With many new cars fitted with ultra bright xenon or LED headlights, you may feel like your being left in the dark with your standard halogen bulbs. Having brighter headlights can definitely be a blessing when driving at night, particularly with many councils now turning off much of the street lighting after midnight in a bid to save money.
Happily, there are options available to upgrade your headlights and it’s certainly cheaper than buying a brand new car! A quick search online for xenon lights will offer up a range of DIY upgrade kits which include the bulbs and a ballast as xenon lights need a higher voltage than offered by a standard car battery. You may want to think twice before going for this option, however, as xenon lamps without auto levelling constitute an MOT fail. This is because the bulbs are so bright that they can dazzle oncoming traffic, even when dipped, when travelling on an undulating road surface. While factory fitted xenon lamps will feature auto-levelling, very few upgrade kits include this.
The best alternative is a set of ultra bright halogen bulbs which come in a range of brightness’s (you’ll get what you pay for here) with some bulbs boasting 100% brighter output than standard halogen bulbs. These fit the same as standard bulbs, requiring no extra equipment and there are also tinted options to give a xenon or LED effect.