Bandit 1200s - Think I have main beam upside down

Started by markgrinyer, April 13, 2014, 07:33:57 PM

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markgrinyer

Hi.


When I installed the HB3/HB4 kits to my bandit 1200s K2 the dipped beam is amazing as expected, but main beam isn't nearly as good as what I was expecting. (main beam being HB4).


It does add a little light 'above' the dipped but does not improve the visibility of the road ahead that much (on a normal 'a' road only illuminates about 4 extra cats eyes, not nearly as much as the comparitive visual brightness would suggest.


I did a little test today and turned both lights on and held a piece of cardboard right in front of the headlight unit. (The dipped pattern is amazing, this is only an issue with the main). I was surprised to see that whilst the dipped produced a 'u' shaped arc, the main produced an 'n' shaped arc.


The board was too close to show the flicks on the near side but these are clearly visible (on the dipped).


I have projector headlights.


Does it sound like I have the main beam upside down or just really badly adjusted. The mounting caps fell out when I removed the halogen bulbs so I couldn't use them as a reference.


Many Thanks
Mark

Fluke

Hi Mark

That's a strange one. Both the HB3/HB4 bulbs have no up / down orientation of any note especially with HID...The difference in performance could be mainly down to headlight alignment combined with your headlight projectors setup.

Maybe the alignment of your low beam was relying mainly on the fall off in light intensity, so you got a massive boost in distance when fitting the HID.

It might be possible if the projector lens is similar to raise the high beam height and get that increase in range which should be possible with all that extra light output.

As a note often people find that when running a low beam HID their high beam becomes much less noticeable especially if not doing a high beam upgrade.

I could be wrong on the above, I'll try and do some research for you.


markgrinyer

The dipped is effectively the main beam now, but with a very clear cut off about 2 seconds down the road at 60mph (very useful for not tailgating lol), I can't praise the dipped enough, especially compared with the originals that were like candles.


I have wondered about alignment too, the main focus of main beam appears to be at the near side tip of the dipped, but I was wondering if this is just because of the dipped flick up. I raised the main beam by 20 half turns and there was a slight improvement but not much. Does the HB4 have the flick at the near side too? If not the main beam could be aligned to the near side too far.


Its going into a garage in a few weeks for a hole in the exhaust, I will get them to have a look too but at the moment I don't enjoy riding at night that much (which is when I'm mostly on the bike)

Fluke

I must admit I'm not 100% on the HB4 as we supply so few of them. It's very possible a slight 'tweak' like you say could be all that's needed here.

Keep me posted how it goes.

Regards

markgrinyer

Hi


I will do. I'm just nervous about moving that focal point across in case its a flick to the near side like the HB3 bulbs (which illuninate road signs).


See what the garage says I guess


Many thanks
mark

markgrinyer

Hi Fluke


Just an update, I readjusted the beams after changing colour again (from 5000k back to 6000k), and with a slight adjustment to the horizontal aligment have now got the focus point of the main beam dead centre of the road beginning where the dipped fades out, and I have to say I'm amazed at how good they are, especially compared to the stock headlights (which dipped HID was better than on its own lol).


Lesson is, aligment is crucial, especially on the bandit lol


Many thanks
Mark Grinyer

Fluke

Hi Mark, thanks for the update...so glad you got it sorted.

If you need anything in the future just yell :)

Regards