metal lightbulb shield inside light housing? is it needed or not

Quick question... occured WAAAYYYY before I took the metal sheild out.. my left light has always seen about 1/2 times bright than my right... what could be causing this?? is the right on dieing/effected?? its been doing this for a couple months now

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Originally Posted by Colossus

Quick question... occured WAAAYYYY before I took the metal sheild out.. my left light has always seen about 1/2 times bright than my right... what could be causing this?? is the right on dieing/effected?? its been doing this for a couple months now

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Could be the bulb going out, or there could be a breakdown in the wiring to that bulb. Grab a volt meter, and check the output at both plugs and see if there is any difference. If no difference, then you most likely have a problem with the bulb.

Right on......thanks

the proper hid is no brighter than stock headlights, but when someone mods headlights to give better sign illumination (removing shields/ 100w bulbs) they are brighter than proper hid (to light up signs I have to use high beam, the hid I use only illuminate the road from cars bumpers down) I do agree that hid bulbs in oem reflectors are a bad thing, but so are 100+ watt bulbs, and driving around with highbeam on in heavy traffic.

why would you be driving with highbeams on in traffic? and btw with the shields out the normal lights are still less bright then the highs, and you can still see a difference

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Originally Posted by 98gtp

the proper hid is no brighter than stock headlights, but when someone mods headlights to give better sign illumination (removing shields/ 100w bulbs) they are brighter than proper hid (to light up signs I have to use high beam, the hid I use only illuminate the road from cars bumpers down) I do agree that hid bulbs in oem reflectors are a bad thing, but so are 100+ watt bulbs, and driving around with highbeam on in heavy traffic.

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Thats unpossible.

How can there be more light on the road... if the lightbulbs aren't brighter than "stock headlights"?

Sorry to say, but HID's are stock on a lot of nicer cars these days, and the SUV's with them on are MUCH more blinding than the standard halogen headlight SUV's.

I say SUV's because those are the only ones with their headlights high enough to blind even if their high beams are off and their headlights are aligned properly.

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HID headlamp burners produce between 2,800 and 3,500 lumens from between 35 and 38 watts of electrical power, while halogen filament headlamp bulbs produce between 700 and 2,100 lumens from between 40 and 72 watts at 12.8 V.

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From Wiki but i'm sure Sylvania would produce similar numbers.

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Originally Posted by matt5112

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I say SUV's because those are the only ones with their headlights high enough to blind even if their high beams are off and their headlights are aligned properly.

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i hate that sooooooooo much... super blinding-ass bull****! can't even see the road in front of me when they approach & pass by or i'm blinded by them in my rearview mirror... perhaps some don't aim them properly or others don't use the proper housings, but it seems like some SUV folks intentionally aim their bright-ass **** right at eye level!!

Haha, glad someone revived this thread. I searched to see if someone removed the diffusers and what resulted, but came up empty. Anyways I bought the cheap ebay housing and the diffuser is held onto by three screws. Basically I had to crush the diffuser inside the housing in order to get it out, the only other way would be to open the headlight housing and attempt to reseal it. Long story short the light output is much brighter and high beams work equally well. Nobody has high beamed me. And honestly the light output is the weakest of all my cars + i'm running silverstars. Yes, the lights are aimed correctly...

hey guys i am going to revive this thread again to release my findings. i took the shield out of my drivers side to do a side by side comparison. standing in front of the car the drivers side looks the exact same as the passenger. really i could not tell any difference in brightness(dims or brights). i took it out on the road and noticed a little difference in visibility in both lows and highs, but nothing to be really excited over. who ever said it was a 2 minute job exagerated by 30 minutes. mine are screwed in and the piece does not slip out(didnt try k.y.) i pryed, twisted and pulled to get it out and needless to say the shield will not go back in my light even if i wanted it to. i will try to have some pics up tmr night and when i change my passenger side i will report again.

on a side note, matt if you read this... you said earlier that 9007 is not the bulb to use so you make me ask, what is the "right" bulb?

Anything that isnt dual filament.

But you cant change that.

I just got finished doing this a minute ago, Before I even looked on this thread. My car was strange, the lows would be where I wanted them, and the highs would be offset! So I will see how it looks when i head out to work tomorrow morning. And it took me about 5 min to remove them without damaging them.

Everything Matt has said is true. Doing this technically makes your lights illegal, Some of you are lucky they don't do Inspections like they do in Europe, They inspect the output of your headlights and how they are positioned, and those of you pull the metal shroud out of the light, you would fail.

I know the light output sucks on these cars, my Suggestion? Besides a retrofit, I would make a Relay Harness (pretty easy to do), get some High wattage bulbs (80watts or higher, they tend to be made by Hella, don't buy those ebay POS saying they will up the output). I did this on my dad's Caddy, I should have grabbed so pics but they actually did help to make the beam pattern branch out a bit better, it was great but better.

And just to make it all fair, that is actually legal to do. Doing a Retrofit is technically illegal.

After driving last night and this morning, the lights are better. Not as dramatic as you would want, but for the price, you can't beat it. I would say this is worth doing for the time and tools involved.

When I came back from a meet in Chicago a friend was behind me w/ 35w HID on his regal and when he tinted his headlight awhile back forgot one of the diffusers. The light with the one missing was significantly worse as far as glare goes. It wasn't brighter, it just spewed light out EVERYWHERE, pretty irritating behind me and I have 5% tint on the back of the car.

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Originally Posted by Reefer82

When I came back from a meet in Chicago a friend was behind me w/ 35w HID on his regal and when he tinted his headlight awhile back forgot one of the diffusers. The light with the one missing was significantly worse as far as glare goes. It wasn't brighter, it just spewed light out EVERYWHERE, pretty irritating behind me and I have 5% tint on the back of the car.

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this. all this.

anyone who took that diffuser is dumb. sorry, but you are.

and its illegal.