# 85W HIDs- are they that much different?



## warmurf (Jan 5, 2012)

Hi all,

I've got a 35W and 50W HID- love them both, but can't say the 50 is that much brighter than the 35W. For a while there I had my eye on the new 65W HIDs (more power-always!) but lost interest. I now see there are 85W HIDs! Now that's a fair jump up! So my question is how's anyone's experience with these? Are they say twice as bright as a 35W? Throw twice as much?? I know they're cheapies and really they're just play lights but as anyone knows who have them they're great fun for spotting and bush walks with the kids.

Would love to hear any opinions on these lights, especially comparisons.

Cheers all and Happy New Year.

Rick from Oss.:thumbsup:


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## Patriot (Jan 6, 2012)

Quality for quality, reflector for reflector, the 85W HID will produce more than twice the output of a 35W light. The throw, however better, will be far less than double.


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## 51coronet (Jan 17, 2012)

I have one but not another HID to compare to. It is brighter than all my other lights. I have a dry tripply xml that is said to be driven at 5amps. The DRY tripple XML is extremely bright for a small handheld light. However the HID on low blows away the dry on turbo, there is no comparison. Supposedly the DRY is in the realm of 2500 lumen on high, if this is the case the HID is easily double that out the front on low. 

No test equipment just what my eyes see. Definetely plenty of light for the price.


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## 2100 (Jan 18, 2012)

51coronet said:


> I have one but not another HID to compare to. It is brighter than all my other lights. I have a dry tripply xml that is said to be driven at 5amps. The DRY tripple XML is extremely bright for a small handheld light. However the HID on low blows away the dry on turbo, there is no comparison. Supposedly the DRY is in the realm of 2500 lumen on high, if this is the case the HID is easily double that out the front on low.
> 
> No test equipment just what my eyes see. Definetely plenty of light for the price.



Yes, the DRY 3*T6 is about 2500 lumens OTF, and this 85W HID probably touches 4000 lumens OTF. Throw is another matter, it should be able to touch 250k cd. (my 65W does 235k and another copy about 190k cd). That is from my meter, so it should be in the ballpark and not a wild guess.


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## RCantor (Jan 21, 2012)

The 85W is an 8000K bulb, the 75W and below are 6000K, if that matters to you.


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## warmurf (Jan 22, 2012)

Thanks guys- I'm convinced for the price to try. Just blew my flashlight cash on a TR-J12 5-LED XML, however a 85W HID is next on the shopping list. I have a 4.2A DRY and it's very impressive, so if the HID on low blows that away it must be a killer! Cheers again.


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## 51coronet (Jan 27, 2012)

warmurf said:


> Thanks guys- I'm convinced for the price to try. Just blew my flashlight cash on a TR-J12 5-LED XML, however a 85W HID is next on the shopping list. I have a 4.2A DRY and it's very impressive, so if the HID on low blows that away it must be a killer! Cheers again.



It is a killer and impressive for the price. One thing about the 85w I had ordered was the bulb flashing on then off then the battery pack goes completely dead with no response. Plugging the pack back into the charger was the only way to override/fix the protection circuit. Fortunetely this problem went away recently for me. The things that made it go away could be several but I will list them in case yours has the same issue, these steps might help.

I activated the strobe mode by holding the on button for 5 or so seconds when the light was on medium or high. I also rapidly pressed the on/off switch turning the light on and off rapidly. I opened up the battery pack, inspected it then closed it back up. Possible a wire was partialy shorting against the battery pack case (it's aluminum). I did these things the same day out of frustration with the light and not having any confidence away from a power source for the charger.
Now I have had no flash/dead light since then.


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## borgqueenx (Feb 2, 2012)

RCantor said:


> The 85W is an 8000K bulb, the 75W and below are 6000K, if that matters to you.



If the the color is all that changes....the 85w also comes with a bigger battery and longer runtime, on ebay.
Is the color all that changes?


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## scheven_architect (Feb 3, 2012)

Don't think the wattage has anything to do with color temperature.
I just ordered me a 85w HID flashlight and the seller confirmed it is 6000k.


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## borgqueenx (Feb 3, 2012)

What seller?
I cant find a 85w hid on ebay that has less then 8000k color temperature. There is one with 12000k lol.


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## scheven_architect (Feb 3, 2012)

http://www.aliexpress.com/product-f...7800mAh-Delivered-in-3-7days-wholesalers.html

contact seller leo, really helpful guy.
Ordered mine there gonna receive it next week.
They only have 6000k version but no other sellers offer other color temperatures anyway


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## scheven_architect (Feb 7, 2012)

Received my 85w today, so far not that impressed.
Ran it without reflector and lens next to my 150 lumen sipik zoom light also without reflector (about 100 degree beam). Even in high modus after 10 minutes the 85w wasn't that much more light than the sipik. Read some post of people saying it gets much brighter after using a few time so let's hope for it. As it is now i would estimate it rather a 28/35w HID and it would really surprise me if the light as it is now blows a tk70 away. But let's just hope it gets brighter or it's just a daylight mindfuck as i had with some other lights.

Delivery was very fast about 2 days only  to belgium, very helpful seller so far.

color temperature is about 5500k but shifts to 4500k seemingly randomly.


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## romteb (Feb 7, 2012)

You may have a dud, event the 65w version completely destroys the TK70, on the other hand my experience has been that it is extremely difficult to judge the output of any torch in daylight environnement.


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## scheven_architect (Feb 7, 2012)

well it's now completely dark here and i'm getting impressed. Compared my brightest single and triple xm-l's and they just get blown away. Now i can only hope this light gets better and better


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## scheven_architect (Feb 8, 2012)

Went out last night to test out how this light throws but even though this thread is about a 35w hid (chinese style so i guess = 'ebay' style), but i don't have the feeling my 85w puts out the same amount of light and it doesn't reach trees 400m away with that much light. Nor do i have the feeling the light is capable of this. Maybe these pictures are overexposed and giving me wrong expectations, i don't know. I didn't take beamshots myself.


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## romteb (Feb 8, 2012)

When the bulb is skewed or the bulb assembly not centered the throw is ruined, happened on mine.

I also suppose you know that by rotating the head you can adjust for throw.


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## scheven_architect (Feb 8, 2012)

Yes i know that, but i find the focussing very strange. I was expecting that one side of turning would be throw other more flood but it seems to be totally random and i wasn't expecting that you can almost keep turning the head, i thought it would be just a simple twist. Well the bulb seems to be off center so i guess i'm f***ed :s, it really has to be perfectly centered i guess?

problem now is taking a decent picture which shows the off-centered bulb, it's very very obvious when i look at it with 1 eye. Distance on 1 side between bulb and reflector is about 2-3 times more than on the opposite side


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## 2100 (Feb 9, 2012)

Bro, if it's off-center then there is really very little you can do. You cannot twist it so that it's straight up, you'll just break the quartz bottom. Maybe take a picture and send it to Leo and see what he says.


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## [email protected] (Feb 9, 2012)

Hi guys, yes 2100 is right. Just take a picture and send to supplier. Well quality control is not too good to be a fact because of the price factor. 

I had a similar issue but got a replacement as well. From I can see the best is 65w models.. Anything above will generate more heat and they do have a auto step down to a lower wattage when left running for a few minutes. I have both the 75w and 65w and prefer the latter. Hope this helps..


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## scheven_architect (Feb 10, 2012)

Well i've managed to perfectly center the bulb, although that doesn't give the best possible beamprofile (beam more concentrated in a lil' bit off center position, but good nevertheless). Hotspot about 5m in diameter at 15-20m, visible making the church in my town look brighter (bit like how full moon lights up stuff) at 350m in a urban environment (no hotspot visible anymore). No problems with stepdown atm because it's freezing here.

maybe i'll go to a industrial site tonight where i can light up some white buildings in pitch dark which should give me a better idea of focus/throw.


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