GE8 H4 Hi/Lo HID Flash to Pass?
 

I was thinking of upgrading my current, stock lights to 35W HID. I was wondering if I got a HID with Hi and Lo beam, would the flash to pass function kill the Hi bulb? I've Googled this, but found nothing that helped answer my question. I know that the constant turning off and on of a HID bulb will prematurely kill it. So if a HID bulb has a Hi and Lo beam and I use the flash to pass function a lot, it would prematurely kill the bulb, right?

Depends on the actual hi/lo type.

There are two kinds... one with a xenon bulb for low and a second halogen bulb for high... this is actually a pretty bad setup. Because of the setup, you can never get both to an decent aim...only one or the other. This type will prematurely wear out either bulb when you flash.

The other type is listed as bi-xenon, it uses a single xenon bulb for both high and low. It uses a solenoid to move the bulb and the better ones also have very good shields to block the light when in low beam mode (the bottom half of an H4 type reflector is for high beam). Depending on the quality, the solenoid wear out sooner than the bulb (but aside from a few that seem defective from the start, haven't read too many complaining about it).

Personally, I don't flash to pass... I just pass. Usually, I use my turn signals since I am basically doing lane changes.

Aren't there Hi/Lo HID with two xenons? One for low and one for high? Are DDMTuning's 35W Hi/Lo two xenons or a xenon with a halogen?

None that I've seen.

with the bi/xenon HID bulbs you have to install a relay harness which comes with the kit itself, but the bulb itself is shielded by some sort of metal and quite well!

Not all are created equal... some of the cheaper ones are cheap for a reason.

I retrofitted my car with a Bi-Xenon Morimoto mini stage H1 kit with XB35 bulbs. Our car uses a single halogen bulb for both hi and low beam. Toggling the hi/low beam changes the voltage to the bulb. The Morimoto H1 kit comes with a integrated relay for toggling between hi/low beam. Toggling the hi/low beam will raise or drop the shield in front of the HID bulb in the projectors.

If I have to do it all over again, I would retrofit with the Bi-Xenon Morimoto mini stage D2S kit with better quality OEM HID bulb such as Phillips or Osram bulb. There are noticeable shade difference with my after market XB35 HID bulbs. One bulb is whiter and the other is more bluish.

H4 bulbs have two filaments, so they actually switch circuits from high to low beams.

Yeah that right. The voltage change is for DRL. I pulled the fuse for DRL to prevent the HID bulb from flicking.

Yeah, DRL can wreck havoc with HIDs.

Now, that I've thought about it, my setup isn't far off the crappy hi-lo HID kits I hate so much (HID for low w/halogen for high). Its just my setup uses a separate reflector bowl for the halogen H1 bulb for High beam vs the projector for the HID low beam, which is one of the reasons why i like dual bulb housing headlights.