| Author | Message | ||
     Greg_e |
I finally had my bike out past dark the other night, and like everyone has said the lights just plain suck. So I want to put in a set of these: http://www.rallylights.com/detail.aspx?ID=4924 Can't afford the Bi-Xenon versions and I'm certain these are way better than the stock 03 light on low beam, especially with two of them burning. Going to give it another night before I really buy them to make sure I want to spend the money. Now here is the hard part... I really need a headlight mounting bracket thing so I can work on this and make mods that may not work or be reversible... Anyone have the headlight mounting hardware and mount for a decent price? Doesn't even matter if the frame mounting point are broken, just as long as the headlight mounting points are still OK. | ||
| Iamarchangel |
Try the Silverstars and the warranty headlight fix. That made a huge difference for me. Yes, I always run high beam on, both lights on. Cheaper and less hassle. | ||
| Greg_e |
No one has a wrecked set of mounts around? Broken is OK if I can piece it back together well enough for measurements to make the adapter I'll need to fit the larger lights. | ||
| Greg_e |
Got the mounts, need to call about lights, connectors, and mounting flanges. I think this will be a doable upgrade but might require cutting the fairing a little to clear the larger diameter lights. Looks like the tail side should be fine. | ||
| Gunut75 |
Try buellsterparts.com. They have some scratch and dent stuff. | ||
| B00stzx3 |
Yeah, the 90mm Hellas have been done. Lemme find some threads for ya. http://www.badweatherbikers.com/cgibin/discus/show.cgi?tpc=32777&post=212600#POST212600 (Message edited by b00stzx3 on October 01, 2010) (Message edited by b00stzx3 on October 01, 2010) | ||
| Greg_e |
The ones I'm going to try are hi and low beam in one enclosure so I will always have both lights shining much brighter than stock. Same concept as a real BiXenon where there is a servo that moves a widget to make the low or high beam. These happen to be halogen lights because I can't afford the $500 each of the BiXenon. The ones in your link are just a "common" low and high beam, Hella also makes those in 50mm, 60mm, and I think 70mm so a size could be found that required very little work. Didn't get the time to call about ordering today. | ||
| Greg_e |
Looking through the service manual I see a larger issue than trying to fit the new headlights to the existing mounting brackets... Why would they run the low beam off of the same connection as the injection? There is an open spot on the relay block that should have been used to power the lights, and then they could have used the 15 amp "lights" fuse that only protects the high beam. I was hopping this would be mostly plug and play after designing a mounting adapter, but now I see this will involve a lot of electrical work and I may drop back and punt by adding a relay and fuse like most (smart) people do when adding HID. | ||
| Greg_e |
EDITING POSTS WITH THIS USERNAME/PASSWORD ISSUE IS A PAIN! Anyone know where I can get the terminals that go inside the relay box? Does American Sport Bike carry a repair kit? | ||
| Ratfink |
Curiosity, but why didn't you just go the HID route? You can do both bulbs for around $65 and no cutting into your harness. | ||
| Greg_e |
Because you can't do them legally and you should use a wiring harness that will support the start up draw. Also to use the correct HID to get both lights with low and high beam each (a real BiXenon) would have been $1000. Pretty much those people looking to do the same old thing as everyone else shouldn't bother reading any of my mods threads. I have my own ideas on the way things should be done and that is certainly not a hack job the way most people put HID lights into their machines. At the minimum you need to have a wiring harness and relay to power the ballasts that runs from the battery. If you take a look at how the low beam gets powered, you would never stick any kind of big load on there because if it shorts you lose the entire injection system with it. High beam is the only one that has a fuse all its own. | ||
| Ratfink |
Ok. Maybe its just me but I read your comment as though you were mad that I asked a question. I was merely doing just that. Asking. Not saying anything negative. I have dual high beam housing on my bolt. Hid bulbs.55 watt.6000k bulbs. No, its not legal. But it is not blinding to others nor is it a nuisance. I run a harness for each bulb. Not just one for both. Just my way and I think it works VERY well for me at the inexpensive price I paid for them. Thus giving me a little more cash for other mods. I hope that you understand I ment no bad thoughts. Just was curious. Best of luck on your upgrade. | ||
| B00stzx3 |
After reading this again, I got the idea of doing an alternative retrofit. How about Morimoto, E55, FX-R or other projectors usually reserved for car HID retrofits Greg? I know the Hella 90mm are tried and true but others could work. I see Hella even has 80mm projectors... maybe they would fit easier than the 90mm? | ||
| Greg_e |
Most of the car projectors are designed to be placed inside a protective plastic and wouldn't last long out open on a cycle. I looked at a good number of the salvaged units on ebay and bid on a bunch but never won them. It's a good idea but I think it would take a lot of work to get completed. You could build a Lexan cover over the front of the eyebrow, and then you would need to seal up the fixture around the back. Some of them were sealed around back so then all you would need would be to make a cover out of 1/8 or 1/10 inch Lexan to keep the forward water out of the lens. This would have the benefit of being MUCH cheaper than the brand new Hella BiXenon and still be DOT approved since you would salvage them from a USA model car. If a person did it this way, I would stand behind it as being the proper way to add HID to these cycles. And having twice the low beams certainly would make the road brighter. Now that I've had some help with the relay terminals I think I can go ahead and order the lights and start working. Need lights (1 pair), connectors (1 pair), shutter connectors (1 pair, and the only thing that doesn't show up on the web order form), and the mounting square (1 pair) just so I get a good idea what it needs. I'm thinking a simple aluminum riser from the old headlight screw holes to the mounting square for the new headlights. The new headlights are about 20mm longer (overall) so they will need to be positioned about 10mm forward to clear everything in the back, which should give just enough to raise the mounting square to clear the adjustment screws on the mount. Then I think the fairing will need to be trimmed a little. The eyebrows need to come out, but mine are already gone. Probably need to touch up the black paint I sprayed in the depressions after trimming. This should be a relatively easy mod depending on how you deal with the wiring. Super easy would be to run a harness with fuse back to the battery and just trip the relay with the low beam power, and trip the shutter with the high beam power. Mine will be more complex than that since I want to use the extra space in the relay block and one of the "spare" fuses to try and keep things neat and stock looking. | ||
| B00stzx3 |
Ahh yeah, I didn't even think about that. They are always intsalled in a headlight... Well if you need more info I'd suggest going over to http://www.hidplanet.com/forums/ Got a lotta useful info about retrofitting for my Focus and seen bike stuff there. In fact, this guy did what you're referring to with polycarbonite plastic http://www.hidplanet.com/forums/showthread.php?27551-Can-lenses-be-left-in-the-open&highlight=buell and here http://www.hidplanet.com/forums/showthread.php?27481-starting-my-fog-light-retro. for foglight projector retrofit but it might apply to your project Good luck!! Post some pics!!! (Message edited by b00stzx3 on October 05, 2010) | ||
| Greg_e |
Typical for my life, been wanting to do this mod for about a year... Lights are out of stock all the way back to the factory and not expected until basically January   | ||
| Greg_e |
With any luck I just grabbed a pair on Amazon, hopefully these are really in stock. | ||
| Greg_e |
New headlights are here, going to take a completely custom mount to make this work and not going to be simple at that:   Pretty damn big lens and cover, going to be hard to fit that through the fairing, probably a bunch of cutting going to happen.  The all important DOT stamp. I can tell by looking at them these suckers are going to be BRIGHT! The came with a 65 watt DOT stamped lamp. Only downside is I still need to find the connector for the shutter servo. (Message edited by glitch on October 22, 2010) | ||
| Greg_e |
There are some days where I REALLY hate the formatting methods of this forum, nice embedded images there   for some reason they are not hot linking today , photobucket must be having a bad day. (Message edited by greg_e on October 15, 2010) | ||
| Greg_e |
Decipher if you can:  Mostly keeping the thread from going archive. Lots of lines that do not represent anything except how I will have to machine the plate with the tools I possess. Waterjet or CNC would make this SO easy! Also keep in mind that this is a sketch and tolerance is about 0.050 inches which should be plenty accurate for this project. Hole diameters are the only really important things because the swivel holder for the headlight needs to snap into the mounting plate. Those holes will almost definitely need a little work with a file or grinder to make things fit and align. Need to check and make sure I really have room for the extra material before I order material. (Message edited by glitch on October 22, 2010) | ||
| B00stzx3 |
Cool thanks for the info Greg. Think on next paycheck I'mma try and grab a set. Question though... Would you recommend 1 high and 1 low or just both high? I mean I don't wanna blind peeps and cause accidents, but as of now I ride with my high on constantly with the 5000k HIDs. Besides, if I come up behind a car I'm usually gonna pass em anyways. I don't wanna get a low beam and have the crappy "spoon" halo thingy the OEM projectors got. | ||
| Glitch |
There ya go Greg. It's best just to use the image's URL and not Photobucket's formatting/tagging. Yeah BadWeB is unique, but then again, so are we  | ||
| Greg_e |
I recommend something that will provide both beams from a single fixture like these Bihalogen or a real BiXenon. Next to that I would recommend using one low and one high from either the Hella 60mm series or the 90mm series. The single beam type lights are cheap, I think about $50 each and someone else has already done those so you might get some direct help. Or wait a little while and see how my mod comes out and do it the best way. I'm told these lights are so new they are having trouble keeping up. Since they are small and DOT and quality they should remain around for a good long time. They are designed similar to my micro DE fog lights, those lights are fantastic so I expect these to be damn good too. Hella makes great stuff, just look at half a dozen different luxury and regular cars on the roads. Whenever possible go with a DOT approved (for USA) solution because then no one can give you grief about being illegal. | ||
| Greg_e |
Meant to add that all I need to do is find a connector set for the shutter and order another H9 connector because I broke one and didn't get a spare like usual. Everything else is on the way so I just need to lat out the metal and start cutting. Also the plastic headlight mount will never be able to be used on stock headlights again. If this is a problem fr you, you will need to buy another mount somewhere like I did. | ||
| Greg_e |
Spent some time with a CAD, still need to learn how to make a line tangent to two circles then clean it up and dimension everything.  | ||
| Greg_e |
 Might start machining it tonight after work. | ||
| Greg_e |
 After about 2 hours of work  Another 3 hours, still needs to have a bunch of stuff cleaned up.   | ||
| Greg_e |
Looks like the shutter connector is an Amp/Tyco 282080 which can be purchased from places like Mouser for under $2.00 each. That said they are expensive and difficult to put together since you need to buy the seals and pins/receptacles separately. I think I'm going to buy some 2 pin male and female Deutsch DT connectors. (Message edited by greg_e on October 30, 2010) | ||
| Petebueller |
Mine are mounted off a plate bolted to the headlight support bracket. The support bracket has all the bits ground off it to let the plate sit flush.  This is the template  I have some off in December and plan to do a revised version based on the current fit. You may have seen I've had a twin light driver made for XBs (and soon the CR) which lets to run the high beam at reduced brightness on low beam. This is the low beam now.  I've set the brightness of the beam down one setting since I took the photo. I looked at the bi-xenons when I did the conversion. Apart from the expense they were going to stick out too far. I've been working on getting the twinlight driver for 2 years now. I didn't like the unbalanced look on one bulb only, and I wanted something that would give me light if the low beam bulb blew. I couldn't see a way of using the bi-xenons to do what I wanted. The power harness that comes with it gives more than a 65% increase in brightness on high beam. This is an animated view of the effect of the increase brightness on a Triumph Daytona that was used to develop the Triumph version  | ||
| Greg_e |
How much of the fairing did you need to cut away to make them fit? My eyebrows are already gone so I have a little extra room but not sure that there is enough. I was looking at the plastic mount last night and thinking that I need to machine it flush for the metal to fit right and give me close to the correct distance for the light to fit. These bihalogen are only 20mm longer overall, if I can get the mount to fit correctly there is about 5 mm of room in the back which will make them only stick out an extra 15 mm which I think I can live with. If I had a welder I would just build a whole new headlight mount and ditch the plastic. The light driver is a good idea, but I'm still concerned with blinding people because it is still on highbeam even if the power is reduced. |
