New bulbs for the Golf... hard work!

[Booner!]

Which is ridiculous really, bulbs are supposed to be able to be changed at the roadside in emergencies even in the dark. Fitting bulbs these days on a lot of cars is a big piece of work so you've got no chance in that situationn.

Surely it's a wear and tear item....but it still required me to:

Take the battery out (mounted not only with plastic clips, but a massive bolt)
Take the front grill off
Take the Front Bumper off and detach from wheel arches.
Take the light clusters out and then fiddle with the latch holding mechanism for ages.


I felt good afterwards... I had dirty hands, white lights and a big grin - I was a wrench monkey for an afternoon + the rest!


What I had to do to get to the lights... friend helping on the right (not me!) Grill is dangling off!

OLD front indicators (tango)

NEW front indicators (DIADEM OPTICAL) - bad photo, but they are crystal and light blue in day time - no orange.

LEFT LIGHT = Old sidelight, RIGHT LIGHT = New Sidelight (bad photo, but big difference)

 

[Booner!]

This shows the new white sidelights.

This shows how Orange the new Diadem clear/blue indicators are...made the old ones look yellow!

This shows the dipped beam lights (Night breakers), which are more white than shown here. bad photo in the wet/cold just now in the scary dark tennis court!

And again, the white side light

I am chuffed with my work, but need to get them calibrated by my mate at the VW garage as the dipped beam are focusing too close to the floor infront of me. Can see so much better now though, sides of the road are illuminated very well!

Once the car is clean, I will post some better photos of the light upgrades. I think that is everything done on my car... nothing else worth doing except the GTI spoiler, which is money best spent on a new car really.

Fox will be happy that i didn't go for HID conversion in the end...!

 

[OllyM]

What a stupid design!

Looks to be a nice improvement though

 

[Booner!]

Hopefully when they are calibrated they will actually show their 90% extra light on the road. Currently I have great side vision and very little focused beam. I was next to a Golf tonight and drew neck and neck to compare and they had very amber dipped beam, but very focused like two cones. Mine was spread out... not sure it is supposed to be like that..

 

[OllyM]

I think the 90% claim is probably a bit over the top - I've got some Philips +80% bulbs in my main beams and to be honest I can't really tell the difference between them and the standard bulbs, so a bit of a waste of money really. They look all yellow too .

I considered a second HID kit but that's a no-no because you can't flash people with them.

 

[Booner!]

I considered a second HID kit but that's a no-no because you can't flash people with them.

hmm, with the Golf mk4 - you have 1 set of bulbs for dipped and 1 set for main beam.

If you upgraded the dipped beam with HID, then you would rarely need the main beam and would still be able to flash people with the main beam. Apparently there is only a 0.3 of a second lag when flashing with a good HID kit anyway, so you don't get lost into darkness when trying to flash somebody

However, to upgrade to them meant a new set of lights really. I CBA to spend much more on my golf, nor bother to read up on the HID conversion!

 

[Tom|Nbk]

They look all yellow too ..

Massive improvement over the stock yellow parp IMO. These are mine with the Osrams.

 

[OllyM]

That's what I mean

 

[Tom|Nbk]

Ahh right. The HID does show them up a bit.

 

[Booner!]

By the way, if anyone likes the look of the Blue-ish, de tangoed front indicators I have a spare set:

OSRAM DIADEM
PY21W
12V
TYPE 8A
http://www.powerbulbs.com/bulb_finder.asp?cat1=39&make_id=45&model_id=444&year_id=444&bulb=3
RRP on the website: £19.99


I have a spare set of these here on my desk, anybody interested - please check that these fit your car...

 

[OllyM]

I guess it doesn't really matter about what they look like, after all, you shouldn't really have your full beam on while approaching other people.

The main problem is the lack of light.

 

[Tom|Nbk]

I guess it doesn't really matter about what they look like, after all, you shouldn't really have your full beam on while approaching other people.

The main problem is the lack of light.

Not sure why you're having this problem. My Osrams light up the road like a stadium with the full beam. Some incredible power.

The only way you're going to get more light if you really even need it is get some "ILLEGAL RALLY 80W YO'"

 

[OllyM]

Yeah, not worth the bother really

 

[Tom|Nbk]

http://www.autobulbsdirect.co.uk/product.php?productid=16778&cat=607&page=1

Just make sure no one is around when you hit the switch for these suckers

 

[OllyM]

Don't tempt me!!!

They even have 100W ones

 

[Tom|Nbk]

Don't tempt me!!!

They even have 100W ones

100w would be taking the **** a bit

 

[OllyM]

I guess flashing people during the day with them in may cause accidents

 

[Wayn0r]

umm, i changed the sidelights in my r32 yesterday doing nothing more than opening the bonnet must be a different setup as mine are xenons? just a simple clip and the back slides off.

 

[Booner!]

umm, i changed the sidelights in my r32 yesterday doing nothing more than opening the bonnet must be a different setup as mine are xenons? just a simple clip and the back slides off.

The Xenons are different where the bulb is fitted IIRC, plus these hadn't been chhanged before - which made things slightly harder than expected. The only bulbs which I could change without removing the battery etc was the driver side indicator (by touch and luck) and the dipped beam were relatively easy to get to. Side lights being the hardest of the lot!

 

[eidolon]

I've got a main dealer receipt here for bulb replacement in my Golf........£156!!!