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HID Cut Off Line - Photo Needed

8K views 19 replies 12 participants last post by  virtualdev 
#1 ·
If it is not too much of trouble, can you guys post some pictures of your headlight cut off line?
If I shine my headlight against a wall, especially if I am like at least 50 feet out, the line isn't really straight horizontal....more like wavy horizontal line with some small gaps. I have 2014 Mazda 3.
I've seen some with solid horizontal lines with no lights leaking out. Why is mine different?
 
#6 ·
step up towards passenger side is how beam distribution is designed for LH handle vehicle application.
It's to illuminate pedestrian side farther while preventing other side of beam reaching to oncoming traffic causing glare to them.

Some projector do have what is called "flat cut off" ( flat cut off line all the way across entire beam pattern) but it is not that common.
vast majority of set up has either slope or step up from "elbow point"

HID or Halogen, they have slight light distribution designed to leak above cut off line.
It's to illuminate street signs enough, while controlling not being overly bright enough to cause glare.
Also this leak helps "to be seen"

Clear lens has very slight benefit gaining more output compare to frosted surface textured lens or rippled( Fresnel like) lens, sometimes combine of both.
Our halogen projector has lightly frosted surface texture on lens surface.

Clear lens tend to shoot too sharp distinct cut off line, this is actually not desired.
Too distinct lit and unlit area can cause "view evaporation"

To prevent this, smoother transition from lit area to unlit area(above cut off), so it is commonly controlled by texturing projector lens surface.

Also clear lens shows more reflector surface imperfections as well..

Many likes intense color (by chromatic aberration )band along center of cut off, which you can generally obtained by clear lens.

I think our halogen projector is decent performance projector. Very light weighted and easy for eyes distribution.
 
#7 ·
Yeah, the halogen projector has pretty bad cutoff and squirrel finders that can blind oncoming traffic. Here's the cutoff on mine for example (about 10 ft away only)

 
#11 ·
You have H11 set up right?

Our H11 projector does has flare up spread toward each end of beam pattern but yours looks slightly more than usual and seems center intensity ( hot spot) is weak.

what bulb you are using. Aftermarket HID ?
they tend to have poor arc location alignment.


Same kind of wall shot picture but with lower exposure setting will help us see if beam pattern is within acceptable tolerance or not.

may be block one side at the time, so you can compare RH headlight beam and LH head light beam individually.
 
#12 ·
Yeah like @upashi said aftermarket hid kits quality isn't always the greatest and and even if the tube is slightly misaligned, it'll do weird things to your light output and cutoff. Did you notice the wavy cutoff when you had stock halogen bulbs?
 
#15 ·
Just installed HID kit from my Jeep that I sold in my wife’s halogen projectors. I’m using a quality kit/bulb and am not impressed with the output. When relatively close to the wall I get dots above the main cutoff. When a couple feet from wall there’s a large gap in the middle. Most perplexing is I have these beams of light that come off the side of the car. From the driver’s seat they almost appear as thought the light is protruding from the side mirrors.

Is anyone else experiencing these things? I can live with a imperfect cutoff, but this other stuff is bad, almost distracting. Didn’t have these issues with the Jeep. I’m pretty sure there’s only one way to install the bulbs. I have the glass part at 12 and the wire at 6.
 
#18 ·
Don't waste your money on Silverstars. They aren't any better than the OEM bulbs.
Heat Issues? No, they operate at fairly low temperatures, under 200° F. Decent bulbs have heat sinks also.
Look around, there are a lot of different brands. Get something that uses Philips Luxeon technology.
Something like these from iJDMToy are fine.
 
#20 ·
So I guess my question now is, should we be looking at anything online with the Phillips like @arathol said, or support one of the vendors of the site?

Diode Dynamics

The price is double the iJDMToy link, don't know what to say :)
 
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