Couple of lighting questions

[Highlander]

I have replaced my standard lamp with a xenon one of the same wattage, which made a significant difference, but the light is still not particuarly good.

Would replacing my lens / reflector with one of the modern clear ones (rather than the older lined glass that I have) make a significant improvement?

Has anyone here gone down the path of fitting extra ligths (as in spots / driving lights). From the LTSA info I see you can have one additional light. What have you found?

Other suggestions for upgrading my lighting.....

[What?]

I think your bike has the standard trapezoidal-pattern headlight unit that Honda have been using since about 1980. Try a 100/90W bulb - that's what I've had in my 1100 for the last 20-odd years, and it's a huge improvement. Many of the newer headlights have plastic reflectors/lenses, which give good patterns, but may melt if bigger wattage bulbs are used.
And buy a good quality (i.e. German) bulb - the Chinese cheapo's are crap.

[Blackbird]

What's suggestion is spot on for your bike - that's exactly what I did with my BMW K100RS. I'm not sure about your wiring circuit and alternator though, might pay to stick a relay in. I got our local auto sparky to do mine just to be on the safe side and it wasn't an expensive mod.

[Pancakes]

Partmaster do Narva 130/90W bulbs which are ok price and quality. I did a relay for my bike here, would be happy to do you one or show you how for the price of the parts. They help make your switches last longer and the bulbs brighter. Hella quotes the figure 1V drop = a third less light. Thats lots of light lost just to warm up your wiring!

Here's photo's of the relay I did. http://www.kiwibiker.co.nz/forums/sh...ad.php?t=51912 (from post #10).

[Highlander]

Got a 100 / 90 lamp to put in, will give that a shot and put in a relay before I go too far.

[Max Preload]

Hella quotes the figure 1V drop = a third less light. Thats lots of light lost just to warm up your wiring!

And bikes are miserably under wired. I put a 'Narva +50' bulb in my bike - same current draw (same wattage) but 50% more light output (so logically probably also cooler running, which can't do any harm either).

[FROSTY:Me]

If your headlight is the same age as your bike I'd suggest buying a headlight from a naked SV650 or a gs500 /bandit600 naked etc etc -doesn't need to be suzuki just 7 inch and almost new
Then fit the 130/90 with a relay
Basicly theres a really good reason the driving lights on rally cars are round -best light spread

[Pancakes]

Yeah I agree w/ Frosty. A shit reflector will just make more light in less than ideal places. Having good shape and low cutoff will be a vast improvement and as Frosty has said there are tons of good designs around. I would probably go as far as saying that alot of the round naked ones have had more thought put into their design than the ones from faired bikes.

[Highlander]

If your headlight is the same age as your bike I'd suggest buying a headlight from a naked SV650 or a gs500 /bandit600 naked etc etc -doesn't need to be suzuki just 7 inch and almost new
Then fit the 130/90 with a relay
Basicly theres a really good reason the driving lights on rally cars are round -best light spread

Thanks for that was thinking along those lines too. Worthy of further investigation at least.

Cheers Guys.