HID Ballast Pics + Reviews

I will be posting internal and external pics of HID ballast from different companies

Please be patient and stay tuned while I take all these pics and post some reviews

If you have a ballast of your own and the brand isn't posted up, feel free to take pics and add them to the thread along with your own reviews

First up, unknown brand


Heavy ballast, feels solid, not flimsy metal. Was very difficult to pull the metal covers off to see the internals.

Completely stuffed with silicon on the back side

Very thin layer of silicon on the front side. Igniter (white box inside) is completely exposed to the elements

Good wire thickness to support the high voltage

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Second up: DDM "Raptor" ballast

Semi difficult to pull metal covers off. Filled with water on the inside, but ballast still functions properly


Back side completely filled with silicon

Front side metal cover was very easy to pull off

Silicon looks like it was sloppily splashed into the ballast. Everything is covered except for half the igniter.


Nice thick wires to support the high voltage



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DDM/ Apexcome Old Style Slim Ballast


Back cover really easy to take off. Fell right off when the last screw came off


Inside completely COVERED with silicon except for 1 little piece. However, the silicon does flake off to the touch. It is not completely filled


Igniter is basically impossible to pull apart. I'll get back to you guys on this one haha


Nice thick wire. Cheap knock off "AMP" connectors


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Agape Brand


Front cover was almost impossible to take off. Actually broke a screw driver doing it

Very well coated. Really thin layer but it is very durable.


Back side has some type of clear plastic cover with silicon on top of it. Idk the philosophy behind this but it's not a very good design. Little scratches and tears in the clear plastic and water can get into the computer board


Plugs and wires look very nice. Thick wires

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Xentec

Only ballast I have personally ever seen with a plastic casing. Feels very cheap


Tore the front cover off with my fingers (held on with clips. No screws or sealant) inside has absolutely 0 waterproofing and very horrible soldering points. Everything about this ballast seems cheap and very Lo quality.


EXTREMELY skinny negative wire.

One of the worst quality kits that I have ever seen

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Autovizion

Very light ballast


PLEASE NOTE: I scraped all the waterproofing material off of this in the past
Back piece came off with a little resistance. It was very well coated and 100% sealed


Extremely skinny negative and positive wire

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G.G. Lighting Ballast


Front cover fell off right after the screws we're out. Back side was sealed and had to be pried off with a screwdriver.


Back side has a metal piece covering/ protecting the internals. Fully encased in weatherproofing material


Front side is 100% filled with weatherproofing material.


Ballast has no plug wires.

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HIDynamic

I'll get back to you guys on this one. Screws are all stripped out


Stay tuned for more. I am super busy but I will post up as much as possible

 

Great thread, very informative!

 

Finally! I am surprised this hasn't popped up sooner

 

very cool thread and awesome pics showing what you were saying bro. Thanks for taking the time. Learned a lot.

 

Hopefully I will have some more pics over time of old/ used ballasts that I pull out of customers vehicles. I will add more as I get them

If anyone wants to send me your ballast I will take it apart and criticize it. Ill send it back after if you'd like as well

 

Wow.

I've seen 4th grade science projects that look better than that Xentec!

 

Hahahaha. I was amazed at the horrible quality of that ballast

 

Here's a Kensun kit off Amazon.



It unscrews easily. The parts completely missing was from me picking at it before I started taking pics but you can see how thin it is, barely covering in some spots and not covering in others.


The back side had a much thicker coat. You can see here where I pulled the whole thing off. It was nice heavy coverage. Too bad the other sucked.


The connectors are the same as just about all the others. I've gotten them without the connector boot before too, so be warned. It's not a big deal, but it can happen. I've heard it happen with others though as well.

One thing I want to point out is the bulbs. They're a bitch to get in. It's not the tabs on the bulb, it's the giant o-ring. If you swap it with the o-ring from the halogen bulb you're replacing it's still water tight, as long as the old o-ring isn't in terrible condition. You can see them here for comparison. Most of the time I've been able to mash the new big ass o-ring in there. I was pushing so hard with these I was nervous I'd break something.



Customer service was EXCELLENT. They're open on Sunday, I think they're closed Monday and Tuesday IIRC. I had a bad ballast and they asked me 3 questions. "Are you sure it's the ballast?" "Can I have your order number?" and "Can I ship it to the same address?" Nothing about sending the old one back. No cutting wires. It took a 2 minute phone call and I had a new one in 3 days.

I have a JLM off Amazon I can gut too, I just have to find it.

 

Other than the pink wire and unpainted case, that looks identical to the DDM kit that I used in my '93 Blazer.

 

It's definitely possible they both get some parts from the same supplier. Although, just going by the first post it seems there's a lot more variety than I thought.

 

The G.G. Lighting ballast looks very similar on the outside to the ones from CarID.com. I had one of them go bad after 1 month of use. Now I wished I would have taken it apart before I sent it back.

Theirs were called Nitto


They sent me a new one and paid shipping both ways at no charge.

 

The companies in china all use 1 manufacturer for casing.
So like 20 different HID factories will all buy their casing from one company. But the internals on each ballast are different. That's kind of the reason why I made this thread. To show the differences in ballast quality

 

so which one is the best buy for the $$$

 

I wi not be stating any personal opinions here. Only comments on the quality of the ballasts when I pull them apart

As far as "best bang for the buck" goes - I say it's all personal opinion. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion on what the best quality kit is. Everyone you ask will have a different answer based on a few different factors

 

Send me your non working/ unused ballasts so I can add more to this

 

After looking at these I'm thinking it might not be a bad idea to open up ANY ballast you plan on using and do a little additional waterproofing. Or at least a quick inspection.

 

My son had lighting problems the other night. It ended up being the anti-flicker capacitor that clips into the wiring harness. CarID.com puts just a little heat srink on around the capacitor but, nothing on the ends so water can get in there.

Anyway while working on his system, I took one of the Nitto ballast apart and the insides and outsides are identical to the G.G. Lighting ballast. I took pictures but, have to upload them at work because I don't know how on a iPad

Also, if anyone is wondering 1998 Tacoma does not need the anti-flicker capacitor.

 

As promised for future reference, this is the picture of the CarID.com Nitto Ballast. They look like the G.G. Lighting Ballast.