Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 02:31:33 -0400
Reply-To:     David Beierl <dbeierl@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         David Beierl <dbeierl@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
Subject:      Re: Bus Dee-Poh H4 lights
Comments: To: mrvolkswagen@HOTMAIL.COM
In-Reply-To:  <BAY7-DAV24pcXCXWtji00000281@hotmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed

At 12:42 AM 7/8/2003, Chris S wrote:

>http://www.busdepot.com/details.jsp?partnumber=HQ6014
>
>Has anyone tried these?  Only $35 for the pair with bulbs?  Gooder or badder
>than the Hella H4 units offered from 'other' vendors at twice the price?

I can pretty well promise that they're not as good overall.  That being
said, they could easily be significantly better than the stock H6014 7"
round halogens.  Assuming the picture is of the actual lights you can
easily see that they have the European beam pattern -- how well it
conforms/performs I can't say, not having seen them.

>   My
>credit card is itching and my current lights suck.

If they're dim you likely have a wiring problem or non-halogen lights or
both -- the round headlights are perfectly stock American sealed-beams,
exactly as good or bad as any other of that brand.  They do not have the
genuinely bad low-beam that the later prettier Vanagon-specific rectangular
lights do.  However if they're just ordinary, the E-code pattern gives
significantly better visibility than the American pattern on low beam -- if
they're aimed correctly.  If they're not -- either you can't see or you'll
blind everyone else.

For the money -- I'd be inclined to try them if I couldn't afford the
Hella/Bosch/Cibie lights, or if I could afford to get them as an
experiment.  I'd expect to find shortcoming(s?) somewhere, either in beam
quality of the fixtures, precision (beam quality)/construction of the
bulbs, or sturdiness and longevity of lens, reflector and so forth, but it
wouldn't shock me if they were wonderful -- they could be truly awful or
quite superior in beam quality without making much (any?) visible
difference.  I suspect that the DOT off-road approval may mandate some
minimum quality but I don't know.

These are among the many things that can be made in Asia significantly less
expensively than Europe/US -- and could be of almost any quality or vary
randomly from lot to lot.  The best Asian precision manufacture is
extremely good; the worst (and I think India may have some of the worst of
the worst) is extremely bad.  Bus Depot are not likely to have the test
facilities to see how they compare against the regular ones...

Good luck.

david


>Thanks,

--
David Beierl - Providence RI USA -- http://pws.prserv.net/synergy/Vanagon/
'84 Westy "Dutiful Passage"
'85 GL "Poor Relation"