Underwhelming Headlights?

[BaileyRam]

Had my first ride at night with my new-to-me S10. The headlights were essentially useless. I haven't aimed them yet and that will be next on my list, along with the cyclops LED kit.

Is this a known thing with the S10? I could barely tell they were on. Super dim and dangerous. At least I had a little help from the rigid fog lights...

 

[Madhatter]

the stock lights are (been so long since I've had stock lights I cant remember how bad they where ) not great . my first head light upgrade was to a brighter bulb... but they don't last that long .... cyclops for me , has made a huge difference in being able to see. I also have rigid lights to help them out . I ride in the dark quite a bit so lighting is important . buy the cyclops , they make a big difference .

 

[Madhatter]

 

[TenereGUY]

Yep, bad as my 84 wing. I put oxilam led bulbs in then two massive Clearwater lights on. No problems now.

 

[BaileyRam]

View attachment 105392View attachment 105393

Those lights look pretty legit!

Cyclops lights are officially on the way...

I'm going to work on aiming the auxiliary lights too.

 

[Cycledude]

Yes stock halogen headlights are pretty lousy, I now have Cyclops LED and they are ok, tried a cheaper and brighter set of NovSight recommended by another board member, they did look very bright but they were actually worse than the stock halogens when riding after dark.

 

[Madhatter]

LED cyclops lights in place of incandescent , rigid spot slaved to high beam switch (also have a button I can push to disable the spots while working the high beam s ) and the lower rigid are a more broad beam to cover more area ,mostly pointed to the sides to light up the ditches ( for deer and other critters and to not totally blind car drivers ) these are on their own switch that I manually engage at the start of a ride (like a day time running light , also put yellow lens covers , not shown , less harsh on car drivers eyes ) I can see quite well at night .

 

[WJBertrand]

My bike was delivered new with the headlight aimed ridiculously high. I could not see much light on the road and switching to high beam actually made it worse. High beam didn't seem to do anything at all. Riding through a line of tall eucalyptus trees at night finally showed me where the high beam was shining - way the hell up into the trees! I adjusted both beams down several turns on the adjusters and found this to be a massive improvement, so for sure this is the first thing to do.

I still wanted more light output, even though I now had some low beam light on the road and functioning high beam so I fitted the Cyclops LEDs. They were an improvement but took some fiddling to get the dark areas in their pattern either filled in or oriented to where they didn't matter as much. I was reasonably happy until one of them dimmed and burned its emitter in just over a year, the second one followed a couple of months later. I tried various Amazon LED headlight bulbs but wasn't happy with the pattern, longevity or total light output on the road. They all looked super bright to look at though. In my experience how bright they look tells little about how much illumination they provide on the road.

I finally bit the bullet and installed a Morimoto H7 HID kit and now I'm a happy camper. Plenty of light on the road and no weird patterns. Been running them about 5 years now and they've out lasted any incandescent or LED bulbs I've tried. Not a cheap alternative. I'm happy enough now that I probably wouldn't have needed the additional driving lights I installed.

 

[jbrown]

I don't have any problem with the stock headlights on my 2012. Of course, I drive more slowly at night. I do have problems with oncoming traffic with headlights that are too bright!

 

[gunslinger_006]

I don't have any problem with the stock headlights on my 2012. Of course, I drive more slowly at night. I do have problems with oncoming traffic with headlights that are too bright!

Same here for my 2013. I did aim the headlights carefully and i did add an led fog light but its aimed low to illuminate the trails when its dark, it hits the ground about 10m in front of me.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[BaileyRam]

My bike was delivered new with the headlight aimed ridiculously high. I could not see much light on the road and switching to high beam actually made it worse. High beam didn't seem to do anything at all. Riding through a line of tall eucalyptus trees at night finally showed me where the high beam was shining - way the hell up into the trees! I adjusted both beams down several turns on the adjusters and found this to be a massive improvement, so for sure this is the first thing to do.

I still wanted more light output, even though I now had some low beam light on the road and functioning high beam so I fitted the Cyclops LEDs. They were an improvement but took some fiddling to get the dark areas in their pattern either filled in or oriented to where they didn't matter as much. I was reasonably happy until one of them dimmed and burned its emitter in just over a year, the second one followed a couple of months later. I tried various Amazon LED headlight bulbs but wasn't happy with the pattern, longevity or total light output on the road. They all looked super bright to look at though. In my experience how bright they look tells little about how much illumination they provide on the road.

I finally bit the bullet and installed a Morimoto H7 HID kit and now I'm a happy camper. Plenty of light on the road and no weird patterns. Been running them about 5 years now and they've out lasted any incandescent or LED bulbs I've tried. Not a cheap alternative. I'm happy enough now that I probably wouldn't have needed the additional driving lights I installed.

I'm intrigued by the Morimoto kit. I'll have to search the forum...

 

[TenereGUY]

I agree... stock aim for lights way to high. I too was lighting at the tops of the trees. Much better when aimed correctly.

 

[WJBertrand]

I'm intrigued by the Morimoto kit. I'll have to search the forum...

This is the kit I have, with the type B bulbs:

https://www.morimotohid.com/morimoto-elite-h7-hid-system?quantity=1

Looks like the price is quite a bit higher than I recall paying, which was around $170 4-5 years ago.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

[BaileyRam]

I was finally able to adjust my headlights. They were pointed super low! I had to bring them up by about 6". I bought the bike used, so not sure if a previous owner adjusted it or what, but they're lighting up the road now.

The cyclops LEDs should be here in the next day or so.