Poor Low beams WHII

[ILLaViTaR]

Hey guys I'm currently driving a WHII statesman. Good car except the low beams are awfully poor. There's no yellowing of the lenses or anything like that, adjustment is fine etc.

I noticed the lights have a chrome bowl/reflector thing in them that reflects the light back towards the main lens. Can these be removed? They're held in by a single screw which I removed but I still can't get them out of the headlight as they're bigger than the hole.

My plan was to remove them and polish them up, hoping they'll reflect more light back onto the main lens

 

[RiffRaffMama]

I have a VX Berlina and I also have this exact problem. It has been an uphill battle to find a way to get more light out of my low beams and so far I have had little success.
I too, tried to remove the stupid reflector things, because I can see that the chrome inside them has crackled off and so there's nothing there to function as a reflective surface anymore, but I met the same problem you did - you can unscrew them, but you can't get them out through the hole in one piece. I have genuinely considered just breaking them, but I'm concerned the lights might not be angled right without the stupid thing covering them.
I don't know about your lights, but I assume they're the same as mine in that they have an "extra" globe, like there's the normal H4 high/low globe that everyone has and there's the park globe, but then there's another globe again that comes on with the low beams. (You wouldn't believe the argument I had with my husband one night when he was telling me I was an idiot and that I must be mistaking the park light for the low beam globe and there was NO extra globe... was worth it for the "Oh. Wow. There is an extra one..." moment when I took him outside and he actually looked. Drives a VZ Acclaim and thinks he knows everyth...) Anyway, I've tried a variety of different globes and have found that replacing the "extra" one with a good LED helps a little. You can buy them at Supercheap for I think it was $15 a pair. Make sure you get the right ones - there's similar ones that look better and even have the same base, but they're too big for the space they have to sit.
It was suggested to me that I splash out on some exorbitantly expensive high/low globes, but honestly, I'm not convinced they would make much of a difference if the stupid non-reflective reflector obstacle is still in the way and I guarantee that 3 days after I install $120 worth of globes, a f*cking roo will throw itself in front of me and take my headlights out.
I've even had a lengthy discussion on here about just how illegal it is to install driving lights that come on whenever your lights are on, not just when you hit your highs like they're "meant" to. The general consensus was that it is very illegal and the Highway Patrol would be delighted if I did that, because there's only so many times a month they can pull me over for a "random licence check" before it starts to look like they're stalking me, and to be honest, that is pretty much the only thing stopping me.
I wish I had better advice for you. You should get a 20% improvement with an LED "extra" globe, but I'm yet to find a decent solution that doesn't make passengers say "are your lights even on???" when they're in my car at night.

 

[Ginger Beer]

I upgraded all globes with Narva in my VX SS

H4 Plus 150 for the low beam (comes with parkers) and H1
intense for high beam

These work extremely well, basically a night and day difference.....pun intended, and are all the same colour of "white"

 

[ILLaViTaR]

Cheers yeah I can't get the reflectors out without breaking them. The reflectors look 2 piece as in the stalk for the screw might be able to be removed from the reflector bowl itself (there's 2 metal tabs), but I was worried about it falling into the headlight if I tried that. I would've liked to remove them & polish the inner surface or simply not use them, my previous Falcons never had them, but I'm assuming the headlight design requires them to be used.

I'll try those Plus 150's hopefully they make the difference. Doesn't feel right running them with a dud reflector but if they do the job it would save a lot of stuffing around! Is the inner surface of those reflector things supposed to be chromed? The outside of mine are chrome but yeah the inner surface where the light reflects off is very dull, looks like a powdered/matt plastic, no evidence of chrome peeling off though

 

[lout]

i would not use narva globes if you paid me to use them
buy phillips
https://www.philips.com.au/c-p/12258XVPS2/x-tremevision-plus-headlight-bulb

 

[RiffRaffMama]

Is the inner surface of those reflector things supposed to be chromed?

I just assumed they were meant to be. Mine looked dusty, like baked plastic dusty, not dirt dusty. It's been a few months since I looked, but I swear I remember there being flaky bits of chrome on the inner surface. If I could get them out I would buy some good "mirror finish" type chrome paint and paint the insides of them, because it seems like the obvious thing to do. Why would they cover the globes unless it was with something to reflect the light back to where it can be magnified against the big reflector surface? Like, it makes sense - any light that is projected from the front of your lights does very little in terms of lighting anything up - no globes of any kind project far or wide, globes are just electrically powered candles when it comes down to it. That's where the big reflector surface comes in - it's made with angles and tiny dimples to magnify the available light and project it in different directions than the globe is physically capable of doing, multiplying its output exponentially. Brilliant concept. An extension of that would be to throw some smaller reflectors in front of the globes to "capture" some of the wasted light and throw it to the big reflector surface to multiply the available light to magnify and reflect. Great in theory until 23 years later and people are still relying on these little reflectors to improve lighting conditions, not make them worse, but they weren't manufactured with a reliability and longevity to match the car they're attached to... and here we are.
I'm hanging to know whether you've gone for some pricey new globes and what the result has been, because I've never come across somebody else with the exact same problem for the exact same reason.