I just purchased after market low beam HID's for non HID vehicle. Now I am questioning:

1) Are these illegal?
2) If illegal, will they be too bright (4300K bulb) and will a blind people / attract attention, **** people off?
3) Am I going to pass inspection?

I decided to purchase HID's because I was sick of taking off the bumper every time I needed to change a halogen bulb. The Sylvania high end bright bulbs that I was putting in seem to burn a little hotter and don't last as long. So I thought an HID kit would be more longer lasting. Now I think I am regretting it. Opinions?

 

Our cars have projectors so the beam of light will be distributed nicely on the road. When you put HID bulbs into reflector housings, then the beam isn't distributed as evenly, so you blind oncoming traffic. You will be just fine.
I recommend 4300K because it is the brightest. Anything higher than 5000k will just give you more color, but less actual light output.

 

1) I am uncertain if there is a law in PA concerning aftermarket HID headlights.
2) 4300 kelvin is color temperature rating, not brightness. Anything above 4300k is blue and starts to get purple around 10000 kelvin, below 4300k is yellow. It is not the brightness that blinds the hell out of people, it is the inadequate cut off of the line which shouldn't be higher than the window line of cars in front.
3) Probably will.

 

Non-hid RX8s come with projectors, but that does not mean it will have the proper cut off. HID bulbs are different in dimensions compared to halogen. There are also OEM HIDs that come in reflector housings. It is just the matter of how it comes from factory.

 

A lot of cars come from the factory now with 4300k bulbs.

 

1. It should be legal
2. 4300k bulb won't **** a blind person (i promise you that)
3. It should pass inspection with flying colors

 

I think the cut-off and everything is the same because there are quite a few members of the forum who have upgraded their halogen lights to HID.
You're right about some OEM set-ups with HID bulbs in reflector housings, but they have special shields to keep the light from reflecting off of the bottom part of the housing.

 

I think theoretically HID headlights are supposed to have a self-leveling mechanism which retrofitted lights won't have. So from that perspective it may be illegal - but the question is if this will be spotted during an inspection. I'd say, not likely... depends on how strict they are in PA and what do they check.

 

The projectors (which includes cut offs) are different for RX8s when comparing between the halogen and HID variants.

Reflector housings do not have shields, it is simply designing the reflector itself to reflect the light to certain angles only.

 

Older Nissan Maximas and M3s used hid in reflector housings. The way they made it work was with a D2R bulb, which has a shield on the bottom of the bulb to keep light from hitting the bottom half of the reflector. Sometimes, people make their own shields and they work well without blinding anyone.

OP, just do a search about HID conversion and you will find a few threads on the forum of people who did it successfully.