Aftermarket HID lights on a new to me 2007. Not sure I want them...

I have just bought a 2007 Prius from an original owner. It has package #3 on it, which does not include HID lights. The PO really wanted them and got them installed aftermarket. Thus the system does not have a light leveler and the reflectors are from the halogen setup.

My question is: does the factory HID setup have different reflectors? What, besides the lamps and leveler is different between factory HID and halogen? I have not tried the lights at night yet, but the PO says once I do I will love them. I do not want to blind oncoming traffic, so am kind of thinking of going back to halogens.

Thoughts?

 

That is exactly the info I was looking for! I will need to explore that option. If you can point me to the parts (on ebay or elsewhere), I would really appreciate it. The lights look a bit blue, is that normal? They do have the ballasts and most likely the relay. When they are first turned on they go through this sequence of dimming and getting to the full brightness. I don't like blue lights at all. White is great, but blue is terrible and is a stupid trend. I will have to drive around at night some and see how these things are. PO said he had no regrets at all for spending a lot of money on this upgrade. For me the jury is still out. But I want good lighting. I live in a countryside and there are a lot of unlit roads with animals darting across.

Thank you for the advice. I am new to this, so forgive the silliness of some of the questions I may have.

 

I looked at the bulbs and they looked like they had that stupid blue tint on them. Thy are definitely HID, not fake HID, but they may be tinted blue as well. I think it is the stupidest trend in lighting. If anything, yellow tint is more desirable as it cuts through fog better. Blue just makes things appear fuzzy. Some higher end halogen bulbs from major brands like Sylvania have the same stupid tint and it drives me crazy.

When it gets dark later I will try to take some pictures of what I got for a light temperature and pattern.

What is the difference between projector and reflector? Is that a function of the lens? Where and how would I look for a projector setup to go with the HID bulbs?

 

Thank you, 2k1Toaster. Here is what things look like.



When going for a ride after dark, I really did not like the lights. They are really blue and tint everything bluish. I hate that. Color is information and I do not want that information taken from me. If the blue light makes it look brighter (but really isn't), then I am willing to spend a little more energy and get the white true color lighting. I hate seeing blue surroundings. It's disorienting and ugly and confusing. I am sure I can get used to it, but I don't really want to. It's like getting used to being color blind for no good reason.

Now the pattern. Low beam is okay, though it goes too far and makes reflective surfaces far away "bling" at me unnecessarily. It's not terrible, but also distracting. The real problem occurs when high beams are turned on. The light output seems to be cut in half or more. It's almost like turning the lights off (but not quite). The pattern does shift up and even further, but at such a low brightness as to be useless. I did not get anyone to flash me on my test drive, so that aspect seems okay (but I will need to check it myself by driving another car in opposite direction). All in all, I think this is a terrible lighting solution as it is now. Perhaps there are other bulbs that do not have the tinted glass and also adding projector enclosures... If you have done this to your Prius, please point me to a place I can look at projector enclosures. I think I will attempt to temporarily put the original bulbs in and disconnect the HID system and see how that treats me. I may just be satisfied with that. At least I'll have high beams.

Here is the box from the bulbs used. I think the system also came from the same company.

 

If you look above the headlight pattern you can see a light in the garage. This light is a fluorescent bulb in my garage. That bulb is very cold white color in reality, but it looks almost yellow in the picture. It is hard to capture colors in such a photo, but as a relative comparison you can see a cold white florescent light showing up as yellow. That's how blue the lights are.

I may be in the minority, but I know what I like and don't like about lighting. I like the amount of light, I am even fairly okay with how far it is thrown, but I definitely DEFINITELY hate the color. As I said, I like things to look real when I am driving. With these lights everything looks like I am wearing blue glasses and I hate it! I want the light to be either neutral white or slightly warm white so as not alter the color of reality. I am very sensitive to colors and I like having colors in my visual reality. I do not think taking that away from me is a good thing despite what majority thinks.

I think low beams do not need to reach as far as high beams, yet in this setup that's exactly what happens. I feel like I am driving with high beams on and when I turn high beams on, I feel like I am driving with just parking lights on. That is total crap and unacceptable. Original bulbs have two filaments and I do not think thy move back and forth in the housing. I think they just turn on an additional filament for high beams that has a reflector/blocker on it, which causes it to add light farther away when I need it (as opposed to all the time). This setup is utterly useless as it is right now. Low beam is effectively high beam and high beam is non-existent. how is that superior? I do not need to see a mile down the road, but I do need to see a well lit area around me and a bit ahead in low beam mode. If I need to see firther I turn on the high beams. That is how it works on every car I have ever driven in my almost 40 years of driving. I like it that way.

Again, I do not believe the bulbs move in the housing (I may be wrong). I am looking at a halogen bulb for this car and it clearly has two filaments. One being shielded by a piece of reflective metal. I think the way high beams work in the halogen setup is the second filament is turned on and because of a slightly different shielding/reflection in the bulb it reflects off a different part of the housing providing a additional light in a higher pattern. This is how high beams work on everything that I have ever driven. I have never ever seen a high beam be lower in intensity than low beam. Never in almost 40 years of driving many different cars, trucks, motorcycles, what have you.

I'll drive this way, of course, only because I don't have the time at the moment to undo it. But there is a fundamental issue for me here. I do not want the low beam to shoot as far as this system does. Bright, yes, give me bright. Far? no Blue? Hell, no!

My sister has a Lexus with HID lights. They do use projectors and they are white, not blue. Cold white, yes, but not a hint of blue Colors look normal under them. They also provide a truly excellent lighting pattern. High beams are brighter than low beams. It's all normal, not this "through the looking glass" feeling I get with this setup I have on the Prius. I like good HID, but this is not it and not a very good approximation.

I'll see how I feel after trying to live with it for a while. I am not sure I will want to keep the existing setup. Perhaps with projectors, but I imaging those are costly and I will most definitely need different bulbs without the blue glass (I can actually see the blue glass on these stupid things during the day when I look into the housing). 3000K sound s good. I am not sure what "+" version means, but I assume some sort of longer life designation.

Thanks again for all the info. This is daunting and I know I am not with majority about the blue lights. I hate them. Always have, always will.

 

I would like to know more about the projector retrofit. Where and how do I find the parts? I am pretty handy, but I am not sure I want to spend huge money on it. I bought the Prius to save money. The bulbs in the car now may be replacements as PO put the kit early on and he said he had to replace the bulbs already. I have not gone inside the housing to look at the bulbs, but I can see through the lens that the bulbs have blue tint on the glass. The originals may have been tint-less. The blue coloring drives me crazy. It's like nails on a chalkboard kind of thing for me. Really tires me out while driving.