What Special Headlamp Bulb You Running? How's It Performing?

Are you running a Designer "Ultra-Bulb" of some kind?

What's the 4-1-1 on it?
How much was it?
Where did you get it?

I'm looking for the Brightest Headlight Bulb I can find ... staying within the specs of what the Headlight Circuit can ~~> Safely <~~ handle ... without breaking the Bank!

 

Re: What Special Headlamp Bulb You Running? How's It Perform

Good question as my son and I were just talking about this last night. I run a Bosch H4 that I took out of my Vetter fairing. It's BRIGHT! How much can we add to our bikes in the way of "extras" without putting a load on the system?

 

Re: What Special Headlamp Bulb You Running? How's It Perform

Slyvania silverstar in a cheap APC 7" round headlight housing.

I am very happy with it, it's as bright if not brighter than most new car and motorcycle headlights.

 

I run 2 driving lights with 55 watt halogen bulbs. No hi-lo beams, but whatever, they are super bright and I haven't had any trouble from them yet.

 

OSRAM Silverstar (the ones you have to order from Europe or off ebay, not the overpriced blue tinted pieces of crap they sell for $40 a pop here) H4 in the stock rectangular housing. That combined with the installation of a headlight relay makes for great visibility. The Silverstar is definitely a crisper, whiter light, because you can see the yellow spot from the stock aux bulb in the main headlight beam.

I also found some odd driving lights which I want to replace the aux light with.. They have a 55w H3 bulb behind a glass rod, which produces a beam with a very sharp cutoff at the top and bottom. I think they have potential..

JimH.. If I remember correctly, the alternator produces somewhere in the neighborhood of 265 watts @ 3000rpm. Headlight is 65w on high/60w on low. Aux light is 55w. Gauge cluster bulbs are 5w each. Tail lights are 8w each (2 bulbs). Brake lights (2 bulbs) and turn signals are 27w each.

So if you are sitting at a stop sign, with your high beam on, the aux light on, in neutral, with the brakes applied, thats 210 watts right there. Then if you have a turn signal on, thats another 59 watts flashing. Easiest way to free up juice to add accessories is to change over all of the small bulbs to LED. Each module uses less than 1 watt, and is as bright as its incandescent counterpart. Just by changing the tail/brake lights and turn signals, you free up over 120 watts. It is an expensive initial outlay (roughly $15 per bulb), plus you will have to change out your stock flasher for an electronic one, since the stock one will not work with LED's, but you will have more available power and less strain on the bike's alternator and wiring.

 

Re: What Special Headlamp Bulb You Running? How's It Perform

Without increasing the wattage of the bulb, here's my picks in the standard 55w/65w catergories (going by light quality/output - not cosmetic crap like "blue bulbs" or "whiter"):

OSRAM Silverstar's are excellent bulbs - too bad we have to order them from overseas.

Sylvania Silverstar's that we get here in North America are CRAP - they're overdriven blue-tinted bulbs that are only rated to last 12 months or less. Everyone I know feels ripped off by these bulbs.

GE's Nighthawk bulb is supposed to be quite good too, haven't heard a whole lot about it, but far less people complain about it that's for sure. Said to be on par with the 'good' Silverstar's for light output.

The sleeper bulb in our market seems to be the Philips Vision Plus (in the pink & black packages). They've got excellent light output, long life expectancy, and very affordable compared to the above "premium" bulbs.

An excellent source for lighting info is Daniel Stern Lighting -- check out his Tech section here about "Good" bulbs:
Good Bulbs