Automotive Bulbs Manual
There are a lot of car bulbs that are used in the vehicles today. These are used in the head lights, tail lights, fog lights, brake lights, side lights and various interior lights. The automotive bulbs and lighting technology is getting advanced day by day, becoming safer, more stylish, and more energy efficient. So when you want to change any bulbs in your car, there are 2 thing you need to know: what to do it and what bulbs are available as a replacement. Although car bulbs from different manufacturers can look identical, they can differ quite considerably in terms of quality of construction, materials used and the testing process that they have undergone. The best quality bulbs are labelled as OEM and this stands for Original Equipment Manufacturer and it means they were built to exactly the same standards as the bulbs that were fitted to your vehicle when it first left the factory. The other mark to look for is the testing standards E1 mark. The E1 code denotes that the bulb has been tested in Germany, which is widely regarded within the automotive industry as superior. Our site will guide you through all the piculiarities related to the bulbs, their types and installation instructions.
The main part among the car bulbs belongs to the headlights. In effect there are really just three types of car bulbs that you can install in your headlights and they are, standard halogen bulbs, modern upgrade xenon bulbs and heavy duty long life bulbs. Standard halogen headlight bulbs, are the bulbs that were fitted by the vehicle manufacturer at the factory and are normally full OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) specification. These type of car bulbs will typically last between 350-400 hours of use and emit a reasonable level of light onto the road. Upgrade xenon bulbs use xenon gas to produce a light up to 90% brighter than standard halogen bulbs, making night-time driving safer and less stressful, and because of their high performance construction they can be expected to last between 200-300 hours. Finally there are long life headlight bulbs and they will certainly cut the amount of time for replacing your car bulbs. By using reinforced heavy duty components you can expect a long life headlight bulb to last over 50% longer than ordinary halogen bulbs, giving you an expected bulb life of 500-600 hours, whilst still producing the same light output as ordinary halogen bulbs.
Another type of bulbs which has a large spread today is LED or Light Emitting Diode bulbs. LED bulbs have many advantages over ordinary filament bulbs, such as longer life, quicker on and off times, lower power consumption more clear colors but are not as bright as stock headlights. This problem can be solved if a large numbers of LEDs are used. In this case they will appear brighter than filament bulbs. The state of the art 3 Watt and 5 Watt LED car bulbs are brighter than most standard filament car bulbs. If the distribution of light is focused it will appear brighter if not then it would not be as bright, generally it depends on the size and shape of the bulb housing and reflector. LED’s are available in many colors but which suits your car the most? For best results the LED color should be the same as the lens color. LED headlights are avalible in many sizes. They are 1-5/8 inch diameter so please measure to make sure they will fit in your car’s headlight housings. The other difference is that of Narrow and Wide viewing angle.
When replacing headlight bulbs or sidelight bulbs it is recommended, and good sense, to change them both at the same time. Firstly if one bulb has blown the odds are very strong that the other one will blow shortly afterwards, and by changing them together you won’t have to repeat job for a while. The second reason is that as headlight bulbs get towards the end of their service life their performance starts to reduce, and so if you only changed one headlight bulb you would be left with a light imbalance that reduces the performance of your headlights and can prove distracting. When it comes to changing other car bulbs like indicator bulbs or brake light bulbs it is normal practice just to replace the failed bulb.