Hey all, I have had a couple bikes now and it seems that riding the main issue i find is others not seeing you. Also owning the 999 it seems that the headlights on it are not that great... I have thus decided to improve this On my last bike (black 900SS), against all advise, I have installed some LEDs under the fairings and over the wheels, and it looked sick! also it helped with visibility from the sides especially, and with a black bike during the night it was a lot easier to see. On the 999 I have looked all over online, google images of other people doing similar things, and on youtube, and I have ordered and awaiting the following mods: * HID headlights kit - i have ordered 2 bi-xenon set, I will replace both lights with xenon lights ( a LOT brighter) and also as they are both bi-xenon I will alter the wiring to have both lights on when on low-beam, and when in high-beam I'll have both lights still on, just switch to high beam * I have also ordered a LED halo (angel eye), I have looked online and I have really liked the look of these on bikes, I'll put one on each headlight, giving it that BMW look if you want a comparison. * I have also ordered some LEDs to put under fairings and over front and back wheel to improve visibility and add to the look of the bike. As it's a black bike, all the lights I have gotten in RED which I think will accent well. Let me know if anyone has done any of the above, any tips or suggestions welcome! (I'm sure i'll get some haters... but i really do like the look of the bike with these mods and will help a heaps with visibility) Thanks.
Was thinking of hid but seems the packs that come with these are not so small with no where much to hide them? Certainly like to see some pics when done. Good luck - sure the lights themselves will look smart
I will post some once done. Should have all the bits by next week. The canasta for the his kid I ordered are meant to be half the size of regular ones so we will see how easy it'll be to fit.
Hi, I have done quite a bit last little while, unfortunately some other things took priority: * have replaced spark plugs with new ones (turns out its quite a job! on these bikes) * bled front and rear brakes and clutch and taken them off to clean due to locking * replaced rear suspension adjusting rod blah blah. Anyways, I have installed 2 red halos around both lights, I have connected them to the front, quite useless, windshield light. They look really cool in my opinion! and as they're connected to the same wiring as the little windshield light, when i put parking lights on only those are on in the front and look really good! I have went to play with the headlights, which turned out a chore and a half, as they're so built in and very little room to play with. Originally I wanted to replace both top and bottom lights with HID ones, and rewire to have both on all the time. Couple of issues: * the HID kit i got, was one of the smallest ones they had as far as ballasts and all, but it was not made for my bike in particular. I didn't think this would be a problem... but couple of things came up: 1. obviously the mounting for the bulbs didn't fit, but that's nothing some plastic and screws cannot fix I mounted the bottom one fine, the top one however turns out the HID bulbs have quite a large fitting behind them... which meant that when i installed the top one the clock (tacometer) didn't want to go back in... soooo after thinking about it for quite some time, i decided lets just do the bottom one, as that's the one that's on all the time and not rewire them. Done that. 2nd issue came up. Turns out that the HID bulbs seem to be made to light sideways, meaning that when you install them into the headlight you're meant to have them mounted pointing to the side not pointing forward. I have looked up online and it does not state that's the case, however that seems to be the case.. I thought the reflective insides of the headlight should be sufficient to whatever way the bulb is facing, reflect the light forward. Apparently that's not the case, meaning that i'm actually at the moment having, what seems like, less light than i did with the standard halogen light bulb... it still looks nice as the light is pure white and the red halo around it looks really good, but i'm going to have to think about what I can do to get more light out of the bulb. Interestingly the bulbs are bi-xenon, meaning that they have low and high beams installed in each bulb. The way it works, which is interesting, is that there is a seperate mechanism in each bulb which sucks the bulb in with a magnet, causing less light to come out of it. I'm thinking that I can maybe permanently put it to high beam in the low beam light, causing more light to come out, but as it's not reflected properly it'll look more like low beam... something to think about. I have all the side red LEDs which i'm going to install to have a glow from under the side fairings and over top of the wheels, but i've been so consumed with the headlights that i have not installed those yet. Any suggestions? I'm not an expert by any means on lighting, maybe there is something i'm missing here... Anyways here are some pictures of what the 2 halo's look like, let me know what you think the halo's look a bit orange here, but in reality they are pure red
These are not lights per say they are just accent lighting. A halo around the lights. In actuality you cannot see them light up anything just see them when looking at the front of the Bike. When the lights are on the light in front of you is just white you can't se. The red again unless you look at the front of the Bike. A's I said to each their own but I think this looks great!
Good idea any extra lights, but wouldn't having red lights on the front be miss leading to oncoming traffic as they would thing they are tail lights? Wondered why you didn't go with white Halo's?
Since the 999 has the low beam always on when the light is on you cannot see the red light as distinctively but just see a red circle around the light . Plus white is boring. The red will match the accent red logging I'm going to put on the sides
