What happends if I insert a brighter halogen bulb into an older headlamp?
Let’s say you wanted to buy the American Silverstar that has 20% advertised gain. Fact is that the 20% increase can only be achieved if headlamp is new. As an example, let us say that headlamp is 6 years old with plastic front glass. It has 100 000 miles (or 160 000km) so it will probably have high general pitting of front glass. That will lower the actual output on the road with maybe 40%. Then the 20% advertised increase will be reduced by 40%, and you end up with 12% increase. That’s when you really wonder if it is worth putting in any new bulb at all… A difference by 12% is hardly noticable.
