[donkie]

Silverstar bulbs, my experience. (long)

So recently (or better yet all the time) lots of talk about bulbs, sliverstar, hid, etc got me curious. I would rather comment on things that I have direct experience with, and even though I had dismissed silverstars as junk I had never actually had or seen them in use, so I figured what the heck I'll get them and just ebay them if I don't like them. And they are a dealer option with a genuine Mopar part number now (P/N P09006XSST) so I figured I would go pick them up and actually see for my self how they worked and what the fuss was all about. If you want to debate what is and what is not "rice" go find a thread on a Honda forum, that is not the purpose of this thread. I wanted to see how these worked because I know the factory low beams are not acceptable to me. I live outside of the city and have to drive a lot of country roads with a ton of deer and other things I would like to see.

I drove over to the dealer and to my suprise they were sold out. The parts guy said they are identical to the retail version just twice the price. I then headed over to walmart for some good times. They too were sold out of just about all of them, just a pair of 9007's half open left. Guess these were a hot christmas gift or something. Finally I found myself at advanced auto parts staring at all the totally stupid bulbs on the bulb isle. Found what I needed, some 9006XS for the low beams. About to head out, saw they had 9005XS too so I grabbed them. Online I could never find a foglamp in silverstar, but aap had a 9145 which fits the 04 so I figured it could not be that much different and headed home with my 6 bulbs. They were on sale too, all 6 were like $70 something total.

The high and low beams are super easy to swap, just a 7MM bolt and the whole lamp assembly pops off. Kind of scary if you have never done it, but just pull it will come off. Literally two minutes tops. The fog lamps were a different story, not much clearance down there so I just removed them using a 10mm socket. At least for a brief moment I hoped whoever designed it that way would somehow DIAF, but I got them in pretty easily. The 03 uses a 9040 fog bulb, and I had a 9145, which according to the label on the bulb is 4 watts greater. I had to clearance the bulb about a 1/10th of an inch on two of the tabs but otherwise they fit right in place of the 9040 bulbs. My passenger side was a PIA as the bolts came out of the housing, but they went back in just fine. Fired everything up and after two seconds it was apparent that I would have to aim them again as the driver lamp was now low and to the center, but I drove around anyway to see the differences.

Are they brighter? No.
Are they blue? Yes.
Are they whiter then factory? Yes.
Do I see better with them? No, possibly it's worse.
Do they look like fake HID ebay bulbs? They could be worse.

My camera has quite a bit of blue push, they don't look nearly that blue next to a regular bulb in sunlight but here are a bunch of pics. I really miss the factory HID's in the Acura TL I used to drive, you could see perfectly. Too bad the rest of the car was a POS.

Test subject - muddy from some land I was looking at yesterday

The bulbs

Remove this bolt

Pull hard

Side by side

Silverstars on Drivers side, OEM on passenger side

foglamp

Driver silverstar fog bulb, Passenger side OEM bulb

The PITA lamp

Pics of the silverstars output

[donkie]

low beam
High beams
My camera is adding blue here, misaligned



So, there you have it. Are they better than good old regular bulbs? I don't think so. Since they are somewhat tinted blue and the same wattage they should put out less light and I think they do put out less light. They do seem brighter though. Will I keep them? Don't think so. I am going over to the shop and aiming them on the flat surface we have, hopefully I can see better when they are pointing in the right direction...

[donkie]

9040 oem and 9145 bulb side by side

[greasefingers]

Thanks for taking the time out for the review. Good job

The only reason I have not tried them yet is they only lasted about one year. But this was a several years back so they may not burn out as fast today.

[///BHRpowered]

Originally Posted by donkie

Silverstar bulbs, my experience. (long)
Are they brighter? Yes.
Are they blue? No.?
Are they whiter then factory? Yes.
Do I see better with them? Not really, possibly it's worse.
Do they look like fake HID ebay bulbs? No.

Get a lumen meter, there not brighter.
I bet there cloud blue
My blood pressure is being used in the other thread, will return later

[donkie]

oh believe me man I'm on your side don't blow a gasket. I install CRT and other video projectors, and I know you can't focus on blue light like you can green and red. I just wanted to actually see them installed on a WJ. They are not brighter. I have a colorfacts unit I use for front projection, not sure it would like headlamps though

[Woody]

Save your blood pressure please, we know your thoughts already.

No that's not a suggestion.

[///BHRpowered]

very well then, to taco bell I go....with my HID's blazing

[donkie]

///BHRpowered please tell me you went to taco bell to eat and not sit in the parking lot with mazda tuners :joker:

I just went to dinner and it's raining here in TN where we don't have reflective road striping. The silverstar bulbs do this really neat trick when it's dark and raining I learned - they totally vanish as if you did not even have your lights on!

I was hoping I could prove myself wrong and that these bulbs were better and improved the lighting on my WJ. That they were the "brightest and whitest light available" I can now say from personal experience and not rampant internet bench racing speculation that is not true. Sure it's whiter with a higher color temp, but you can't see or focus "blue-r" light as well. They have taken a regular halogen bulb, coated it slightly blue and doubled the price. It puts out less light than a standard 9006XS as a result of the filter.

I will still aim them tomorrow when it stops raining just to make sure it's not just the alignment so it's a fair evaluation. The high beams do rock, but overall silverstars bring the suck. You can even get silverstar turn signal and brake bulbs now...someone should take them to task over the marketing claims. And how did these end up as factory OEM dealer parts?

The Toshiba HIR bulbs are only available in regular right angle sockets. I did not pay attention to my housings, will they still fit? While I'm at it I'd like test those as well.

I have a few rolls of 8GA and 10GA wire laying around from my car stereo days, might just rewire the lights on their own circuit to see the difference like so many others. That's just stupid that we would need to do that, I just want to be able to see better at night. My ZJ had 2 150W KC daylighters on the bumper, I guess I'll have to do the same again.

I'm good with the ballasts, wiring, etc but if someone could tell me exactly how to modify the factory housing with proper parts for optimum HID implementation I'll try that too on another set of housings. Guess I'll have to start reading hid forums now...

[SAZJ]

The difference is that since they are further along the spectrum towards blue, the light that is cast out may not be brighter in lumen's, but it does have more energy due to the shorter wavelength. Therefore it can be seen further away. Thats why when you see a cop car, the blue light is seen first and then the red light.

[MtnbikerWJ]

The Toshiba HIR bulbs are only available in regular right angle sockets. I did not pay attention to my housings, will they still fit? While I'm at it I'd like test those as well.

You can get the right angled bulbs to fit. As I have right angled silver stars in mine as when I got mine they didnt have the straight bases out yet. There are a few write ups on how to install.

[lma1973]

If you dont like the Siverstars, then definitely dont get the Sylvania Cool Blue's. If you look at the temp chart on the box, supposedly the Silverstars are burning much hotter than standard halogens. I cant remember exactly but its something like 4100K versus 2800K?

[P NUT]

In my high school/college days, I had an Integra and bought some Silverstars. The 9006's didn't make any difference at all. So I got the 9005 (for high beam) and all you have to do is cut out a little piece of plastic to make it fit in the regular beam. It actually came out brighter and I could see a bit better...for about 5 months. Then one burned out and a couple of months later, the other. Happened once again, probably due to the fact that the high beam bulbs don't have as much life as the regular bulbs.

Bottom line -- I can see fine with regular OEM bulbs. If anything, put that money towards a true HID system. But even then, I still don't see THAT much difference between the two. The white/blue tint does look better, but not enough to justify the price nor the time. I had HID in my S2000, but if one of the bulbs would have gone out, I'd have been pissed ($80), as opposed to a regular halogen ($6).

[BlaineWasHere]

I have silverstars on my ZJ... they looked cool but burnt out fast. I have had the stock bulbs for over 2 years and they were in there when I bought it so maybe longer.

[///BHRpowered]

silverstars = what I did in the bathroom 5 minutes ago, period.

And no, I went to taco bell because I was hungry

modifying ballasts is down the line a bit. A basic 4300k kit in the WJ's housing will vastly improve lighting, but if you do a retrofit or atleast some projectors, even cheap ebay ones, combined with hid's you will get 30 fold better output and driving light. Now, using ebay projector setups will not yet OEM results, but you'll be so impressed you won't care...until the itch comes again