One of my low beams decided to quit on the way into work today. Got new ones at Walmart after dinner and threw them in so I'm legal, but doing so reminded me that the headlights aren't great, which of course led me to think about bulb upgrades. The housings on the 128i are fully enclosed, so I'm ruling out LED bulbs on the basis of heat, which leaves me with halogens. I need H7 bulbs for both high and low beams. What is the hive's current preference?
can you get european housings for those lights? Even today, you would be surprised just how much USDOT lighting sucks compared to the rest of the world
I thought the reflectors were global at this point (car in question is MY2009), but I could be wrong. By the look of it, the only difference between the US housing and the Euro one is the presence or absence of the amber tint on the corner marker. And at $250 a side I'm not inclined to experiment.
In reply to mad_machine :
i dunno man i can't tell you how many times i thought people had left their high beams on in the u.k. back in the late 90s so you'd flash yours with no effect. I can't remember what the fad was back then but you were regularly blinded by oncoming traffic on narrow main roads. It sucked! I suppose two decades later must/might be better. 
I was running silverstars in my 00 explorer with the stock housings and was getting disapointing results. Decided to try the bottom the barrel ones....and they are significantly better.
Maybe the yellow light penetrates the hazy housing better? Ive polished them a few times before but they probably need replaced now
Sylvania xtravisions have worked well for me.
I got some chinese LEDs off amazon (seal light?) & they are about 1000% better than stock on a 2000 4runner. Had them for a year- still working great. These ones had cooling fins on the back/outside of the housing so they can dissipate heat outside the sealed area.
I replaced sketchy ebay/amazon HIDs with xtravisions in the Mustang and was very happy with the results. Now I just need to aim them.
The cheapest bulb behind the counter, not the same bulb that’s twice as much hanging up, my flaps has sitting there. Oh and replaced in pairs.
Hella higher wattage h7 bulbs have been good to me. Amazon for about 20 bucks a pair
I added a +1 for the XtraVisions. Silverstar level of brightness, minus the tint to make the white appear more white, and typically without the Silverstar markup. Best bang for the buck in bulbs, IMHO.
For US vs ECE lighting, the beam pattern specs, etc. are fairly different for reflectors, so they're often different units. For projectors, they're a lot more similar, so it's more common to find the same light used for both.
Keep in mind that LEDs produce less heat, not more, so the only reason to discount LEDs for heat reasons is if you're worried about your headlights icing over in winter.
If you put a LED bulb replacement into a halogen housing you have to be careful to choose one that has the high/low beam LED dies in the same spots as the high/low beam filaments in the bulb it's replacing, or you'll blind oncoming drivers. LED sealed beam replacements take care of this for you.
LEDs produce less heat, but they also need to run much cooler than a halogen. So without enough airflow for cooling, the LEDs will run hot and depending on the chips and drivers in use, either suffer some brightness loss or have a short lifespan or both.
^True, if the heatsink at the back of the "bulb" (where the plug on a traditional bulb is) is enclosed that could be a problem.
The whole headlight assembly is closed up on this car; there's a plastic cover with an O-ring seal retained by two clips that locks onto the back the light assembly. The bulb retention clips probably wouldn't permit LEDs either, come to think of it.
I'll see about getting a pair of the Xtravisions and trying them out.
I like the Wagner Night Defense 9007s I have in my '96 F-150. They're very yellow, but very bright. They seem to do the job.
Any tint on a bulb is blocking light. I may be wrong, but it seems that the brightest bulbs would not have any tint to them.
jfryjfry said:Any tint on a bulb is blocking light. I may be wrong, but it seems that the brightest bulbs would not have any tint to them.
Correct. Tinting a bulb will always hurt output somewhat. The only exception are coatings that aren't really a tint like the coating on early HIR bulbs (before they figured out how to get the same brightness without the IR reflecting coating). That coating was used to kick IR back into the bulb instead of letting it leave to run the filament hotter or something like that.
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