! I'm all about safety and practicality and that was my original purpose in buying "better" bulbs. Thanks man, you just saved me $80! Good post!

 

i have silverstars made by sylvania and i think they emitt a more brighter whiter light than stocks do. with silverstars, the light is are aimed on sort of like an angle to help iluminate the street signs better, and to see any pedestrians better. stockies just amied straight across. i think they are very excellent bulbs. i have had them on all my cars.

 

i disagree. i had silverstars in my xB and they are garbage. Silverstars are more white, but the ground doesnt look more illuminated.

 

my personal experience with PIAA bulb replacements, is that they are garbage. I've personally run three sets on two different cars. Two sets on a 2000 civic HB and one set on a 2004 Lexus IS.

I've talked with PIAA about their bulb life and was told that they will last as long as an OEM bulb. I can honestly say that at the time when I talked with this gal at PIAA, we had 96 4-runner with OEM bulbs that were 5 years old.

The civic went through three bulbs in less than a year, the fourth good bulb went in the trash and I changed back to the OEM bulbs.

The Lexus actually lasted about a year before I noticed that the drivers side was noticably dimmer. When I yanked the bulb, it had blistered on the edge of the front coating.

IMO, those bulbs run too hot for the light housing, thus causing a premature failure.

I have to say though, I am a huge fan of thier fog lights and wheels. Course Hella fogs are even better.


singleshot

 

Keep in mind that all headlights dim after a period of usage. Comparing two year old bulbs to new(er) ones is not a reliable test of brightness, illumination, or whatever.

Still lovin' my SilverStars.

 

does anyone make a good projector housing to kinda focus the light in the direction of illumination..instead of spreading it out?

 

See my post about the Vision Plus: https://www.scionlife.com/forums/vie...540932#1540932

This is the problem with "cool" (meaning trendy) bulbs........ they're BLUE, which restricts light output. There's another reason why stock bulbs are yellowish........that glowing orb above us? Yeah, that thing called THE SUN..........see, our human eyes adjusted to its wavelengths some time ago, thus we can see better!

Face it..... any bulb which is tinted will be dimmer than an identical yet NON TINTED one.

HIDs are blue because of the gas, but they're also truly brighter because of the technology involved.

Silverstars made it much more difficult for me to see at night, so I took them out. Signs (or anything with reflective material) would produce so much glare that I had trouble focusing on anything else BUT that object. Not good.

In short- "cool blue" /"hyper white" = bad for your eyes.

(anybody please correct me if I am mistaken.)

 

I took out my Luminics bulbs because I couldn't see ____ with them on, without the fogs on.

I'm running stock headlights, and Luminics yellow bulbs in my fogs w/rockblocker yellow over that. When botch are on, I get amazing light output.

 

The bluish lights look cool but don't illuminate any better. What you want is an almost pure white light. Even though the suns natural color is yellow, test show that at night, a pure white light reflects off of objects better than any other color.
That being said, I installed a set of Silverstars and noticed a definite improvement in visibility. However, one burned out after only three months which ____ed me off after dropping $30 for the set. I even cleaned them with alcohol before installing them and did not touch the glass to make sure that no oils or residues were on them.

 

This is an interesting topic. I've always wanted to buy some new headlights and replacement bulbs but I was unsure what is real and what is just rip offs (looking on ebay also). I dont know much about bulbs or headlights for that matter.

The blue tinted lights are cool, but what about those bright white bulbs? You would assume, at least I would... That white will be bright.

But I'm not suprised bulbs are gone after a year or two, I know the house bulbs are different, but try replacing bulbs youve had in your house or apartment for awhile theyre going to put off light much better... Some of our house light bulbs (I have no clue what the wattage are but theyre just small basic ones) are already burnt out after a year. How long do you expect stock bulbs to last? I'm really interested in buying some alternatives.... So ill give that link a lookover.

 

Blue produces glare. Yellow reduces glare. I have Nokya yellows 2500K headlights and they are great. Maybe a little less bright than Silverstars but no glare. I definately notice an improvment in visiblity with them. Plus people notice you faster which is good for safety. Yellow is the most visible color. Any light that casts a blueish beam is going to produce more glare. Combined with yellow fogs, you really couldn't or shouldn't ask for more output. Then again, each to his own.

 

I think you are. THE SUN, as you have put it, burns at about 5800K optimimally. Where if you have noticed, the HID's burn at about 5400K which makes them more like the sun. As you put it, the color of headlights you say that we are adapted to are yellow, i dunno about you, but the sun shines a white light. The silverstars run at about 4000K which is closer to the 5800K than 2800K of normal incandescent or even the 3200K of standard halogen lights. So SCIENTIFICALLY, the silverstars are better. But its all a matter of opinion, if the glare from the silverstars is too much to bear with, then yes, take them out. (by the way, the K stands for Degrees of Kelvin, if you so desire i could find the exact wavelengths in angstroms, but i doubt people are interested in those kind of numbers.) But i personally like my silverstars, i mean, it is all a matter of opinion, just read the posts, people say they work , some say they dont. It just goes to show not everyone is the same, if we were, it would be a boring world, and there probably wouldnt be any xB's in it either!

 

I think you are. THE SUN, as you have put it, burns at about 5800K optimimally. Where if you have noticed, the HID's burn at about 5400K which makes them more like the sun. As you put it, the color of headlights you say that we are adapted to are yellow, i dunno about you, but the sun shines a white light. The silverstars run at about 4000K which is closer to the 5800K than 2800K of normal incandescent or even the 3200K of standard halogen lights. So SCIENTIFICALLY, the silverstars are better. But its all a matter of opinion, if the glare from the silverstars is too much to bear with, then yes, take them out. (by the way, the K stands for Degrees of Kelvin, if you so desire i could find the exact wavelengths in angstroms, but i doubt people are interested in those kind of numbers.) But i personally like my silverstars, i mean, it is all a matter of opinion, just read the posts, people say they work , some say they dont. It just goes to show not everyone is the same, if we were, it would be a boring world, and there probably wouldnt be any xB's in it either!

 

Yea. Silverstars are very good. they illuminate everything so well, BUT, i just installed my 6000k H.I.D. lights and they are AMAZING. i mean dammmm, they illuminate the whole frickin street. it seems like daytime when i turn them suckers on, and yes, they do have a relay. they are not glary at all. but for people that dont wanna drop that kinda money on a lighting system, get Silverstars. they work!

 

The sun does produce white light which is a combination of all colors of the spectrum. Different people see the spectrum differently. Personally i prefer yellow lights because they help me see sharper contrast, even if they are only 2500K. Shooting glasses are yellow for the same reason. I have bad night vision anyway so with the yellows it cuts down on the star vision and makes signs easier to read.

 

You and I are the same, then- the highest that I'd ever go in a bulb is white; I would never go back up into the blue range that Silverstars give you, advertising be damned.

But, as was stated before, everyone's eyes are different and will react differently.

 

i am running these as well, and think the visibility is great. i went from stock to silverstars to nokya "HID blue" and now the nokya yellow. the silverstars were great in that they went almost pure white with a very slight blue tint, but one burned out in less than a year. the nokya bulbs lasted about as long i guess. i really love the yellow ones though, for the same reasons as bsbox.

 

cool. my friend has yellow bulbs on his yellow xB and i think they look pretty cool. he says the same thing about glare and visibility. i guess to each his own. then again, if we all thought alike, all our scion would look alike. thats why scion owners are so cool. because there are endless possibilities....