I've long been in search of good lights that will allow me to ride sweepers and twisties aggressively at night and be able to actually SEE where I'm going. The Hella FF50s upgraded with Xenon H7s work OK when pointed up and out but aren't ideal.
Of course I could buy uber-expensive HID driving lights but where's the challenge in that?
Upgrading regular driving lights to HID is complicated by the fact that most of the HID upgrade bulbs have a big ass that won't fit in a typically small driving light housing.
Anyhow, earlier this year I stumbled across this post. (http://www.hidplanet.com/forums/showthread.php?38090-Ultimate-Hella-MICRO-DE-FOG-Upgrade-Halogen-to-HID-(56k-big-no-no)) This piqued my interest because the halogen Hella Micro DEs do have enough room in the back to accommodate the big ass of an HID conversion bulb.
So, last summer I dropped $60 on Fleabay for a pair of the Halogen Micro DEs and then another $35-40 on a DDM Tuning set of 35W HID H3s, did the install and mounted them on my K75 with a K1100RS fairing.
The one issue with the Micro DEs is that, being fog lights, the top of the beam has a very sharp horizontal cutoff at the top. This obviously isn't good for a driving light so I figured I'd be better off flipping the housings over and having the cutoff be at the bottom of the beam pattern. I have the, now bottom, cutoff aligned about 50 feet in front of me, since my brain has already processed that pavement and picked a line.
Anyhow, since I installed these over the summer, I really haven 't had a chance to try them out riding dark twisties and sweepers. On Monday night, riding the Redwood Highway (199), from Grants Pass to Crescent City I finally got a chance to try them out on various turns along the Smith River and through the redwoods. All I can say is WOW! These things are stupid bright and EXACTLY what I was looking for. I have them mounted under my RS mirrors and they look around turns farther than I do. I can finally ride dark turns at night as fast as I want to and see what the hell is ahead of me. The beams from them are about 25 degrees vertically and about 120 degrees horizontally.
I'll now be installing them on all of my bikes.
They are, of course, pretty dang bright so you need to be very careful not to blind oncoming traffic with them.
(Given that you have to mess with the wiring and mounting I consider this more of a DIY than a straight upgrade but that's just semantics.)
(http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j246/smithduck/k75f_old/k75f_555_dl1.jpg)
Update: I'm REALLY impressed by these so I decided to make another set of them for my K1100RS. However, for the life of me I could not get one of the connectors off in order to run the wire through the rubber boot at the back. Instead I just cut the old wires out and slipped the new ones in. Conveniently, there's a channel in the boot around the lip that's perfect for a zip-tie. :2thumbup: I'll put some black RTV in there to keep them waterproof.
(http://i1221.photobucket.com/albums/dd470/Motobrick/lighting/microdev2.jpg)
Out of curiosity, I measured the height and width of the beam of one of these. It's a whopping 70 degrees wide :eek: (seems like more than that when riding) and a respectable 35 degrees high.