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Retrofit labs projector comparison video

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Old Feb 18th, 2019, 19:22   #21
rxtian
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I’ve got the shutters wired to full beam so they work as bi-halogens. You really wouldn’t want the shutter always up - it would seriously blind oncoming traffic. It doesn’t make a massive difference to full beam but cost nothing, and has a nice effect when you flash.

The retrofit labs projectors with the Volvo (facelift - pattern of squares not circles) lenses totally fix the headlights.

I don’t see why any decent reflector wouldn’t give the same results.

One of ours was completely flaked off, the other looked fine on first inspection (but I can now see it has dulled) and I was surprised there wasn’t an obvious disparity between left and right. If anyone has looked at your reflector and thought “huh looks ok” because it seems intact, you could still be well down on light output.
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Old Feb 18th, 2019, 19:26   #22
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LizardOfBodom View Post
Ah c'mon, nothing wrong with BF4 poster and some Razer accesories in the frame as a bonus :P
If only I had any time to play these days! The house was a bit of a wreck due to some DIY....I need to learn to do one thing at a time lol
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Old Feb 19th, 2019, 11:30   #23
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Originally Posted by Yobbo View Post
HAHA! Okay so "logic" as follows...

rtxian remarked about not having enough diffusion/scatter above the cut off, so hence I though well just wire it in to the sidelights perhaps then the shutter will always be down and he'll get the diffusion.
Also I find that my high beam is quite possibly TOO bright when approaching signs haha...
My rationale for getting the D2S fitment projectors was really just based on not having another choice on Ali Express! But they were about £45 after discounts so I though well I might as well just get some LED bulbs while I'm at it as I don't want the possible problems associated with aftermarket Xenon WM/CEM failures.
Yea.... no....

as rxtian said - you simply CANT leave shutter up all the time. Its equal to driving with full beam. Shutter on bixenon goes DOWN when electromagnet is activated with high-beams, releasing the full beam pattern



The type of bulb in this case makes no difference - Halogen, xenon, LED - its only a light-generating source, its the shutter that makes correct low-beam cutoff.
Also - why would you want to wire them to parking lights???

I get your point with D2S availability, but I seriously hope now it will work for you. Its proven by a lot of people that LEDs are really hard to match to achieve decent results and you may end up with light pattern scattered everywhere. THen you will have no other option than a) go full HID, b) revert back to oem projectors. And you really dont want to juggle them too often.

Fingers crossed for your mod, I will be very interested to see results so make sire u do some pics please.
btw - can you show link to LED bulbs you choose? just out of interest
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Old Feb 19th, 2019, 15:47   #24
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Quote:
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Yea.... no....

as rxtian said - you simply CANT leave shutter up all the time. Its equal to driving with full beam. Shutter on bixenon goes DOWN when electromagnet is activated with high-beams, releasing the full beam pattern



The type of bulb in this case makes no difference - Halogen, xenon, LED - its only a light-generating source, its the shutter that makes correct low-beam cutoff.
Also - why would you want to wire them to parking lights???

I get your point with D2S availability, but I seriously hope now it will work for you. Its proven by a lot of people that LEDs are really hard to match to achieve decent results and you may end up with light pattern scattered everywhere. THen you will have no other option than a) go full HID, b) revert back to oem projectors. And you really dont want to juggle them too often.

Fingers crossed for your mod, I will be very interested to see results so make sire u do some pics please.
btw - can you show link to LED bulbs you choose? just out of interest
All points taken on board,

Obviously no one with any sense would want to blind oncoming traffic!

I initially got my orientation wrong regarding the shutter, duhh.
So again, I was thinking about being able to have the effect of diffusion, the standard projectors have no cut-off shutter so you get that little bit more of a scatter on the fringes of the beam which is something I like and
in wiring the shutter to the side lights the shutter will always be UP.
You would however have toy with your low-beam alignment (getting it low enough not to blind other drivers) but I hope it could be done.


Link to D2S bulbs - https://www.aliexpress.com/item/2pcs...56d64c4dBgWJ2W
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Old Feb 19th, 2019, 18:42   #25
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The original reflectors do have a shutter it’s just fixed.

The shutter is essential to make the dip beam a dip beam. The Volvo lens provides sufficient diffused light above the cut off for road signs etc. That diffused light is fine from a halogen but may be too bright from a HID.
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Old Feb 19th, 2019, 21:45   #26
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I too worry about the diffused light with HID.

Needs some tests conducted.

Perhaps we could get hold of some OEM HID lens from a P1 car and see if they differ from the Halogen ones?
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Old Feb 20th, 2019, 12:45   #27
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Quote:
Originally Posted by rxtian View Post
The original reflectors do have a shutter it’s just fixed.

The shutter is essential to make the dip beam a dip beam. The Volvo lens provides sufficient diffused light above the cut off for road signs etc. That diffused light is fine from a halogen but may be too bright from a HID.
Perhaps I'd know that had I bothered to have a closer look at the projectors...

But that being the case it may well be something to do with the design of the shutter. Anyway, no more speculation for the time being!
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Old Feb 20th, 2019, 13:12   #28
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I too worry about the diffused light with HID.

Needs some tests conducted.

Perhaps we could get hold of some OEM HID lens from a P1 car and see if they differ from the Halogen ones?
I can assure you that it does, atleast for pre-FL cars. While mine OEM was frosted, the OEM xenons have much different lens just by looking at it. Not sure if FL cars differ as much though but I would also imagine that yes.

I only tested HID setup in my OEM frosted lenses for fun - results were pretty bad and you can see how much light was leaking over the cutoff point
Driving on that wasnt too bad actually (for me) as there was much better and gradual dark->light contrast but I can only imagine how bad it would be towards the oncoming traffic.
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Old Feb 21st, 2019, 02:37   #29
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@rxtian
Thanks for the excellent thread. I've looked on retrofit site for H7 projector products for our cars & drawn a blank.

Any chance you can post a link to what you bought & installed.

Cheers

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Old Feb 21st, 2019, 08:36   #30
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Hi Paddy

Thanks I'm glad you found it helpful - I got the projector reccomendation from others on the forum.

Here's where we got them: https://www.retrofitlab.com/en/xenon...-design-1.html

In the version box pick "Aharon E-46-R | H7 - Left hand traffic" if you want to do what I did and still use halogen bulbs.
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