G'day all,

I thought I would share a little project I undertook on the weekend to add a new farkle to my '06 KLE. The motivation for this project stems from a couple of near misses (and a 65kmh impact!) with kangaroo's whilst riding the scooter home in the early evening.

My understanding of HID light setups was/is that these are expensive and used by anyone doing a fair amount of driving/riding/racing after dark.


The KLE has a twin light installation, with each lamp operating independently to provide low and high beam operation, so a basic car kit should suffice. Upon doing some homework, I discovered that kits come in a number of variations, such as globe type and rating, colour range and ballast size.




A check of the bike species and a visual inspection highllighted some considerations for the installation.

1. The globes are H7 style
2. A rating of 35W for the HID lights exceeds the output of 55W halogens whilst reducing the total draw on the electrical system
3. Only the ultraslim ballasts can be fitted due to space limitations

Given the limited power available and space to fit ballasts and the associated wiring, I decided that a car kit with H7 globes rated at 4300K colour (evidently the best for seeing things at night, and the “whitest” light) and ultra-slim ballasts would be the ticket.

After hunting around the local stores and the net, I found an excellent deal on fleabay - $AU158 delivered. Although the kit had to be sent from Hong Kong, it was on my doorstep within 5 days of ordering!

Here is the kit as supplied.




First job was to compare the position of the light sources in each. HID relies on an electrical arc through xenon gas, as opposed to the conventional glowing wire in the old globes. The position of the light source relative to the reflector is critical to the efficiency of the lamp.



Fortunately, everything was spot on!

Next job was to fabricate a mount for the ballasts. Thankfully, the underside of the instrument cluster is the perfect spot, so a plate was made up to fit the three existing instrument panel mounting bolts, and the ballasts were fixed to that using small nuts and bolts.





This photo shows just how thin these ballasts are.


The wiring is basically plug and play, with male terminals placed directly into the existing light sockets, with a little care to make sure that the correct ballast is connected to the respective high and low beam lights.

A quick comparison before and after



Low beam before



Low beam after



High beam before



High beam after

The only downside is the warm up period when switching between high and low beams, The first second or so after switching beams, the light is reduced in power and quite blue. Visibility is still ok, just takes a little getting used to – but the trade off in light performance is well worth it!

This is a brilliant mod I may copy at some stage.

What you may consider is to alter the wiring so when you flick the switch to hi beam the low beam stays on. Like when you press the light trigger in front of the handlebar (pass buttom).

Because HID should in theory generate less heat it should be sweat on the lens, you wouldn't have that instant of dimmed light and because the low beam stays on the lit area would be greatly increased.

Will

Will,

I am presently looking at that option, just trying to figure the load present and how the stator will cope with heated grips, comms gear, gps etc hanging off the auxilliary power supply.

I read your post about the power mods to your KLE - sounds sweet! I will perhaps head down that path after I have the suspension sorted.

I forgot to post the photo of the HID globes mounted in the headlight



Just waiting for the local dealer to do some legwork on the electronic specs from Kawasaki.

The proprietor and mechanic at Mudgee Kawasaki just graduated from the Kawasaki technicians course as number 1 (mechanic) and number 2 (proprietor) in terms of final marks, against a large number of technicians from other dealerships, including Sydney based ones. They are gearing up with the full diagnostics kit for late model Kawa's and I have found their service to date to be first rate.

In the mean time, I will hunt around the net for the mod to alter the switching to the high beam light only; perhaps a perusal of the manual may point me in the right direction
:confused1:

Cheers
Ian

P.S. It appears from the manual that I should be able to join the red/yellow and blue/yellow wires together in the switch block to hardwire the lowbeam light permanently on - just the load issues to be sorted now...

Did you hook some relays to your lights?

Without knowing too much about it I think that as long as you are using the current straight from the battery and not from the original wiring you should be sweat. I would try to find a slightly more powerful battery that fits the tray to run all the accessories.

The draw wouldn't be too bad for a thicker cable and relays and you wouldn't have the hi beam on all the time anyway.

I also have heated grips and they are brilliant.

The latest mod to my kle was to add a dual tone stebel electromagnetic horn. Hooked a relay and hooked the two horns set. I was going to go for the nautilus one (the air one) but decided to go electromagnetic as the air one tends to fail sooner because of the exposure to the elements. Now the horn is really loud, no more excuses or piss weak original horn.

Have a look at STEBEL S.p.a. for the HF80/2

I'm going to have a look at that kit you got. Sounds interesting.

Will

PS: If you decide too do some performance mods you should really consider a full exhaust system instead of the slip on. You wouldbe able to squeeze a few extra ponies that way. Not sure if they would be enough to make it worthwile tho.

Will

Nice horns! Guess you must live in Syderney - horns used to wake up dopey cagers. My biggest problem here is kangaroos, and they don't seem to fazed by horns, 'cause hopping "into the light" is way more of a temptation for them.

The ballasts only draw 7A peak on ignition and 3.3A nominal feeding the HID globes, so I elected not to run relays from the batt, as the headlight feeds already run through a relay.

It may not be a bad idea to do so though if I go the full time low beam route.

A mate made up some pannier racks for my bike and just today a pair of Expedition Panniers turned up in the post. The saddle straps are a poofteenth short, so looks like I will have to organise some extensions.

I will drop you a PM shortly.

Cheers
Ian