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[Varche]

Sorry to sound thick (or stuck in the seventies)

My car has xenon lights which I think are great. Now what I would like to know is what are projector lights, HID and so on?

Can anyone give me a simple description or a link to a web site that does?

The reason for asking is I found some headlight beam deflectors I bought before I found out about the wonderful flick levers at the back of my lights. They said diagram 13 was correct for my car but only listed omegas from 97(post face lift?) onwards. If your car isn't listed use diagram s A to E. None of those seemed to fit the bill!  Just curious now.

olive

[sounds2k]

the original lights were reflectors - with the ribbed lenses - they're poor, but made better with 50% brighter bulbs
the mini-facelift brought in new lights - halogen projectors and the Xenon HIDs - both types have a clear lens and what looks like a glass golfball for the dipped beam. Both of these were carried over to the facelift model, but I think the design of the outer case changed slightly - eg, mini-facelift HIDs have a washer pump & nozzle fixed to the underside of the headlight itself, whereas on the facelift there's a fixed nozzle mounted into the front bumper.

Xenon HIDs are a much better type of light than normal halogen bulbs (or even normal bulbs that are filled with xenon gas, sometimes (often) advertised as "xenon bulbs" - these are NOT the same as HIDs. The easiest way to spot HIDs is to turn them on, they flicker on then come up to full brightness - much like a flourescent light does, as they use a similar method of operation ... normal halogen or "xenon" bulbs just switch on like a standard light bulb.

The facelift models came in around 2000, 1997 is mini-facelift ...

[TheBoy]

And the projectors and hids have to continental adjustment levers....