Without meaning any disrespect to our site sponsors I've been doing some digging on the price of HID bulbs and find that it's genuinely a complete minefield out there and was wondering what the consensus was on how much you need to spend for a replacement HID Bulb.
The starting point is the Main dealer who is quoting £121.09 each. Now we all know that you'd have to be mad to pay their prices but after 2 minutes searching the information superhighway I am more confused than when I started.
There are a lot at about £60 each as per below for instance. This seems to be the genuine benchmark figure that you need to pay.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/PHILIPS-D3S-XenE...1221829429
Then After another minute I find "2 for £80" and then "2 for 60" and then these are £32 for 2 with a 12 month warranty.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/D3S-HID-Xenon-Bu...3cc126c7a4
How do they do it?? It’s a specialized HID eBay shop. They offer a 12 month warranty!! Is it a case of you get what you pay for?? Are the cheaper ones Fakes? I really don't know.
I'm quite happy to pay the £60 each which seems to be the going price but you'd be a fool not to sit back and think for two minutes how these other people can knock them out for a quarter of the price or an eighth of the price of the Main Dealer…… Regards
Mark

2009 D4; 1993 Classic 3.9 VSE

Hi,

I've previously bought bulbs for prestige cars from powerbulbs.com, a UK firm I found via an Audi Q7 forum. I found this firm to be quick, reliable, reasonably priced and selling recognised quality, household name/ branded and guaranteed products.

This recent post by Bellini might just touch on what you refer to/ you've maybe already seen it:
http://www.fullfatrr.com/forum/topic21240....p;start=15

My thoughts would be that I would hope to get what I pay for and I would consider £60 for Philips headlight bulbs to appear to represent a good value 'proper' guaranteed replacement bulb as an alternative - with recourse should something go wrong - to paying the initial main dealer quote you refer to.

Have you asked the main dealer "who manufacturers the bulbs" they've quoted you £121.09 for, have you tried Duckworth Parts for a price and have you asked a main dealer if they would reduce the price because you would otherwise intend to buy the Philips bulbs, telling them the exact spec and price you can get the Philips bulbs for?

Thanks for the Link, I tried many searches before I posted this up and still didn''t find that !!
Very interesting though, I hadn't noticed whether the bulb was glowing red prior to going but then it's not something I was looking for.
I'm going to buy a couple of replacements from Craig but I thought it might be worth having a pair of the cheap ones as a back up. Regards
Mark

2009 D4; 1993 Classic 3.9 VSE

OE bulbs are usually osram which are made in germany and philips probably made in europe somewhere , whereas the cheaper ebay bulbs are chinese hence the difference in price..

saying that ,i have used chinese bulbs for my xenons and other applications on my range and i cant fault them tbh ...chinese led/smd/cree products have developed so much in recent years that i reckon they are on par with the german/european stuff...

if you do buy of ebay try and buy from a UK chinese seller as you will get the product quicker and you'll pay no import duty and 'if' the product fails its not such a problem returning it or getting a replacement.. ... - .- -.




Y. O. L. O.
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Why not go for an upgrade with these?
http://www.advancedfactors.co.uk/66240xnb-...3821-p.asp




Anybody experience with it? 2017 Range Rover Vogue TDV8 silicon silver
2011 Defender 90 2.4 TDCI Nara Exclusive
2008 Porsche 911 997 4S Black/black
1970 Porsche 911T 2.2 in restauration
1980 Toyota Land Cruiser BJ40 concours winner

The '2 for £32' arrived this evening and are labeled 'Phillips' and 'made in Germany'
They fitted fine and work so I'm going to give them a couple of days before I order any more expensive ones. Regards
Mark

2009 D4; 1993 Classic 3.9 VSE

did you get the 6000k ones Mark? ... - .- -.




Y. O. L. O.
.

Yep. They certainly look the part. Regards
Mark

2009 D4; 1993 Classic 3.9 VSE

the OE 4300k xenons are good but the slight increase in temperature does make a difference...this upgrade will probably be one of my next jobs.. ... - .- -.




Y. O. L. O.
.

Gruute, those Osram Xenarc Night Breaker Unlimited bulbs look very interesting indeed. I found a video comparing the normal Osram Xenarc to the Night Breaker Unlimited and the difference looked astounding.



My only concern is that I cannot find anything to document the average life expectancy in hours that you normally get with bulbs, but I would imagine it will be shorter for the Night Breaker Unlimited.

That's video clip appears to show quite some difference with the Nightbreaker... The OP got 2 x Philips bulbs for £32 & the advert for the Nightbreaker shows £60 for one bulb.

Yep, there not cheap that's for sure. And the bulb Gruut mentions is the D2S, the D1S fitted in 2006/9 cars is even more expensive at £70 a bulb. But if the difference is as marked as in the video then there certainly impressive.

http://www.advancedfactors.co.uk/66140xnb-...3820-p.asp

Looking at the video clip more closely I reckon the side by side clips are from 2 different camera's. So its possible the dramatic difference is more down to the video camera than the bulbs. The video on the left showing the Night Breaker Unlimited seems of much higher quality and its very likely that the night time capability is also far better, making the comparison unfair.

Not having much experience with HID bulbs, when one went in the FF I thought to save time I'd pop in to Halfords as I was passing. Well to say I was shocked when I found they wanted £70 for ONE. When I got home I went on the bay and found they could be had from around £15 so I ordered a couple and replaced both.

Now fast forward a couple of months and to my surpriseone of the headlights fails . When I get home and have a look this is what I found -

i suspect you have the wrong type of bulb there..i made a mistake of buying that type and having trouble fitting it resulting in damaging the holder..

the correct bulb should have the anti vibration strips on it like in this picture,
 ... - .- -.




Y. O. L. O.
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