I meantioned in a blog entry during my cross-country drive that the headlamps on our long-term Camry are not powerful enough. Then I thought, perhaps I hadn't been fair with what is otherwise an excellent and surprisingly powerful automobile. Perhaps, I'd just become unusually crabby after my iPod battery gave up while I still had five hours of driving ahead of me (and no recharger on board). Possibly my brain, numb and underworked after all those miles was napping and not properly dealing with the data streaming across the ol' optical nerves...
But actually, no. The Camry's headlights are just dim--dim enough that I seem to be forever checking to see if my lights are even on. They are halogen lights, of course--a description that once meant high performance. No longer, apparently. A brief review of the options list for the Camry shows that HID headlamps are not available for any price. This is a shame. Rural customers would ceratinly get their money's worth out of upgrade lights. And unfortunately this is the sort of poor performance characteristic that a potential buyer is unlikely to notice during a brief test drive. Yet I consider good lights to be the first layer of safety. And, judging by the number of airbags and the available stability-control system Toyota has given the Camry, the company is serious about its safety.
One thing I noticed looking through the options package information: The sportier SE model (ours is a mid-range LE) comes with the same halogen lights but the light covers are smoked. That doesn't seem like such a bright idea.
Daniel Pund, Senior Editor, Detroit at 11,492
zach101 says:
06:41 PM, 01/25/07
When the lights are off, they seem like they are HIDs. If I had a car with weak halogens, I would probably buy a set of HID lights to replace them.
oldmanshirt says:
07:20 PM, 01/25/07
If you saw how much real HIDs actually cost (whether as factory options or aftermarket kits), you might think twice.
Also, I believe the SE lights are smoked only on the non-reflective surfaces of the headlight assembly. The lens is the same.
banhugh says:
09:24 PM, 01/25/07
Thanks for mentioning the headlights performance. I hate weakly lighted night driving. I recently rented a Chevy Aveo and even though its a cheap car, the lights were amazingly bright.
sodaguy says:
10:35 PM, 01/25/07
Are you going to post a full report when you take the Camry in for its overdue 10k service? Will you be posting fuel economy data from the trip?
kurtamaxxxguy says:
12:39 AM, 01/26/07
One thing I would love to know about this long term Camry is whether or not its power steering pump can keep up with rapid maneuvers. I recently participated in a face off between Camry and 2 other vehicles, and the Camry, when asked to fast maneuvers, momentarily "lost" its power steering during the rapid steering wheel turns (the others had no trouble).
carlisimo says:
12:44 AM, 01/26/07
Sweet, finally a car that won't blind me when I'm in front of it at night.
And that's interesting about the power steering pump, kurt. I've rarely seen complaints of that kind. The last was of the VW Golf R32 (strangely enough).
blueguydotcom says:
08:26 AM, 01/26/07
My last two cars came with xenon headlights. And I won't ever buy a car without HIDs because of that. Once you have them, you never want to go back to cruddy halogens.
cartester16 says:
08:26 AM, 01/26/07
They might be dim, but I'll bet they throw off plenty of glare like other Toyota vehicles, especially their trucks. I used to "commute" from LA to PHX, mostly overnight, and I will tell you Toyotas are the worst offenders when it comes to headlight glare. Same with most Japanese versions of HID. They seem to simply stick an HID bulb in the same poor reflector, and call it a day, while others do it right, with motorized self-leveling lenses. The Japanese still charge you the same $700-1000 though...
alpha01 says:
08:41 AM, 01/26/07
DP - great title to this post! kurtamaxxguy - Was that the Fusion/Accord/Camry face-off? I've seen the commercials for that and was jealous that I wasn't part of it! :) Seriously, the only thing that angered me was that the Camry they chose was the XLE, and not the more agressive and much more able SEs. I've not had the power steering issue in any Camrys I've driven... are you sure it was the pump losing its boost and not the effects of plowing + understeer, which can make the steering wheel difficult to manage? FWIW, Consumer Reports, which takes objective measurements on headlight projection/distance, rates the Camry "Average" in this regard. ~alpha
cz75 says:
10:32 AM, 01/26/07
Assuming this car uses a 4 bulb 9006/9005 high/low set-up, one can buy Harrison/Toshiba 9012 and 9011 bulbs at various sources on the internet. The 9012 low (only) is also available at John Deere dealers for around $10-12 each, rather than $25. GM does NOT sell a genuine 9011 for the Avalanche, so don't bother buying theirs.
These bulbs are, respectively, an 85% and 20%, increase over stock output, thanks to the Halogen Infrared (HIR) technology GE developed to make stock wattage bulbs perform like high wattage units. Each bulb requires around a minute to trim a single plastic tab on the base to fit in a 9006/9005 housing.
BMW owners w/o HID have been doing this for some time now and I've been doing it for three years in my own vehicle and will do so in my Civic Si:
http://www.bmwcca.org/members/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Let_There_Be_E36_Light&page=2
cz75 says:
10:39 AM, 01/26/07
http://www.edmunds.com/apps/vdpcontainers/do/vdp/articleId=109710/pageNumber=11
It would seem Edmunds' own editors thought the Camry had the best headlights between it and its competitors, so one wonders how badly they must suck.
lexisguy says:
01:50 PM, 01/26/07
DP- I can understand you getting used to the HID headlights, and the light output. I also have a hard time riding/driving a car without them, as my wife and I have them on both vehicles. Going backward is not easy. Thought the projector housing on the new Camry illuminates the road better than a non-projector halogen housing.
The smoke headlight assembly on the SE Camry is only referring to the jeweled area around the projector, no the lens itself. The light output is the same as on other trims.
carlisimo - A factory HID will not be blinding under regular weather conditions. When it rains the reflection can be bright, but this is what they have auto dimming mirrors for.
kurtamaxxxguy- I have never experienced the loss of power steering in the new Camry and I have driven several. Maybe this is something you experienced while driving on a enclosed course / test track (head to head)? The everyday driver will not experience this as the maneuvers on a ride and drive are unlike a daily experience.
Blueguydotcom- I agree with you, I will not buy another car without HID’s. I think all cars should have them and auto dimming mirrors standard.
carlisimo says:
02:28 PM, 01/26/07
lexisguy, most of the cars that I find blinding aren't using HIDs. There are some bad HIDs out there but overall, they're fine when the roads are flat.
I wish side view mirrors had dimming capabilities, and that my car had auto dimming.
blueguydotcom says:
03:09 PM, 01/26/07
No thanks to auto-dimming mirrors. I drove a friend's BMW with them and found they make the world too dark at night. I'll take the occasional glare over blind mirrors anyday. I can always accelerate away from the annoying folks in pickups and such with blinding lights (non-standard and usually tinted a ridiculous shade of blue).
playdrv4me says:
01:58 PM, 01/28/07
cartester16 - It would be impossible for ANY car manufacturer to as you put it... "simply throw the HID bubs into the same stock halogen housing". I can tell you if they even thought of trying that, they could kiss DOT certification goodbye.
HID headlights, particularly the reflectorized ones, have computer modeled assemblies which are designed to make the most use of the beam pattern and intensity of the HID bulb (gas burner). It is designed to not only properly and distinctly light specific portion of the road ahead, but also to not blind oncoming drivers. Despite all the whining and complaints of people who claim Xenon headlamps are an annoyance and blind them, the truth is that unless the vehicle is cresting over a hill infront of you, or on bad terrain, you should actually experience LESS or equivocal glare from a Xenon unit, as you would on a halogen assembly.
That also addresses another posters comment above. Even though they sell kits to do it, it is ILLEGAL and dangerous to swap HID burners into a traditional Halogen housing. It creates nothing but the "look" of HID, and in most cases provides little useful illumination to the driver, while blinding oncoming traffic needlessly.
I will pass up cars without Xenons when searching for a particular model, if a differently optioned version exists with that option. In cars that had the option added in LATER years, I will search out ebay to find the complete assemblies with the burner from a car that HAD the HID option if i can, to retrofit them into the older model which did not have them. Cost is simply not an issue when it comes to xenon lights, to me they are the only vehicle add-on that is worthwhile at just about any price.