NighthawkBlue

$432 per side for Inverter, HID System part # 33144-S3M-AO1
$131 per side for Bulb, Low Beam HID part # 33116-SOA-J11.

864 + 262 = $1,126 just for some of the headlight stuff?
Granted these are retail prices and can be easily beaten by the online OEM parts place(s), but still they seem to only go about 35% below at best.

For the love of goodness, has some 3rd party co. made these parts that us 2nd Genners can buy? Junkyards have been either a strikeout or they want 75% of retail!

Mine is a 2001 CLS.

Rajca

iTrader: (8)

just get an aftermarket hid kit and swap that in place of ur old one.

richardparker

iTrader: (7)

^x2

My kit has lasted 10 months so far and I only spent 35 bucks on it.
Bulbs and ballasts are included and you get to pick color temp.

NighthawkBlue

Awesome!
Any thoughts on which manufacturer to use.
I googled and went to this site (CARHIDKITS):

http://www.carhidkits.com/acura-66/cl-hid-kit-100/

What brand did you two use?

richardparker

iTrader: (7)

Zentec,They come in a black box with red lettering.
The ballast are pretty slim and they are black.

Black is easyier to hide than the chrome ballast one's.

NighthawkBlue

The CARHIDKITS rep is asking me if I want Xenon or not?
Says that a kit will not work on mine but instead he has to put together the parts individually thus it will be $300 .
I'm confused, the kits are from $79 on up.
The 8000K HID Kit is on sale for $109 this month.

richardparker i just saw your post, will contact Zentech.

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

Go here:

http://www.ddmtuning.com/Products/DD...ast-35W-or-55W

Select 35W, D2R, and 4500k (if you want to see) from the drop downs and hit add to cart. Lifetime warranty on EVERYTHING.

Splice the two power wires from the car into the ballast. Enjoy being able to see.

NighthawkBlue

^^ thank you Mel, i mean civicdrivr.
Also, the link site you gave DDM is much less $$ then the CARHIDKITS site.

Does anyone know what candlepower our OEMs were?
I'm tinkering with jumping from up from 4500k to 6000k.

Rajca

iTrader: (8)

4300
i got 6k and love them

Nersh7

^x2
and apparently the 55w kits work in our housing as well, it may be a bit more risky though (possibilty of burning the inside of your housing)

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

Candlepower is the actual brightness. 4500k and 6000k are temperature measurements.

Stock is 4300k which will give you more lumens (aka higher candlepower) then anything with a higher temperature.



Stock halogen is about 1600 lumens, stock HIDs are about 3200 lumens, and 6000k HIDs are about 2600-2700 lumens.

5000k is more of a "pure white" but the issue I have with that is the cutoff is very pronounced on dark roads, so that line between light and dark draws your attention and becomes fatiguing (Im talking about pitch black roads). 4300k is a bit softer so it doesnt strain your eyes nearly as much.

Ive driving cars with as high as 8000k bulbs installed and that was just completely worthless. I felt like I was using my cellphone screen to light up the road.

Maybe my eyes are very good, but I actually notice a difference between my CL (4300k) and my bike (4500k) which are both equipped with projectors. Then again, it could be the optics in the projectors or differences in bulbs but thats a whole 'nother topic.

And Ive already weighed in on the 35w vs 55w topic in another thread.

SG81

iTrader: (1)

my ballast died last month. no way in hell i was going to drop $400+ just for 1 ballast.

i got a 6000k kit off my friend but you could try HID extra. they have a sale right now for $44 and are a vendor on this forum.

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

Yea I saw their sale in the BM. Free shipping as well IIRC. Whats their warranty like though?

SG81

iTrader: (1)

they offer a 2 yr warranty, but i would also try them due to the simple fact that so many members on here have them and i haven't heard of any problems...plus it's only $44

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

Its really a toss up. I havent had any problems with DDM and neither have most of the people on the HID forum. There have been people that had defective bulbs or ballasts but the lifetime warranty covered it no questions asked.

thevikas87

iTrader: (2)

DDM is a big vendor on bimmerforums and lots of their customers hate their customer service and quality.

That being said, I ordered a new set of projector/angel eye headlights for my E39 and one turned out to be defective and they replaced it promptly.

DDM has been good to me, but you just can't ignore the countless horror stories on the forums regarding their customer service.

I on the other hand will continue to be a customer, I think you should try them out.

NighthawkBlue

nice.

civicdrivrI'm liking the sound of lifetime warranty.
Since this is a tried and tested buy by two of you on this thread, i like that too. I'm hearing you too SG81 on the member buy here at the site from the vendor HIDEXTA.com.

Not to muddy the waters, but what did you think of the CARHIDKITS site in post #6? Sound like he's selling me stuff and $300 is out of line?
I'll call DDM tommorow and compare. My '01 CLS got hit and the ballasts and headlights *disappeared* at the body shop. So I'm left with a bare front to work with. That is why CARHIDKITS guy said i have to get separate parts and not the kit. The wreck will actually make install easier i think.

Also i was told do NOT touch the bulbs with bare skin at all. Wear thick plastic gloves as the skin oils can and will cause the bulbs to burst.

SG81

iTrader: (1)

yes, never touch the bulbs

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

I know some guys were pissed off at DDM a few months ago because they were backordered for nearly a month. DDM at one point said they caught up but that turned out not to be true. I ordered an HID kit from them two weeks ago and got it the next weekend (ordered Sunday night, delivered by FedEx Saturday).

I hope your not paying for this stuff if the body shop lost it. If they did, Id get all OEM and make them pay for it. With the aftermarket HID kits, you need to figure out a way to seal the hole at the bottom of the headlight where the original ballast was mounted.

Handle the bulbs by the plastic bases. Never touch the glass. Clean the glass off with alcohol on a soft tissue or even use an alcohol prep pad in first aid kits to clean off all contaminants.

NighthawkBlue

It's a complete cluster. Bodyshop where wrecked Ac was towed i stated to receptionist "in the event of a total, i want ALL parts. Please put that in writing". She said she did but didn't. Now the mistake on my part is i had a car rental for two weeks and so was not in a hurry to get the car.

So while they did replace some of the parts, ie two fenders, two front headlight housings, yeah i had no idea the balasts and low beam bulbs were so damn high.
We'll see how it ends up but at any rate I'm ordering today.

NighthawkBlue

civicdrvr,
DDM is located in San Diego thus i can opt for no fee pick up. WooHoo!

They said if we splice em it voids the warranty. Any thoughts on that?

richardparker

iTrader: (7)

You should not have to splice the kit.
just your cars wiring

NighthawkBlue

^^ ok great.

And on the DDM site, its asking me if i want the
"HID Harness" and "Error Eliminator"?

How do i know if my 2001 CLS needs them? Asian chick recpt said sometimes of two cars the exact same year model and engine type one needs them and one does not.

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

You dont need those at all. The error eliminator is for cars that have headlight out warning lights (i.e. some Bimmers) and the HID harness is only needed if youre going from halogen to HID. Our wiring can handle the power.

NighthawkBlue

Anyone got some thoughts on how to accomplish this?

thevikas87
Put me down on both lists.
The internet kept hassling me about shipping address being different from billing address even tho i chose local pickup, no shipping fee.
I relogged in and now it wasn't accepting my password. So i click the icon to resend password. Never got it.
So i call. Asian chick says i should just come in. I say I'm 40 miles a way, only want to make one trip. She says they "probably will have it." I say i can't deal with "probably" on an 80 mile round trip and could she check? No.
So i call their sister store in Huntington Beach and they say of course they take phone orders but only thru the San Diego office. One more call to S.D. and he confirms no phone orders. I told him about INET, he said it's never happened before. I said *&^% it and had a buddy who works nearby do a walk in buy.

Install should be next Friday. Will try to post some photos. Please give me some fill in answers to the above question.

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

Go to the piping section of Home Depot and get a pipe cap that fits and use some epoxy to hold it on.

SlickShiftNall6

iTrader: (4)

I picked up a DDM kit to replace my bad ballast about 2 months ago. The only problem I encountered, was that I didn't purchase the adaptor cable accessory with my original purchase of the ballast kit.
I put everything together and noticed there was nothing included to connect the new ballast. It just had two male leads coming out of the ballast. I thought they left something out from the kit. They didn't...
So instead of fabbing something stupid and risky I had to buy the extra cable that was not included. I was a little po'ed that they didn't mention I "might" need this cable during the purchase process. So the free shipping of a purchase over $50 went out the window because I had to pay $15 to ship an $8 cable set. Plus it added another 2 weeks to the eventual install date.

I'm still getting a flickering ballast problem, but I think it might be either my wiring or something on my cars end. Not related to the DDM kit. Going to try the other ballast this weekend to see if that fixes the problem.

Overall the DDM kit was high quality and a fraction of the cost of an oem relacement.

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

Which wiring are you talking about? The power leads from the chassis to the ballast or the ignitor from the ballast to the bulb? If you didnt use their bulbs, then I can understand why you had to get the AMP to D2S (D2R for the normal folk) cable but otherwise

SlickShiftNall6

iTrader: (4)

From the chassis to the ballast is what I'm talking about.

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

You could've just cut the connector off the stock ballast and attach it to the flying leads on the DDM ballast.

NighthawkBlue

civicdrivr,
The connector off the stock ballast was hoisted, so whadda i gotta do?

richardparker

iTrader: (7)

Ballast is #13
The bigger round conector goes to the bulb.
The other conector is the wires you are looking for.
Or if the ballast is gone look for the empty conector.

NighthawkBlue

which number(s) on the blowup are these parts?

And thanks for the blowup, MAJOR help.
I'll ask mods about making a DIY.

richardparker

iTrader: (7)

You see # 13 it is the ballast but,it actually pointing to the headlight bulb wire/conector.
The other wire that's coming from the same box (the ballast) is the input leads to the ballast.
That is the wire you are going to tap into for you new hid kit.
weather it before or after the conector it does not matter.

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

Cut the stock connector off the chassis harness and solder directly to the new ballasts power wires. Or you can pick up some waterproof connectors so you can remove it easily. Just as long as + is to + and - is to -. Don't use shitty butt connectors or cover it with tape. Do it right, do it once. Solder it and use shrink wrap.

NighthawkBlue

Thanks for the install info civicdrivr, richardparker and everyone else. Will post pics after buddy snaps photos.

High beam vs low beam. I got every other car flashing me on two lane roads.
Is the low beam on these new DDM bulb and ballast kits combined with my brand new headlight casing just so bright that it seems like it's on high beam? I took it for an inspection today and they said the settings were spot on.

But when i drive up and shine against a building at night, the difference between low bean and high beam is practically nothing. I mean its like low beam is 99% of high beam.

Epiphany

Does anybody have a DIY for this? I know it seems pretty simple, but having pictures and instructions would be quite nice if I do this.

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

Pics?

https://acurazine.com/forums/showthr...hlight=hid+diy

lauseefu

civicdrivr (or anyone else who can answer this),

I ordered the DDM kit, and I've cut the stock connector from the OEM ballast. The two leads protruding from the ballast are not labelled. How do I know which lead is + and which is - ? Thanks in advance!

civicdrivr

iTrader: (9)

I just snapped these pics:



The two blade connectors here are where you connect power.