I had a set of aftermarket HID's on my Mark viii after the stock DC HID lights (Only used in 96-98 Mark VIII's) burned out. It was horrible. Not only was the light pattern junk for illuminating the road I got pulled over by the Texas DPS on multiple occasions for them. Thankfully I could pull the "they're factory" card by showing the owners manual but I would NEVER put HID's on another car. Ever..

 

Ok. I took some better quality pictures to show it's really not all that bad.

 

didn't you ask about the fog lights? your fog light housings are so small, you won't be blinding people that low to the ground. I had a 3000k hid fit in my fog housings and i didn't like the color it threw out. it looked almost green, but they were bright as hell. I ended up putting the stock bulbs back in because I liked the golden color better (I have yellow film on my fogs).

Headlights, I ran w an hid kit for a couple months because I literally couldn't see with the stock halogens. I'm not proud of it, but I needed better lighting. I ended up doing my own retro (+1 for theretrofitsource.com). I won't own another car without a proper retro. It's AMAZING the difference it makes. Silverstars aren't bad. I used those on a GTI I had before, good color, improved throw on the light.

 

I've had few different cars with p&p hids and they were great...
Tried them on my fit (5000k) and they had the worst glare and light output. Left them on for a month(lazy) switched back to oem and I could see the road again!

 

can you tell me some more like which kit did you go for and how long it took you to finish the job and the total price?

 

When I retrofitted the lights on my Integra 9 years ago I sourced everything out on eBay and it was about $400 (Audi A6 projectors, Osram bulbs and ballast). Retrofit Source have really nice TSX projectors I'm planning on putting on the Fit, and they have very nice prices also.

 

I have a write up in the lighting section. Actually, there are quite a few. You can get some good ideas there. It all will depend on your goals. My goal was to do something to set mine apart while being reversible in case anything ever happened. I got the morimoto h1 kit, took me a couple days (mostly because I didn't work straight through and I had detailed painting) and I don't remember cost. I got a bunch of random parts to make it complete (to my standards). Maybe a little over $350? Labor is the expensive part, that's why I did it myself.

 

I put HID's on and got rid of them...Lost the high beam when they are on. Exchanged them for fog light HID's work great. Back to Silverstars for the headlights

 

Why didnt you consider bi-Xenon setup instead then?

 

Like others have said, not nice. The glare is awful for both oncoming drivers and for yourself in areas with little/no ambient light... aka outside of the city (especially if you have light sensitive eyes)

HID's aren't going to make people see you coming more than any other headlight and they'll be detrimental. HID's reflect more light off of things that shouldn't be illuminated (or illuminated as brightly) such as bushes off to the side, trees above, signs(shouldn't be as bright as they are). While all of this sounds good, it is actually very bad for night vision. the more useless light reflected back at you, the more your pupils constrict... and in turn, the less you actually see.

For Example, Try this:
In the dark, go outside on the porch and shine a light towards the woods, then hold up a few pieces of white paper reflecting back some of the light. (or simply turn on the porch light) In which instances do you actually see more? definitely not the papers in front of you or the porch light on, which is what HIDs illuminating everything around you is essentially doing.

The goal is VISION, not total lumen output and the two are definitely not directly related. You want as much light as possible but only exactly where it should be and NOWHERE else. any light where it shouldn't be negates some of the "well aimed light". This is the Real benefit to Projectors: Focused light.

Morimoto seems to have been a great success for many looking to retrofit and produces a much better cutoff than the above example.

~SB

 

On the other hand, that foglight cut off line appears low enough that you should be okay without retrofitting the foglights. Provided they're 3000k

 

Fact is, getting the HID was simple, and since this is my grocery getter, which I will sell next year, I didn't bother to look into it beyond what I did.

 

Does anyone know why the easy to install retro fit kits are not that expensive? and would these fit on any car because i couldn't find any reference to which cars it will fit

 

Those kits used to be expensive. I think they just want retrofitting to be affordable and easy to do. A buddy of mine got that kit when it first came out and it was around $450ish. All you have to check is for your relay harness because that's how it will connect to your oem headlight harness.