Will it have HID's?

I hope so.

Perhaps on the more upscale Cobra come 2006. I doubt we'll see them on the GT, even as an option.

HairyCanary said:

I sure hope it doesn't. I don't care if it's an option, but I don't want them on mine. Yuk.

Dave

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I sure hope they are! Not sure what you don't like about them, I mean beyond being much brighter and a far better color spectrum...

course not, even though almost every new car gets em

HID's are still pretty pricey. They involve the addition of a ballast and igniter which drives the price up. I'm pretty sure the Fed's have also mandated self levelling for '05. I think on other cars that offer them as an option they still run about $500-$1000. If you see them, they would probably be optional.

rhumbline said:

I sure hope they are! Not sure what you don't like about them, I mean beyond being much brighter and a far better color spectrum...

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Yes, they're much brighter. That is the problem. HID headlights are almost as bright on low beam to oncoming traffic as halogens are on high beam. It's just ridiculous. If they could figure out how to aim them properly, that would be a different story. But I have yet to see an HID on the road (factory or not) that wasn't much brighter than halogen.

Dave

Well the SVT focus has HID so it should be standard on the 06 cobra imo

HairyCanary said:

Yes, they're much brighter. That is the problem. HID headlights are almost as bright on low beam to oncoming traffic as halogens are on high beam. It's just ridiculous. If they could figure out how to aim them properly, that would be a different story. But I have yet to see an HID on the road (factory or not) that wasn't much brighter than halogen.

Dave

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This is the reason the fed's have mandated self levelling. Some congressmans wife got blinded on the way home by a car with HID headlights that were aimed too high.

HairyCanary said:

Yes, they're much brighter. That is the problem. HID headlights are almost as bright on low beam to oncoming traffic as halogens are on high beam. It's just ridiculous. If they could figure out how to aim them properly, that would be a different story. But I have yet to see an HID on the road (factory or not) that wasn't much brighter than halogen.

Dave

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As you touch on, the real factor is not the brightness of the HID's per se, but rather, the poor optics of many designs, which is bad in general regardless of how bright the bulbs might be.

Simply reverting to dull lighting seems to be approaching the problem from the wrong direction, rather, I'd prefer the optical quality of the lighting system be brought up to par.

An HID system with very good optics, now thats the ticket to good, safe night driving.

will it?....

no way

smart $ says no

hids are a luxury gimmick. they're better because they're brighter. duh. unfortunately this brightness blinds oncoming traffic. i have yet to see a hid system that just did not plain annoy me in traffic.

holler said:

hids are a luxury gimmick. they're better because they're brighter. duh. unfortunately this brightness blinds oncoming traffic. i have yet to see a hid system that just did not plain annoy me in traffic.

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Yep, I read it takes old people's retinas something like 20-30 seconds to readjust after being blasted by these things. You don't need that kind of visability at legal speeds on most urban and suburban roads anyway.

I'm sure the lights will be an option, they are an option on the focus, not having them on the GT would be idiotic.

holler said:

hids are a luxury gimmick. they're better because they're brighter. duh. unfortunately this brightness blinds oncoming traffic. i have yet to see a hid system that just did not plain annoy me in traffic.

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I certainly wouldn't call them a luxury gimmick, good bright healights being critical to night driving, especially high performance night driving. As I noted however, bright headlights alone are only part of the equation and just as important are excellent optics and lensing to properly focus the light on the road and away from oncoming drivers. This becomes all the more important with brighter lights such as HIDs which, if matched to poor optics, can blind oncoming drivers. But ideally, properly designed HIDs are the way to go.