DISCLAIMER: PLease do this modification at your own risk. I am not responsible if anything bad or unwanted happens to your vehicle. Remeber you are increasing the wattage that will be running through your low beam's wiring and fog light's wiring. Please do research and read in these forums!!! Doing this modification may not be legal in some states for onroad/highway use; it may only be legal for offroad use. Please check all of your local DMV and Highway laws regarding modifications to your headlight's. I will not be responsible if you break the bulb or destroy the bulb housing while modifying it to fit. Please do the modification at a slow pace.

Lets get started!

I decided to follow GRAND_GS 4's and GSteg's recomendations to try using HIR bulbs. I must thank them for convincing me to take the plunge with these bulbs. I cant be happier
Thread Here

HIR bulbs were developed by GE and are licensed by Toshiba. These bulbs significantly increase light output. For more information on HIR's and purchasing the bulbs please read this website: http://hirheadlights.com/
These bulbs have been approved by the DOT unlike many of the other blue bulbs. The HIR bulbs are stamped DOT on the side of the housing.

Vehicle:
Second Generation GS300/400/430 This modification can be adapated to other cars using 9005/9006 bulbs. I have heard of people using them in SC's, Land Cruisers, American cars ect.

Time:
About 1 hour. This will vary depending on your experience with a dremel and how you modify the tabs.

Equipment:
Gloves or a paper towel. Do not touch the bulb. Oil from your hands can cause a bulb to prematurely burn out.
Either a Dremel or cutting tool to modify the 9011 bulb.
You will also need 6 9011 bulbs.

You can do a direct stock replacement that requires no cutting:
High Beams: 2 9011 Bulbs
Low Beams: 2 9012 Bulbs
Fog Lights: 2 9012 bulbs
All you need to do with these is replace the stock bulbs and you are set. To replace all lights with 9011 keep reading.

I purchased 8 bulbs from this seller on ebay:
HIR HEADLIGHTS
You will need 6 total (I bought 2 extra in case the bulbs burn out):
High beams: 2 9011 Bulb
Low beams: Either 2 9011 Bulbs (modifying the tab) or 2 9012 bulbs
Fog lights: Again Either 2 9011 Bulbs (modifying the tab) or 2 9012 bulbs.

The 9005 housing is identical to the HIR 9011
The 9006 housing is identical to the HIR 9012

You can modify the 9011 bulbs to work in the fog lights and the low beams (they use 9006 bulbs stock). I changed out the fogs, lows and highs to 9011 HIR's made by Toshiba.

High Beam Installation:
Just remove the previous bulbs and insert the 9011 bulbs. There is no cutting required.

Low Beam Installation:
The low beams and fog lights can accept 9011's by following the 9006 to 9005 modification
HIR tab modifying information here
9006 to 9005 information

This is where a dremel comes in handy.
Cut off the portion of the mounting tab that is painted white. Then you will need to cut off the interior tabs where you connect the bulb to the wiring. After that it will slide right in the low beam housing. This took me about 10 minutes but I have experience in using a dremel. You can also use a file or a cutting tool. Use what ever you feel comfortable. I will not be responsible if you cut off the tab and the bulb does not fit.

Fog Light Installation:
When installing the bulbs on the fog lights, I ran into a minor issue when I was modifying the 9011 housing. I am doing this on a 2001 GS300 with clear fog lamps. First of all, I would not immediately cut off the white areas on the 9011 mounting tabs. I did this and realized that the bulb did not fit. Instead I would place the bulb into the housing and mark off the areas you need to cut off. In my case I needed to trim areas off of each mounting tab to get the bulb to fit. You may not even need to trim off some of the areas painted white. Your results may vary. Please make sure you know what you are doing. I will not be responsible if you cut off the tabs and the bulb will not fit.
This took about 20 minutes.

Pictures:
This is not a step by step guide with pictures. I appolgize. I didn't think I was going to write up a guide. You can see some pictures of the results below.

(Will be re-uploaded soon)

I did get a little lazy taking pictures. My macro like lens was inside and I did not want to get it so I did not take any close up pictures of the bulb plus it started to drizzle. You get the idea. BTW I do not have Polarg M4's in the wedges. Superautobacs was out.

Overall I like how much brighter the bulbs are compared to stock. You will be able to see an immediate difference between stock and after.
Many people may be concerned that the bulbs are more expensive. I would argue that for the increased safety from higher output makes up for the cost.
This is another alternative for HID's.

 

i've been preaching on HIR bulbs for awhile but people either want to go with HID or leave the bulb OEM-spec. No one wants to try the HIR

I'm glad you have great experience with them

 

Thanks for the kind words. HIR's look terrific in person. Sure, they dont look nearly as nice as HID's but I didn't want to hassle with the kit. I'll report on the life of the bulbs. I hope these last.

 

Looks great. do you have any wall shots? Also where did you purchase them and for how much? Thanks in advance!


Bunthy

 

I will see if I can get you some wall shots this weekend provided it doesn't rain. When I was taking pictures on Sunday it was drizzling so I stopped. DSLR Camera sensors + water =

I bought them off ebay for $27 each? I have read that they last a while. Just search for HIR and they will come up.

Today during my drive to school it was raining heavily. I had a lot more visibility then compared to stock.

 

I have the OEM HID's but I bought these HIR lights for my yellow fogs and this is my favorite light upgrade that I have done so far (licences plates, trunk light, side markers, lower door panel, and rear seat reading lights with M4's......still waiting on my M16, M17 dome light and map lights). The HIR's really put out a lot of light and make the fog lights useful. Great bang for the buck!

I just used a flat file and a rounded file and only had to modify one tab on each HIR light to get them to fit in my 99 GS400. It took about 15-20 minutes to remove the old lights, file, and install the new HIR's.

 

Great write up man, great job

Glad you happy with them, i think they are the best alternative to HID's. and the BEST alternatives to stockers in fogs. I notice a big difference with them in my fogs... Not only better lighting in the front, but to the sides as well... makes it easier when taking turns in the dark.

 

what is the point of this thread with no pictures of these HIRs?
lets see what they look like guys

 

There are pictures. I have them hosted on my website You must not have read the entire post carefully.

You can see them here: CLICK HERE FOR PICTURES

I will try to take some pictures against a wall soon. It may not be for another couple weeks. The CL meet this upcoming weekend along with midterms; this has eaten my time for the moment.

There are some pictures against a backing on the first link in the thread.
They can be seen here

Thank you for the kind works GRAND_LS_4.
I have to agree with you. The increased light coming from the fog lights is incredible. My friend who I was driving behind thought my Hi Beams were on; what he actually saw were the low's and the fog lights. I have recently put my two extra bulbs on his low beams and the difference is like night and day.

BTW I have rewritten and reorgainzed my review into a semi-formal guide. I hope you like it.

 

Great post pingu, thanks for the detailed write-up!

I'm using HIRs myself - installed on my Land Cruiser to replace a burnt out low beam lamp. It does put out a whiter and brighter light when compared to stock. I know HIR's aren't that popular on CL (yet) but I'm sure they will be once people learn a thing or two. I'm gonna eventually replace the fogs lamps with HIRs as well, just need to get around to it.

The real benefit of HIR is that it puts out more light using the same power draw and doesn't burn out in 6 months like those "other" guys. You do need to make modify the housing as pingu posted, but a little effort is worth the results.

 

I've already gone the HID route for my low-beans, but I'm interested in this for the fog lights. Are there any yellow HIR bulbs?

 

I don't think there are any yellow hir's (not yet at least) but I did put hir 9011's in my oem yellow fog housings...

 

Looks good. I'm going to order the narva 9006 bulbs 1st. If I don't like 'em I'll have to spring for some yellow fog housings and HIRs

Are those stock HIDs and polarg M4s?

 

stock HIDs and 1 watt white leds (ebay)

 

Im still looking for a set of yellow housings. Yellow fogs have always appealed to my eye.