92 ES300 bulb upgrade

[Steve]

I am looking to upgrade my bulbs.. but i keep reading posts about certain bulbs and along with that i hear some horror stories.

At the moment my bulbs are useless... not very good at night. I want to upgrade the bulbs to the best possible without cooking my projector units.

Can anyone recommened a good bulb that are safe please?

Looking for something near white light/HID/Xenon

thanks in Advance

Steve

[SW03ES]

I've heard great things about the Silvania Silverstars, they seem very safe (direct replacement bulb) are DOT legal and have much of the look of the HIDs.

[Matthew_McNally]

Steve

check out this thread mate

some good stuff on lights in them

[jftsai]

Steve,

Old bulbs get dimmer as the tungsten burns off the filament and yields a dark tint to the glass. From my reading off the web, the (U.S. version) Sylvania Silverstar is not significantly brighter, but a marketing gimmick, specifically designed to empty your wallet. They have a slight-bluish tint to the glass which gives it the "whiter" color temp so they look more like HID.

If you stick with Sylvania, consider the Xtravision. They are reportedly brighter by up to 30% than stock, and cheaper than the Silverstar, but it lacks the "HID coolness factor," as the bulb does not have a bluish coating. Philips Premium bulb would be an equivalent.

In Europe, Philips' VisionPlus and Osram Silverstar (not the US Sylvania Silverstar version) bulbs are reportedly up to 50% brighter than stock bulbs. Both do not have the bluish coating. (Hint! recurrent theme here: blue filter coating reduces available light output.) I do not believe that these bulbs are US DOT approved, but they should still be safe as they are still stock wattage. These bulbs are easily available on the internet, but I'm not sure if they're available in your size. Personally, I'm going to give these a try. They should be better than the Philips Long-Life that came as stock. (Long life = dimmer, but longer life, so less warranty replacement costs for Lexus.)

Don't have unrealistic expectations though. Improvements in illumination will vary depending on the optics of the headlight. And, stock wattage halogen lamps are not going to have anywhere near the brightness of an HID system. Also, even if there is an actual 30% increase in light output, it does not translate to a 30% increase in perceived brightness, because human eye & brain response is not linear.

P.S. - I'm no expert in this field, but that's my summation of my reading on the topic.

As you may know, it's very difficult to get specs on light output (in lumens) on the bulbs with casual reading. It's probably designed that way so we can't compare apples with apples. I did find useful information on the following web site: http://lighting.mbz.org. Sorry for the long post, but hope it helps!

[steviej]

I personally like PIAA. They are pricey but powerful.

The ones I'm running are the Xtreme White (fogs) and Xtreme White Plus (highs) are ~ 4100k, 55w and 1700lu.

I will be most curious to see how long they last. Sylvanias are supposed to the longevity and PIAAs have the power.

We shall see but we shall see.

steviej

[es3doubleO]

I recently adde the sylvania silverstar headlights, they are pretty bright and its a crisp white light. I had the eurolights but it burnt my headlights bulb socket!

[SKperformance]

silver stars all the way

cool blue are the lower version of them and are ok

the silver stars take a week of use to look white

not blue

blue bulbs are crap and useless

only for show of saying i have hid's

[zeta]

i have sylvania blubs for my high beams. they're quite white. my low beams are now being replaced with MTEC 2x headlights. they're practically the same as PIAA's. but quite a bit cheaper.

kevin