Thread: HID driving light owners,,,, delay times

I have an oldish set of spotlights (so not a replacement for low / high beam) and I reckon first on to full beam is more like 60 seconds, although the beam after 10 seconds is probably 50% and they come back to full beam in under 5 seconds for short off cycles (dipping for oncoming traffic etc)

I had HIDs in my Hi Beam and have just changed back to halogens because of this issue. From cold they take about 6-8 secs to get to full brilliance but once hot they work immediately.

The reason is that HIDS use a two stage process to light up - the high voltage first melts/vapourise some salts in the bulb (they look like small brown grains of sand in my globes). It is these vapourised salts that then ignite the gas in the bulb and you have full brilliance.

While the salts remain hot after use the bulb responds almost immediately to power and lights up.

That is a lay description - no doubt someone will correct and errors.

Garry

From my research the latest ones are more like 3 sec, but yet to prove hands on
Have a read at HId-lightsdownunder lot of good info there.

I have run HIDs in my driving lights for a number of years. On initial turn on, might be 5 secs, but on immediately, then growing in intensity to full power. Once they have been used, immediate turn on at full brightness, if off for even a few minutes. Never feel I have been waiting for them to get bright.
My headlights are running single filament HIDs, and the globe stays alight when you raise lights, just a magnet moves it to high beam, so no loss in light.

yeah they don't light up straight away, as posted above (or below for me) they have to heat up first but once hot light up instantly.
the new ones are a lot after then the old ones use to be.

most 4x4 accessory shops normally have a set on display so you can get a first hand looks at how long they take and how blindingly bright they are.

Hi,

I've had a set of H4 hi/lows (sliding type) for a number of years. Big flash on start up then maybe 3 or 4 secs to get to normal (superior) brightness.

The bulb is lit all the time so there is no delay from hi to lo or vica versa once the lights have been turned on.

A couple of weeks ago one of the globes decided it didn't want to live up to its 2,500 hr lifetime so halogens are in till I have time to find a replacement.

Have Jaycar HID's in a pair of cheap Narva spots and they take about 10 secs to get bright, but once they have been on for a while and headlights get dipped (i.e. they are off too) they are almost instantaneously fully bright when back on high beam.

The high beam is instantaneously there because it's the same bulb as low beam and hasn't been off.

cheers, DL

Just fitted a cheap ($30) ebay 55W H3 HID kit to a set of old Hella 500's. Maybe 6-7 sec to reach full power from cold....then almost instant if dipped when they have warmed up. Have another set of converted Nitetstalkers....pretty much the same for them. The Nitestalkers post conversion beam pattern is much better than the Hella's tho.

Maybe we should just wait on the technology. Audi is trialing laser lighting. I guess if we wait long enough, they will find something even better.