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Headlamps... not the same 'ol install question

843 Views 8 Replies 6 Participants Last post by  D.Passat00
Hey All:

Just swapped out the headlamp bulbs in my B5.5 and wanted to run something by everyone. Having never ventured into this particular area of upgrade, I blindly (no pun intended) picked up these bulbs on EBay:



I swapped them for my low beam bulbs, both sets being the same, 55W H7 rating. They dropped right in and seem to work fine.
I can tell there is a long history of experience in this forum with this modification. So... here is my question... given these facts - Will my car blow up?

Thanks in advance.
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hmm don't really foresee an explosion. I think most reports are they generally aren't any brighter then stock just a different color and they tend to burn out faster. but if they do the job they do the job. personally I have the silverstars and love them.


Andrew
Since they are 55W H7, you can rest easy that they are not gonna fry your wires. They're not really HID's... they still use a fillament, not a gas arc. The xenon, etc. are halogen gasses surrounding the fillament.

The main concerns would be *actual* visibility (blue is not as good at lighting up the road as white/yellow is -- there will be some dissent on this opinion). Also, if the bulbs put out a lot of UV, they will eventually yellow your lenses (it takes months/years). See is the product literature makes any claims regarding UV transmission.
Ah that's good news, thanks for the reply. Actually I was being a be melodramatic..hehe.. but I have read about mis-matched bulbs causing problems and I know these are cheapo-s, so was a bit concerned. I suppose they wouldn't really last long selling these things if they were actually rated improperly.

My logic was to try out a less expensive bulb and if I saw any improvement (and liked it) I would work up the some nice ones.

Actually, the stock lamps (bulbs and all) in the '03 Passat are pretty darn nice, imho.

Thanks again.

Mike
pete1 said:
Since they are 55W H7, you can rest easy that they are not gonna fry your wires. They're not really HID's... they still use a fillament, not a gas arc. The xenon, etc. are halogen gasses surrounding the fillament.

The main concerns would be *actual* visibility (blue is not as good at lighting up the road as white/yellow is -- there will be some dissent on this opinion). Also, if the bulbs put out a lot of UV, they will eventually yellow your lenses (it takes months/years). See is the product literature makes any claims regarding UV transmission.
Ah thanks... good info. Having just skimmed the lit. on these bulbs I was pretty confident they were not authentic (altho the seller advertises them as such). I was careful with the gloves and kept my original bulbs intact should the visibility suck.
Simple answer...these things are junk. You get what you pay for...
Barnacle-Billy said:
Simple answer...these things are junk. You get what you pay for...
Hmm... really? I guess there's no point in asking about those brake rotors I won in a Taco Bell scratch off contest then... :cry:
Barnacle-Billy said:
Simple answer...these things are junk. You get what you pay for...
Bingo...

and they are probably worse at lighting the road than the stock bulbs...
i installed these on mine before i installed HIDs, and they'll work, but because of the blue tint on the bulb, the light output would probably be less. it looked better though. i really scratched the bulb when i installed mine, and it still worked for 2-3 months before dying.
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