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Brighter Headlight

grizzly ashton

grizzly ashton

Moped
Before my beautiful Connie I've ridden a lot of oldies. I would put in the brightest lightbulbs I could find in town for them. I've even had two of them riding side by side and the light we could get from them was less than my Connie. I'm impressed. I feel like I can see almost as well in the dark as a cage. But still I wonder... What difference would it make to put in a super bright bulb? Has anyone made the switch? Any comments or suggestions? Thanks, Grizzly
 
Yes bulb changes are a easy and inexpensive upgrade. Silverstars or the like and 100/80 watt or even 130/100 bulbs are regularly used although the use of any bulb greater than the ubiqitous 60/55 is illegal for anything other than off road use. With this disclaimer out of the way go to www.murphskits.com and check out the headlamp harness and available bulb upgrades. More light is a good thing. Oh and thing about auxilary lighting too. AKA "2linby" That's 2-lin-by folks! Northwest Area Director COG #5539 AMA #927779 IBA #15034 TEAM OREGON MC Instructor 133K and counting! http://community.webshots.com/user/2linby http://tinyurl.com/njas8 (IBA BunBurner Gold Trip) http://tinyurl.com/lwelx (Alaska trip)
 
HID Dave Muzzey St. Charles, IL COG#7957 '01 Connie
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+1 on HID. i got a kit off ebay, the company was euroeffects.net. i went with the 10k color and the light at night is amazing. it started out at 70 bucks but that only had hid low beam, for a 30 dollar upgrade i got a bi xenon bulb with a harness that run
 
The light upgrade from Murph's is probably the best money I've ever spent on my Connie, also I've got a pair of Hella 55's on the bug eye mounts and thats probably the second best money I've ever spent. Good light has a high priority with me, I really want to get a good look at the Deer I'm about to hit.
 
I am using a HID kit from cqlights.com and had the 8k bulb and stepped down to the 6.5k bulb. The light is bright enough that I really don't need my Motolights. The kit requires no extra wiring, plugs directly into the existing headlight connector and has it's own ballast and transformer.
 
Wouldnt mind seeing some pics of where guys are installing the ballasts for the HID kits. I have a VVME kit that seems to be mentioned a lot on the other site. 55W kit. The ballast are friggin huge. This is going in my truck, I think I can spare the room. But I am wondering where I would mount than dang thing on the Connie. 2003 Concours, 56K COG #6953 IBA 28004 http://home.comcast.net/~slybones/Concours/connieMain.htm
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Here's where I mounted the ballast & relay. http://i50.tinypic.com/4l3p08.jpg http://i50.tinypic.com/4l6hw7.jpg There's plenty of room there without interfering with the fairing pocket.
 
Griz, After reading tales of melted sockets and complicated fixes, I got an inexpensive 70w/65w bulb from the guys at Susquehanna (see link below). It's definitely brighter without overtaxing the hardware. They have a lot of other wattage options too. Maybe I'll try more power later, but this was a good, cheap improvement for now. http://www.rallylights.com/ Steve
 
Here is a of pix of a HID install I did on Kirt Dix's, IBR Connie. The ballasts were about the size of a pack of cigs.
 

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Here's a pix of the lights.......or stadium lights.  They're Hella Compact 4000 HID's
 

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Murph's bypass setup is a nice and clean plug and play.

I went frugal, and greatly improved my headlight by wiring it directly to my aux. fuse panel, bypassing the JBox and stock wiring harness.

It took 2 relays, a headlight socket plug from an old wiring harness and some 12 gauge wire (I think, maybe 10).  Wired directly from non-switched aux panel to relays.

The stock headlight plug was left intact, with hi and lo beam tapped with blade connectors into the existing stock headlight plug to trigger the corresponding relays for hi and low beam to the new headlight plug.

The difference was remarkable.  Now add an upgraded Phillips bulb and its even better.  I chose to stay with a 55/60 W bulb.
 
I rarely drive at night.  I guess I should consider something like this for when I get stuck out in it though.  What makes it better then Murphs bypass?  How much less cost was it, or did you just have all the parts?
 
I did the HID thing this past August, love it.  My ballast went in roughly the same place as Larry's, between the fairing frame and plastic back behind the right side fairing pocket.  Lashed it in there with crossed zip ties, and been checking it every so often to be sure it's not moving around; after 5000 miles it still seems to be fine.  I don't do a huge amount of night riding either, but I love it for the distinctive sharpness and contrast to the rest of traffic it provides during the day just as much.
 
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