New Company of HIR bulbs? (1 Viewer)

[ShawnTRD]

I looked a couple months ago for HIR and didn't see these on ebay. Look to be higher watts though. 75watts

Low Beam
HIR HB4 9006 Halogen Infrared Reflective Bulb:eBay Motors (item 180445816439 end time Dec-25-09 08:03:23 PST)

High Beam
HIR HB3 9005 Halogen Infrared Reflective Bulb:eBay Motors (item 180445815658 end time Dec-25-09 08:00:31 PST)

 

[PACNW96]

Hmm...made in Korea by ONLITE KOREA. I'm thinking this is a knock off brand. I'm not sure where the Toshiba's are now made as I remember back the location of manufacture did change.

 

[Stone]

Read the guy's feedback...one guy purchased a couple of them and was unhappy. He thought they were not HIR and in fact burned really dim. Hmm...too bad, would have been a good deal.

 

[ShawnTRD]

Read the guy's feedback...one guy purchased a couple of them and was unhappy. He thought they were not HIR and in fact burned really dim. Hmm...too bad, would have been a good deal.

Good researching..

 

[aclos3]

Here's a cross post from the original HIR thread in the merchandise forum. I emailed the seller at finemotoring.com and then did some other research. Enjoy.

Original post:

Ok,

He got back to me and had some bad news about these bulbs. Toshiba HIRs have been discontinued and are in short supply. This is why we don't see the ebay auctions. He still has quite a few to sell for the time being, but they are full price... no deals anymore by the sounds of it. He mentioned that certain Nissan Maximas use them as standard equipment, so I hopped on over to the maxima forums and did some digging.

The 2nd generation HIRs have indeed been discontinued by Toshiba, but very recently Phillips released a 3rd generation HIR bulb. A poster on the maxima forum provided this link: <font color="red">NEW Philips 3rd Generation 9012 (HIR2)</font> as a place to buy 3rd generation HIRs. They are a little bit more expensive and I have no idea about the seller.

The 3rd generation has a rated lifespan of 1400 hours compared to 800 hours for the 2nd generation, but other than that they seem to have very similar specs. I will be ordering a set of highs and lows through the finemotoring.com seller since this forum has a bit of a relationship with that seller. If someone else would like to be the guinea pig and try the 3rd gens, please post your experience.

-Andrew

 

[mot]

That's great news!!

 

[aclos3]

I just heard back from Max at finemotoring and he is aware of the third gen phillips bulbs but says they aren't a true HIR bulb where infrared is reflected back to the filament. He did say they are good 65W bulbs though, just not a true HIR. That site claims 1875 lumens, 3400K temperature and 1400 hours rated life for the 3rd gen Phillips 9012s though, so they sound very comparable to the 2nd gen Toshiba HIRs. I've ordered 2x9011s and 2x9012s from finemotoring and may order a couple of the Phillips bulbs to do a comparison.

 

[aclos3]

Well I received my bulbs from Max Lumens (finemotoring.com) and installed them tonight. They are much brighter than OEM... wow. He paints the areas of the tabs that need to be cut off and I made quick work of it with a dremel cutting wheel and a vice.