Audi 90 - 1989 more light?

Newbie Joined: Feb 05, 2003 Posts: 4 Location: romania

Hi!

I wonder what tipe of lights can I use to my car, in order not to burn out the mirror of the lights system?

I've seen a various type of lights: 100W, 60W, 40W, 120W....

I need an advice on this, because I want to have more light, but not to burn out my light system ( the mirrors arround the light)

Thanks a lot.

Cipi

Posted: Wed Feb 05, 2003 10:05 am

The quickest "fix" is to install high wattage bulbs - the downsides are 1. it's illegal (I know no one is going to check, but still...), 2. they don't last very long and are expensive, 3. they will eventually burn out the headlight switch and/or cabling.

The much longer fix is to change to a "relay" headlight system. This is what we did on the 80q road rally car. If you look at the standard cable leading to the h/ls you'll see it is quite (very?) thin. This means you'll get a lot of voltage drop along the wire, in turn this means you'll get less power from the bulbs and as power is proportional to the square of the voltage (P=Vsq/R), a small volt drop = a big drop in power output!

On the 80q with the standard system with main beam on and engine running, we were getting about 12.5v at the battery and about 10.9v at the h/l bulb.

What we did was run a "substantial" cable (at least 2x 32/0.2) from the battery to a mini fuse box on the shuttle pannel and then via relays 32/0.2 to each bulb. You need to rewire the three pin connectors on each headlight bulb. Don't forget to boost the earth wire as well.

You use the original h/l wires to power the relays.

The net result was 12.5v at the battery and about 12.45 at each bulb = noticeable improvement in light even with standard bulbs. The other plus is you can now fit high wattage bulbs without worrying about the wiring Smile

Two "top tips" if you do decide to do this: 1. use decent relays, 2. don't mount them at the front of the car if you want to go "yumping" - we did at first and it is VERY disconcerting to be doing @@@mph over a hump and have all the relays "knock" out on landing, cos suddenly you've got no lights Sad

If you put the relays back on the shuttle panel they don't suffer so much.

I hope this makes sense - if you want more help, send me a PM...

Clive

UltraUser Joined: Jan 21, 2003 Posts: 4230

Hello Cipi, no need to use higher watts, use Xenon bulbs as they are brighter but use no more power than standard 60/55W H4. Evil or Very Mad

Newbie Joined: Feb 05, 2003 Posts: 4 Location: romania

Gee, thanks.
I guess this is the easyest way to do it.

Tell me, Locomotion, do you know a brand that sells those xenon bulbs, because I didn't find any Xenon bulbs in the shopps here in Romania.
Or maybe I didn't know what code should I look-up.

Thanks a lot

Cipi

Posted: Wed Feb 05, 2003 12:47 pm

There's lots of 'xenon' type bulbs about and i've heard good and bad reports on them. I've got Philips 'bluevision' upgrade bulbs - I recommend them - certainly gives a crisper whiter light - none of the blue taint which actually reduces vision. These combined with a relay will certainly improve things.

Inexperienced Joined: Feb 03, 2003 Posts: 33 Location: UK

http://www.powerbulbs.com/

If you goto the www.audi-sport.com forum it tells you how to get a 10% discount.