Hella Optilux 1100 HID conversion

I must say I was disappointed with these fog lights, even after fitting them with 5000k HID capsules. But after reading Amazon's return policy and in light of the fact that I'm out a mere $34, I decided to try to optimize the Optilux. First off, the lens IS glass not plastic as I originally assumed. The defect may have had as much to do with poor assembly as design. The lenses were loose and the shields were contorted and out of position so as to crop the light pattern too low. The tabs on the lens retainer rings were visible in the light pattern. Light was escaping under the shields too. I trimmed about 3/16" off the bottom of the shields and bent the tabs down on the lens retainer rings to hold the lenses more securely.
BEFORE AND AFTER:


I bent the shields down to expose the light to more of the center of the lenses.
BEFORE AND AFTER:


Then I filled the gap at the bottom of each shield with black silicone to prevent arrant light rays slipping under. I made extensions out of 1 1/4" PVC pipe 9/16" thick with a notch for the wires and painted them black.


I smeared black silicone on the mating surfaces and assembled the caps using 4mm x 25mm bolts. Here's how they look.


So I've gone from useless as ****** on a ****** to pretty good ain't half bad. Still, I can't say I recommend these lights. I'd spend a little more and get FF50's. I'll do a road test and let ya know.

Ok, I take it all back. The shield modification did the trick. The little Hella's are actually pretty decent now.

Here's the low beam only:


Now the low beam with the fog lights:


Here's how the Hella's look from the receiving end:


Not bad, I'm pleased, finally. Remember this dramatic difference came from moving the shield 3/16"!


I'll be tweeking all my lights from now on.

Very Nice Ken!

I have some el cheapo's that I put on the back of my truck that slave off of the reverse lights via a relay and an on-demand toggle (ford calls it an 'upliffter' switch or something like that).

I am going to steal your trick of the PVC cap and do an HID upgrade to them. I ended up having a couple of extra ballasts and and some straight H11's (I was meaning to buy 90 degree H11's).....

kp600 said:

So I've gone from useless as ****** on a ****** to pretty good ain't half bad. Still, I can't say I recommend these lights. I'd spend a little more and get FF50's. I'll do a road test and let ya know.

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Yesterday I took off for Houston about 6pm - 150 mile round trip mostly after dark - so a had a chance to try the new lights out in freeway, back road & urban conditions. I must say the Optilux 1100/HID combo moved from decent to EXCELLENT IMHO. The light pattern is cropped low enough and illuminates the road at least as far in front as the low beam with greatly increased light in the periphery. These fog lights may even be preferable to the high beam without the probability of offending oncoming motorists. Ultimately, this mod was well worth the $70 I spent to do it.

I see you've got a bandit 1200 there. Would you mind sharing a few details and maybe pictures of how you made those mounts that hang right under your fairing?

jonathan_whitwell said:

I see you've got a bandit 1200 there. Would you mind sharing a few details and maybe pictures of how you made those mounts that hang right under your fairing?

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I used flat metal to make supports like so.



I used steel but aluminum might be easier to work with. It's a tight squeeze but fits with a little tinkering.

Where did you buy the lights? Im lookinh to add some to the front of my FZ1.

YamaHauler said:

Where did you buy the lights? Im lookinh to add some to the front of my FZ1.

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I paid $33 on amazon with free shipping. link

Thanks for showing how you did that, it's pretty creative.