Trying Nightbreaker 220 Halogen H4s in my 450SLC
Recently one of the halogen headlight bulbs in my 450SLC went out. While the light is pretty good, I thought it was an opportunity to see if I could get some kind of improvement. I use the 450SLC quite a lot for night drives, so a bit more light would be welcome.
To achieve this, I really had three options:
- Replace the reflectors
- Upgrade to higher wattage bulbs
- Upgrade to more effective bulbs at the same wattage
Realistically option 1 is probably going to make the biggest difference, but is very expensive. My reflectors are in pretty good shape. Option 2 is probably the next best, but since all the current goes through the headlight switch, is only advisable if I were to re-wire the headlights with separate relays. This is a good thing to do, and probably worth it, but is more time consuming.
Therefore, since I was replacing the bulb anyway, I decided to try a more effective 60/55W H4. The Osram Nightbreaker 220 is advertised as doing this. It’s quite a bit more expensive than a regular H4 bulb, but since I had to replace one, I decided to give them a try.
There are also LED kits, but these involve modifying the light, which I didn’t want to do.
Bulb replacement on the 107 is a bit of a pain, as the trim beneath the headlight must come off, then the entire headlight assembly is removed. The trim slides down inside the bumper bar, so once you know that trick its not difficult to get the headlights out.
I re-installed the bulb, tested it and then finished putting the trim back on. So I could do a proper comparison, I only changed the side that was blown. It is very difficult to show the difference in photographs, but the Nightbreaker 220 is brighter. The light is whiter too, but not that terrible blue tinge that cheap bulbs get.
I drove home and I could certainly tell the difference. I would estimate it to be around 10-20% more effective. Is it worth it, given the bulbs were about $27 each? Not sure, I’ll have to do a night drive with them in. So far, it seems like its worth it if you’re replacing a bulb anyway.
