| Author | Message | ||
     Trevd |
Since my New Year's resolution is to be less dumb, I thought I'd start with this. Why did Buell, and others, feel it necessary to have 2 perfectly good headlights on the front of their bikes, but only use 1 at a time? Is it just supposed to be 'cool', or is there a real reason for it? | ||
| Itileman |
In case one burns out, you still have a spare. A real 7" headlight with a high and low beam bulb is too expensive and old school. Al Gore said they could only use one light at a time. I'm sure there are many other good reasons. | ||
| Ratbuell |
The low beam light and the high beam light have two different reflector designs, for "cleaner" beam spreads for each light. A typical hi-lo light has a dual use reflector, with a 2 filament bulb. The way they work is the filaments are in different locations (one close to the base, one close to the lens) and "hit" different parts of the reflector...so one works as hi and one as lo because of where the reflector focuses the beam. Note - they are separate circuits in bulbs like this, so you can still use the highbeam if the low filament burns out. Common ground, separate hot leads. Given the small size of the Buell lights, this was probably the best choice because it kept the lighting designers from compromising beam spread. We all know that as they are, they're "mostly" adequate...if they were dual-use, they'd probably be basically worthless. Sorry...ex-concert lighting designer and college Stage Lighting and Color Theory professor in me coming out  | ||
| Mnrider |
Great answer Rb. I still think the bike should have come with both on in high beam,The lighting is so much better. | ||
| Trevd |
I agree with Mnrider... Ratbuell, why wouldn't they make both come on with the high beam? | ||
| Two_buells |
you can flip from hi to low real fast and cars will move out of your way. | ||
| Ratbuell |
Probably concerned about electrical load. We've proven on a lot of our own bikes by doing the mod that they're OK...but a manufacturer has to err on the side of caution, remember. Can you *imagine* the hateful posts if people's batteries were dying, and stators going out, because of "too many headlights on"?? I know *I* did it the old-fashioned way - installed a voltmeter, checked the system output, made the swap, checked system output...added aux lights, checked system output. Not very scientific, but it works on my bike. The engineers, I'm sure, used actual *math* and had a range of acceptable values | ||
| Ratbuell |
Either that, or the DOT said you can't have both on. I know that's the way on our cars - low beams go off with high beam use. | ||
| Ronmold |
Makes it a lot easier to do a HID mod with 2 beams | ||
| Jphish |
just do the head lite mod. Solder bridge in light switch (prefered - cuz it keeps lights on same circuit) or pin swap @ connector. 10K miles & works fine. j | ||
| Ourdee |
Two_buells, You noticed that too. | ||
| Natexlh1000 |
My X1 has a single headlight and it's more effective than the stock setup on my uly. Why didn't they just make both bulbs dual filament? I added some cheapo driving lights and it's great now. I have never felt the need to improve the old X1's lights. | ||
| Ratbuell |
Your X1 has a 7" headlight. Lens area is 38.5 square inches. (pi-R-squared, or 3.14 x 3.5 x 3.5) The Uly / XB-S has a pair of 4" lights, at only 12.5 square inches of lens area each. Total lens area is 25 in/sq, which is still nearly 30% less total area. No way in hell you can get a substantial dual beam out of something that small. And if they did it that way, each light would have to be exactly the same as the other...so you'd have two crappy little 12.5 sq/inch (a third the lens area of your X1) compromise-style lamps (neither really good at high, or at low), instead of one half-decent high beam and one half-decent low beam like we have now. For the size, though...they do an admirable job of lighting the road. But bigger would have worked better. The size - and having to work within DOT's beam-spread constraints - is what kills 'em. The only way to go smaller and have decent lighting is to go projector, which these aren't. And they can't very well put the "for off road use only" warning label on them like most of the aux lights you can buy - and that's on there because they don't meet DOT standards for beam spread, focus, or lighting output control. Which is why they "work better" - because lots of times they're putting light where DOT says it doesn't belong, like into the eyes of oncoming traffic or rearview mirrors of cars in front of you. | ||
| Trevd |
So why didn't they go with just one big headlight then? Or 2 lights that are bigger than the current ones? Style I guess...? | ||
| Ratbuell |
Bingo. | ||
| Froggy |
I don't think the headlight grill would fit around the X1 light. Oh, my Blast has a single big light, and the output is worse than a certain Uly that rear ended a car. | ||
| Vic_647 |
I have to say, the headlights on my 2001 Triumph Speed Triple do a much better job. Two large lights vs one small light doesn't take too much math to figure out. As far as the looks go, people either love the "bug-eyed" look of the Triumph or they hate it. I happen to like the look and really appreciate all the candlepower when the sun goes down... I will say this though, I think my Triumph has a Denso alternator stuffed between the motor and tranny that is similar in size and appearance to that of a small car and I'm sure its main purpose is to power those bug-eyes... And yes, Froggy, they make a grill to cover those monsters, lol! |
