Headlight aiming...

Does anyone have trouble seeing more than 50-75 feet at night on low beams? Feels like my headlights are aimed too low but I haven't had projectors before so I'm not sure. Brights are great, but when I have to run low beams I get nervous about deer and road hazards. (I've hit a few) Will I blind oncoming traffic if I adjust them up?

 

The stock bulbs are absolutely garbage. Those things are useless. Upgrade to HID lights and it’ll be a night and day difference.

 

Agree, switch them out for some HID. I was overdriving my headlights at 55 with the stock bulbs, now comfortable with 65+. Several threads on how-to.

 

I'm not comfortable on my back roads with brights over 55 at 2am. I do 40 with my low beams .

 

Here's a great article on headlight aiming by one of the leading experts in the vehicle lighting field, Daniel Stern. If you can only see 50-75 feet ahead of you with your low beams on, they are most definitely aimed too low. Spend some time on Daniel's site. This guy knows more about vehicle lighting and regulations than perhaps anyone else out. You do not need h.id. conversions that are not designed for the reflector assemblies in your lights and will not work correctly even though they fit and light up. You just need some good halogen H11 (Philips Extreme) and proper aiming. http://www.danielsternlighting.com/tech/aim/aim.html
Another source of great lighting information is the automotive lighting forum at Candlepower Forums - http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/forumdisplay.php?87-Automotive-Motorcycles-Included

And don't forget that as we get older our night vision tends to decrease, sometimes dramatically, so depending on your age, that might or might not be a factor as well.

 

This is great, thanks.

 

He has projectors, so his headlights will work fine with HID’s...

 

I can understand that. Mostly freeway for me.

 

Coming from a guy that came from the era of sealed beam lights and still uses them on occasion, I can say that the way lights are aimed is more important than the light itself.

Back in the days of sealed beam lights, the quad set ups (two low beam bulbs and two high beam bulbs) always did better than the combined high/low beam two bulb systems. The two bulb system requires quite a bit of compromise and the low beams are aimed where they need to be and the high beams just end up where they end up.

Fast forward to today's world of headlight assemblies that have replaceable bulbs in a single assembly and we are generally back in the two bulb system. The low beams are aimed where they need to be and the high beams end up where they end up.

It is critical that your low beams do not blind the oncoming driver and it is reckless to adjust low beams without taking that requirement into consideration.

There's a fair amount of hype and marketing when it comes to headlights. There's also diminishing returns when you start pumping money into lighting. Can you pour a lot of cash into your vehicle's lighting system and get brighter lights? Sure. Is it a big enough difference to make it worth the cost? That can be a bit iffy.

While technology is improving it doesn't come cheap. Then there's the human factor. All the light in the world will be of no use if the driver isn't paying attention.