So I spent this afternoon getting the car ready for a 1-1/2 week road trip coming up this weekend. Since the first leg is going to be a night drive about 800 miles starting around 10 p.m. I decided to try out a pair of the Sylvania Silver Star Ultra halogen bulbs that I've heard so much about. In reality the headlights in my '01 are some of the best headlights I've seen in a car that has non-HID headlights so I was curious to see how much different or better these would be.
To make a comparison I changed out one light and took these pics for a side-by-side comparison. There really was a distinct difference but it may not show up the best in these pics cuase of my crappy camera. The interesting thing I didn't know here was that the passenger side bulb I left in for comparison sake was apparently a replacement Sylvania bulb apparently replaced before I bought the car.
old=passenger side / new=driver side:
both new bulbs:
( now comments about my messy garage!
)
As you can see there is a significant difference in brightness of the bulbs. Of course it could be due to the fact that the old bulb was 3+ years old and faded somewhat, but frankly the SilverStar Ultras appear to have the closest brightness to HIDs I've seen. I took a little ride after dark and these lights show up highway signs significantly brighter than the stock lights and at a greater distance! For $50 I'd say this was definitely a worth while improvement! :thumbsup:
As a side bar, I have to say replacing the headlamp bulbs in this car is the easiest I've ever seen. The hardest part is getting the pins out that secures the lens assembly. Once you figure out how it's done, both bulbs can be changed it less than 10 minutes! The Ford engineers actually got this one right!!!
To make a comparison I changed out one light and took these pics for a side-by-side comparison. There really was a distinct difference but it may not show up the best in these pics cuase of my crappy camera. The interesting thing I didn't know here was that the passenger side bulb I left in for comparison sake was apparently a replacement Sylvania bulb apparently replaced before I bought the car.
old=passenger side / new=driver side:
both new bulbs:
( now comments about my messy garage!
)As you can see there is a significant difference in brightness of the bulbs. Of course it could be due to the fact that the old bulb was 3+ years old and faded somewhat, but frankly the SilverStar Ultras appear to have the closest brightness to HIDs I've seen. I took a little ride after dark and these lights show up highway signs significantly brighter than the stock lights and at a greater distance! For $50 I'd say this was definitely a worth while improvement! :thumbsup:
As a side bar, I have to say replacing the headlamp bulbs in this car is the easiest I've ever seen. The hardest part is getting the pins out that secures the lens assembly. Once you figure out how it's done, both bulbs can be changed it less than 10 minutes! The Ford engineers actually got this one right!!!
