I like making the bike better, so I decided to try a HID headlight upgrade. I bought it on Fleabay, and you need to be careful to get either a universal kit, or the kit to fit an H4 bulb, and to get a Hi/Lo kit, or yopu'll only have a high beam.
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The kit comes as basically 2 components, the bulb and the resistor / ballast kit. I took out the old bulb (with gloves on, so I hopefully won't have buggered it up by leaving any residue on the glass to create a hotspot), and put the old boot over the wiring, and put the new bulb in. It's a bit bigger than the old bulb, so it's a bit fiddly, and requires the headlight's bottom screws be unbolted so you can tilt the thing - I took the old one out having just taken the headlight fairing off.
I'd tested the thing before I started, and it all worked just fine, but when I plugged it in, it didn't work at all. I fiddled with things and found that the headlight connector was wired wrong. I've fixed that in the picture, but it's black to black with a white trace, white to white and blue to yellow. A quick test, and it was on to finding places for everything and tidying up the wiring.
I put the resistor under the headlight (and zip tied the wires out of the way so they won't cause a problem with the steering). The ballast is on top of the headlight. I put some electrical tape over the back of the headlight connector, as it's designed to be under the boot, and now it's tucked down the side of the headlight. You can see the metal of the spade connectors, so I figure better safe than sorry. eh?
So, on the left is before (low, high) and on the right is after (low, high). Yeah, I know, they're crappy pictures, but I think the HID bulb is throwing out more light. Of course, I need to test it at night somewhere.
The reflector's not designed for a HID bulb, so the actual light pattern is basically the same, but I think the whiter light doesn't drop off as quickly.
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