I have a friend that wants to buy xenons from eBay for his 3 series. I was wondering, what's street legal and what's not, because I have heard people being pulled over for this kind of nonsense.

BTW I'm in florida. And if anyone knows can they put it in terms of 6000k, 12000k etc etc

 

:ibmcartalk:

 

He should be fine with either 4300k or 6000k. Anything higher cops might take notice.

And the fact its a 3series, he should be ok without cops noticing. Now if it was on a 95 civic...

 

^^ That Sellout. But is it explicitly stated anywhere what you can go up to? Or is it just a rule of thumb that too blue or too purple will get you busted.

 

Meant to say Thanks, not That...

 

Depends on the cop. Its illegal to have tint here but many of us have it. If the cop sees it and wants to bust you for it then he can.

I think having purple would scream "look at me" too much.

I say go with 6000k tops, anything higher then its harder to see at night.

 

Gotchya. Anyone know what the rating is for TSX HIDs?

 

4300k

 

I don't believe there is a law stating the exact temp you can go up to, cause lets face it, how could a cop ever scientifically determine the exact temp of your bulbs?
Basically, if they see it and it bothers them, they will pull you over and ticket you for your blue lights...

I agree, 6000k is a good bulb, not too blue to attract too much attention, but still a noticable difference...and anything higher than that will suck for visibility at night...

 

The law is...if the light on the ground is white.....then it is legal.

 

Ive been harrased for my STOCK hids in my CLS

 

I swear, I dunno how many more threads I can take when it comes to the debate of what temperature rating is "legal" when it comes to HID/Xenon Lights.






see where 4300K is, that's the whitest light you get and the best because it's closest to daylight :duh:

 

but I ordered 6000k for my bike .

 

6000 will look cool, but 4000 woulda given you the higher lumen output.

this is why there's been such a big debate over it. some people don't care about the lower lumen output other's do. I personally like the bright white (4300K) look. Others like the blue look.

In the end it's a compromise between safety and appeal factor. To each their own.

 

I thought it was illegal to sell HIDs as of summer 2003? I have 6000k CATZ on my Accord and haven't got harassed but then again I'm in miami where 91 Explorers roll on 22's and 50000k HIDs.

 

It has always been illegal to put HID into a car didn't come with it stock. Vendors could sell Hid kits with the caveat that it was to be used strictly for "offroad use". As Doom said, they then made even that illegal.

But in reality, as long as your HID output isnt a crazy color and doesnt really glare too bad, you wont be pulled over by a cop.

If you want maximal brightness and maximal color, you need to use 4300k bulbs in conjection with a HID projector.

 

 

and vpat.

 

 

 

After owning 2 different cars and using both the oem and 6000k HIDs, I have to argue that the lumen output of the 6000k isn't noticably less than the 4300k oem bulbs.

When I switched to 6000k's in my cl-s (reflector type), I noticed that the color of the light made it a little difficult to see road markings when the roads were wet.

After switching to 6000k's in my M (projector lights) I haven't noticed this problem. But again it's also a different brand of bulb so that could make a difference.

And with 6000k's, i doubt any cop would be able to tell the difference between 4300k's vs. 6000ks in an OEM setup. As for aftermarket setups, if the cop knows his cars, he can probably bust you if he knows you have an aftermarket setup.

 

 

4100k new
4300k used after colorshift

cliff notes
4100k is usually reffered to as 4300k.

like others have said stay under 6k. bmw tends to be more blue white, audi tends to be more purple. i would look for something like 5300k to mimic an oem bmw d2s setup. however since there is no stadard for kits its hard to really say since 6000k from one manufacturer does not match 6000k of another. hell even real oem osram and philips d2s 4100k bulbs dont match. philips being brighter and whiter while osram more purple and yellow. what your friend really should do is find a set of xenon d2s bmw headlamps on ebay and swap the internals. will cost about the same as a quality kit, perform much better, more reliable, and spare parts much easier to come by. matter of fact i have a set of 04 bmw m3 bi-xenon headlamps. in need of one more ballast to make a set.

i am currently running a 5 series d2s projector system in my legacy and ran an older 03 m3 bi-xenon projector system in my 97 cl. i hate kits!!!!!!!!!!!!!

peace