Get used to buying spare bulbs and keeping a pair in the tool box. They burn out much more frequently than the stock bulbs.
Photograph by Tim Suddard
The first time we drove our E90-chassis BMW at night, we noticed something: The headlights flat-out sucked. While BMW offered better Xenon headlights starting in 2011, our bare-bones 328i made do with the base halogen bulbs.
Could better bulbs help? Both the high and low beams both use an H7 bulb, so we went to an auto parts store and picked up four Sylvania SilverStar Ultra bulbs. Since they have Ultra in the name, they had to be amazing, right?
The packaging promised that they were “for ultra night vision,” so just what we were looking for. These bulbs also promise whiter light and strong down-road vision.
As one of the many YouTube videos on the subject will tell you, installation is straight forward. There is a removable hatch in the inner fender liner that gives you access to the headlight bulbs. This is critical on the driver’s side of the car because the air-box blocks access.
The old bulbs clip into place. Wear gloves or wrap the bulb in a shop towel because oil from your skin can cause bulb issues.
After installing the bulbs, we polished the clear plastic housings a bit with some Plexus plastic polish. While we will need to get inside the lens to make them perfect, we still got the headlights looking a lot clearer.
Once it got dark, we took the car out for a test drive. While some adjustment may be necessary to account for the rake we added, the lights now better illuminate the road.
Get used to buying spare bulbs and keeping a pair in the tool box. They burn out much more frequently than the stock bulbs.
Don't touch the bulbs and they last longer, from what I am told. Just the housing bit.
"we polished the clear plastic housings a bit with some Plexus plastic polish" Well there is your #1 reason for better illumination. Faded/foggy/yellowed lenses have a huge impact on night time illumination. Never tried Plexus, I use Turtle Wax headlight restorer (NOT the speed version!) as it comes with dual layer of sealing. Been 2 years so far and no change in headlight yellowing. Meguiar is my usual auto-part store go-to but apparently that turtle wax restorer is the bees knees.
I've had really good luck with the Hikari drop in LED's. They have an indexable rotation to adjust cutoff and solve blinding issues. They burn out faster than standard but are a radical improvement in everything I have put them in. Bonus, they are pretty darn cheap vs things like HID conversions etc.
Daniel Wise said:Get used to buying spare bulbs and keeping a pair in the tool box. They burn out much more frequently than the stock bulbs.
I will second this. The juice is just not worth the squeeze with the "better bulbs" that Sylvania offers. They are way more expensive and don't last very long. For many of my cars that I used these in, I would take out the standard bulbs (that were still good) and put them in the glove box. When (not if) the fancy bright bulbs burned out I just put the originals back in and keep trucking. I don't think I ever got more than 6-8 months of service out of the higher-output bulbs.
I had to check the date to see if this was some sort of throwback post. Silverstars? I used them when they were a thing, some time around, what, 2004?
They're still better than stock, and they lasted for me, but I think there are certainly far better options today.
I've used Silverstars in the past and agree with every comment above. I found retrofit LED bulbs to replace the Silverstars in my 1990 Integra project and I would have to assume there's even more selection for the Bimmer that should outperform the Silverstars. just thinking out loud........
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