Yeah, its getting very old. Piaa started the nonsense years ago,and everyone has jumped on the bandwagon.
I don't agree. PIAA's spiel was more in terms of bogus wattage equivalence claims ("55w = 85w", "55w = 120w", etc.). I don't waste my time paying close attention to PIAA or other toy companies, but as far as I'm aware they don't use the +nn% figures, which are
not bogus when used straightforwardly. Fact is, there are bulbs that can and do improve the beam performance of a headlamp by +nn%. The key to understanding this is that it's
not a claim that the bulb itself produces +nn% more light. That wouldn't be possible, because the applicable regulations constrain luminous flux variance typically to ±15% (depending on bulb type; some have tighter tolerances than others). The improvement is achieved with more precise filament focus, more compact filament coil, higher filament luminance and other bulb construction techniques. But you do have to be careful, because some marketers (Sylvania is the only one that comes to mind at the moment; there may be others) use BS shell game tactics to jigger the numbers. The Sylvania Silver Star is marketed with claims of nn% longer seeing distance, xx% wider beam, yy% whiter light, etc. If you read the (very tiny) fine print, you see they're comparing a
new Silver Star bulb to an old regular bulb operated at 80% of rated value. That's just plain dishonesty, right there.
If the manufacturer doesnt list actual output figures{lumens},I dont even give the bulb a second look.
That must make it difficult to obtain headlight bulbs you consider satisfactory; actual lumen data can be quite difficult to get for most of the bulbs on the market. Most of the "data" provided is just the regulated nominal figure, not the actual output of the specific bulb at hand.
