Having got the engine happy and purring, I took the bike to work on the couple of dry days we had last week, the trips in were glorious but the trips home ? Not so good.
The journey is a mix of A roads, unlight lanes, and motorways.

Day one: Thursday
Hitting the 1st unlight lane, I realised that this was my 1st time on this bike in the dark.
Darkness + dim headlights =  very slow speeds.

Had a look at the bulbs when I got back and they were past their best - considerably past.

Called in at Halfords, left £20 lighter, changed the bulbs for “Halfords Advanced White” ones.


Day 2: Friday

Slight improvement, like max speed 40 on unlight roads, rather than 30, but still scary and still losing the road after every 4x4 with twin white dwarf stars fitted to the front goes past - ( Why are they allowed to have their lights fitted 3ft higher than normal cars ?).

Saturday:
Research alternates to Std Halogens - Lots of reading

 Phillips night breakers:
 -  Canbus compatible.
 -  Brightness OK, but load wiring and burn out quickly.
 -  Potential heat damage to reflector/housing
 -  Old bike = possible dodgy wiring 

 HID’s:
 -  Excellent, but expensive-ish for good quality canbus compatible.
 -  Difficult to install all the paraphernalia on a bike, ballast etc.
 -  High beam and flash function compromised with start up speed.

LED’s:
 -  Can be expensive for good ones
 -  Possible canbus issues
 -  Can have weird light patterns.
 -  Possible cooling problems if not enough room behind dust cover.


After absorbing as much as I could, I made a list of the pros and cons and came to the conclusion that the optimum solution would be HID for dipped beam and LED or Nightbreakers for high beam.

Unfortunately, nowhere seems to sell single units, well, not ones that get good reviews anyway, so - a compromise solution would seem to be LED’s rather than pay for 2 complete sets of HID and LED bulbs.

Found a set of well reviewed LED’s on Amazon, and the price was not much more than the Halfords “Advanced”.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07QXB6SW7/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

These are canbus compatible, have 180 degree rotation to optimise the light pattern, they (just) fit under the dust covers, and for £25.99 next day delivery they looked like a good deal.

The lights arrived at about 10 o'clock - impressive, I ordered them about 12 hours previous to that. Gotta love Amazon.

The only problem I had, was leaving the headlamp unit in place whilst trying to fit them.
Then I realised there were only 2 bolts holding the headlight on and 2 plugs in the back of the unit !!!  <Doh!!> 

I found it best to route the LED tail connector and the cable for the dipped beam, into the space behind the main beam reflector. This left a little more space behind the dust cover on the dipped beam.

I also used a dash of GT85 on the mating faces of the dust covers, this reduced the amount of calories required to get them off and on

Remounted the headlight, screwed it in - then found 2 grommets on the floor under the bike 

Unmounted the headlight - found where the grommets lived - another dash of GT85 on the guide poles that go through the grommets aaaand done.

Started the engine - the lower half of the (dark brown) rear wall of the shed partially blinded me with the reflection from the rough wood. 
The cut off was nice and clear with the “bulb” in the vertical position, ie. the LED’s  pointing sideways.

I’m VERY glad that I don’t have a white or concrete wall.

Tried main beam - yup - predictably bright.

Took bike out and found an unlight road - hmm - why would you need streetlights - like riding in the daytime.

So - yes, I can now ride at a comfortable speed in the dark.



Cheers

Dave