Xenon conversion kits - are they any good?

Anyone put a Xenon conversion kit onto a Discovery 1? Any idea of the impact the the MoT and are they road legal?

mot fail

When i got my Disco 1 the lights weren't brilliant but a set of upgrade bulbs (60% brighter than standard halogens) did the trick, Halfords sell bulb kits giving +120% brightness so i'd go with those for quality light.

Xenon conversion, particularly H4 type, are no good.

Used to have them in my Civic, until a policeman kindly told me 'look mate, I have to give you a ticket but just look at the beam pattern, it's all over the show, that means less actual light where you need it'

So, I removed them and fitted some Osram Nightbreaker which are regarded as an excellent upgrade H4, and they were so much better.

So no, I would not recommend HID.

Chapatis enjoy puttin dem in da BMZ innit, but otherwise they are ****.

They also get you pulled and they fail MOTs now too. Thank ****.

HID's are great til a) you're the poor git coming the other way and blinded b) you have to replace a bulb and find out its just as cheap to buy a whole kit rather than a bulb (if you can even get them!) c) you get pulled over and need to explain yourself; and d) fail an mot because your beam pattern is shot to bits. For that reason I would suggest using ultra bright bulbs (using the standard wattage). I use Ring xenon ultima bulbs and they are vast improvement over standard bulbs and have a nice colour too

I have HID s on my beemer, mot says if fitted must have headlight washers and auto levelling, sports cars with very hard suspension are exempt!!!!WTF.

After a long night time trip in my 200tdi I decided something had to be done about the lights because I was having to concentrate so hard to see anything I was knackered by the time I got to my destination. I tried a supposedly 100% brighter bulb and although it defiantly was brighter I would say only 30% brighter but that could be due to the really poor lenses on the 200.

I did a bit of reading and decided to go for a cheap set of the HID conversions on eBay, I know they are not strictly legal or to be more precise they are not approved but you are not braking any law by fitting them if the light pattern, colour, beam angle and brightness do not cause a hazard so I thought I would give them a go.

The kit cost £34 on eBay compared to £25 each for Halfords ultra brilliance bulbs so I figured if I was not happy I would just stick them back on eBay and cut my losses. I went for 4300K bulbs as they are the least blue bulbs I could find and from what I read googling anything 6000K or lower would pass an MOT.

It took about an hour to fit them then about another hour to figure out I had inadvertently pulled out a connector hidden under a rubber boot to get them working.

I had marked on the wall about 8m in front of the car where my old bulbs cut off and the new bulbs shone a bit higher and with a bit less sharp cut off so I adjusted the beams down a bit to match the old bulbs then a bit more to be safe until I got them tested and set up properly and they are such an improvement over the originals, I feel much more confident and as yet have not had anyone flash at me thinking I have my full beams on. I have not had them adjusted yet and I do think they could be raised up a bit without dazzling anyone so will have to get them set up soon.

You are meant to have headlight washers and automatic levellers but the mot tester has no instruction to check you have them and no section in the mot to fail you on if you don’t have them so can only fail you if the beam angle or pattern is out. I am going to load something heavy in the back when I get them set up to make sure they are going to be ok when the cat is fully laden.

There are four different types of H4 HID bulb, H4-1 to H4-4,

H4-1 have only the dipped beam and nothing else so are no good at all as far as I can see

H4-2 have a HID bulb for the dipped beam and a normal halogen bulb for the full beam, they get good reviews but the bulbs will only last as long as the halogen bulb but since it’s the full beam they should last longer than a normal bulb as it is normally the dip beam which goes first as it is used the most

H4-3 have a single HID bulb which is moved back and forward between the positions for dip and full beam by a solenoid, these are the ones I went for, some people say that some of the cheap ones have loose mechanisms which wobble about and never rest in the exact same position after each change from dip to full or full to dip making setting up accurately a problem but mine seem to be fine. They did seem to wobble a little when I first fitted them but they settled down in a couple of days.

H4-4 use two HID bulbs one for dip and one for full beam which would seem the best set up but as HID bulbs take 3 to 4 second to get to decent brightness then you will have to wait every time you switch to full beam. So that you are not left without any lights for those few seconds the dipped beam bulbs stay on all the time but this dose mean the kits need an extra two ballasts so are more expensive.

When you switch on a HID bulb even though there is a delay in getting full brightness there is an immediate flash which immediately dims again so you can still flash your lights at your mates

I will let you know what happens when I take the car to get the beam angle adjusted which I will have to do soon but if I have any problems they will come straight out and I will stick the old bulbs back which should only take a couple of minutes.

They are now an MOT fail, and it has always been illegal (strictly speaking) to fit HID lamps to halogen reflector units.

Hence the reason why you get a fine for failure to maintain your headlamps.

As I say, they cannot be better than the correct halogen because of the beam pattern.

The excuse here is halogen with projector lenses. They sort out the beam pattern so they will be better light emission, you won't get a pull cos you don't dazzle the copper and if you hide your wiring carefully you might get away with it at MOT time, although I reckon testers now will be inspecting lamp units if they suspect foul play, it's easy to tell a Xenon Lamp Unit from a halogen retro fitted with HID Burners.

The main point here though is don't fit HID to your land rover, they are worse than halogen.

As Chief Dude above word for word, and two reasons for a D1 & 2 failing the test.

Copied from the mot manual:

1. A headlamp which does not conform to diagrams 1, 2 or 3 that has a beam image which is aimed so that it dazzles other road users.

2. A headlamp levelling or cleaning device inoperative or otherwise obviously defective.

I saw the title and thought I waas going to have to go into a long rant about focal lengths etc but thankfully it now seems that people are becoming wise to HID "Upgrades" Thankyou Discool, martyc et al for explaining it Perhaps this thread should become a sticky?

sorry to hijack, i recently bought some new bulbs for my 94 300tdi disco, i dont know if theyre HID but i think they are xenon but i dont remember them being called HID, i may be wrong but they were just a straight fit bulb for bulb, i have self levelers that work but no headlamp washers cos they were on my old bumper. is this now all illegal and im gonn a have to go starting to figure out how to gert washers on a winch bumper? thank fully i still have the old bulbs.

I have always had xenon lights, so when I got the 300 they were like candles!

And I quite agree that you cannot put HID kits in refelctor lenses, even the H7R bulbs with the blacked out parts dont work.

So when I did the conversion to facelift td5 lights, I stripped them and put in projector lenses and then fitted a HID kit, so I have the correct beam pattern and wont dazzle oncomers.

Sailed through the mot, well the lights did.....just had to change the rear brake pipes as too corroded

Freediscoranger said:

sorry to hijack, i recently bought some new bulbs for my 94 300tdi disco, i dont know if theyre HID but i think they are xenon but i dont remember them being called HID, i may be wrong but they were just a straight fit bulb for bulb, i have self levelers that work but no headlamp washers cos they were on my old bumper. is this now all illegal and im gonn a have to go starting to figure out how to gert washers on a winch bumper? thank fully i still have the old bulbs.

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There used to be quite a lot of H4 bulbs labelled as Xenon. These are a direct replacement for standard bulbs and have no extra wires or componentry, whilst they may or may not be legal they are NOT HID
HID come with extra wiring and ballast resistors.

It sounds like you don't have HID

sidewaysste said:

There used to be quite a lot of H4 bulbs labelled as Xenon. These are a direct replacement for standard bulbs and have no extra wires or componentry, whilst they may or may not be legal they are NOT HID
HID come with extra wiring and ballast resistors.

It sounds like you don't have HID

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good, i dont want all the extra faf of all that, just needed to be able to see at night since i do a lot of motroway driving and stops me getting as tired.

I just use standard cheap halfords bulbs as everytime i go through a ford etc my headlights fill with water and blow the bulbs :doh:

H4 bulbs labelled as Xenon are as stated above a direct replacement for the standard Halogen bulb. They are legal, and are halogen gas bulbs but also with the addition of the xenon gas giving the x% amount of increased light..

A worth while upgrade I fink

StuRox said:

I have always had xenon lights, so when I got the 300 they were like candles!

And I quite agree that you cannot put HID kits in refelctor lenses, even the H7R bulbs with the blacked out parts dont work.

So when I did the conversion to facelift td5 lights, I stripped them and put in projector lenses and then fitted a HID kit, so I have the correct beam pattern and wont dazzle oncomers.

Sailed through the mot, well the lights did.....just had to change the rear brake pipes as too corroded

Click to expand...

Must admit Ive always liked your lights ever since you did em and posted pics of em on here, in the distant future If I got some lights would you ever consider doing the conversion if I paid you? (i post em to ya and pay then when its done you post em back at my expense?) pretty please

Not much I wouldn't do for beer tokens

I was actually looking at seeing if the L322 Range Rover lights would be an easy fit, as wishing I fitted bi-xenon projectors now, and looks just as cheap to fit those headlights than buy new projectors etc

I think that would be a brilliant idea, and then you could sell me yours to help finance your new ones

I have been looking at getting another set of the facelift lights to mod again, but they are going for really silly prices, hence looking at RRS or the FFRR, as their lights are cheap as chips.

Will have to wait till my mig welder lands, as reckon I will need to do a bit of fabrication to make them fit and look right.