Plug n play headlight harness upgrade

HWYCRZR said:
The wall alignment works pretty well if you have the distance and a flat space.
The white garage doors at work may or may not have some marks at strategic positions.
I also found a Hoppy headlight aiming kit on E-bay about 2 years ago. With shipping they ranged from $75 -$150.
Great kit and fun to play with.
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Thx++ 4 mentioning the Hoppy kit. Will investigate. This thread so inspired me that I went out this morning and carefully removed the harness from the wrecked '66. Amazingly enough, all 4 headlights came out intact, though the 2 on the impact side had their tabs bent. All the ceramic sockets are good too. :) So, after installing the relays and harness on our 68, I'll again have the joy of flooding the streets with the lovely reddish white light wisely approved by the DOT back when that good Feddy Bureau had some teeth.

The nice thing about fat conductors is that with low voltage, one needs extra ampacity far more than at higher potential. I used fine stranded audio grade #10 for this little job, w audio grade 1/4" female terminals in the ceramic sockets. The one addition I'll use this time will be conductive grease on the headlight tabs. Despite the likely viability of the salvaged lamps, I have plenty of them from a SUPER eBay score some years ago, and will use brand new 50-something yr old lamps.

Headlights are the ONLY thing I leave with Old School farmboy lighting, because of that DOT spec enforced then. I don't personally NEED headlights most of the time to SEE, except in truly Stygian gloom. But its usually GOOD to be SEEN by the reckless fools I must share the asphalt with, ergo....
 
The name is Bond.....James Bond
merge_from_ofoct.jpg
 
Thanks Cbarge, timely post as I am just getting to that point in my restoration, I thought that replacing reg bulbs to comperable LED lights in the tail would be a strait swap, is it different in the tail lights?
Former owner used relays at the front to get the low beams lights to mimic signal lights with yellow bulbs, he had chopped all the lighting harness and I have since returned it to it's original state.
Former owner had aspirations to make the Polara look like a Challenger.
 
polaratherapy said:
Thanks Cbarge, timely post as I am just getting to that point in my restoration, I thought that replacing reg bulbs to comperable LED lights in the tail would be a strait swap, is it different in the tail lights?
Former owner used relays at the front to get the low beams lights to mimic signal lights with yellow bulbs, he had chopped all the lighting harness and I have since returned it to it's original state.
Former owner had aspirations to make the Polara look like a Challenger.
Click to expand...
The rear lighting is straight forward.
Read my thread on this subject:
Exterior LED lighting upgrade
 
Just want to mention the kit I use is for a 2 lamp system but works just fine in cars with 4 lamps.
There are 4 lamp kits out there but personally find it not necessary as the 2 lamp kit serves the same purpose.
 
cbarge said:
What I like about the Hella housings is they look "stock" compared to the LED or Halo offerings. But to each their own.
At the right angle you can see the blue tinge of the PIAA Extreme bulbs. Sometimes you dont see it..

View attachment 546791

View attachment 546792
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Which Hella housing did you use to make it looks more like stock headlights? Do you have a part number for them? Was there any modifications you needed to do to the light buckets to make them fit?


-Gregg B.
 
Gregg Benedict said:
Which Hella housing did you use to make it looks more like stock headlights? Do you have a part number for them? Was there any modifications you needed to do to the light buckets to make them fit?


-Gregg B.
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Boxes buried in rhe shed and cannot remember the part number.
But I did order the conversion kit that included 2 housings with bulbs.
No modifications needed to fit in our old cars.
Go back to my first page you can see the back of the bulb fits through the bucket no problem.
Hella designed their conversion lamps to fit in old cars.
Cheers.
 
cbarge said:
Boxes buried in rhe shed and cannot remember the part number.
But I did order the conversion kit that included 2 housings with bulbs.
No modifications needed to fit in our old cars.
Go back to my first page you can see the back of the bulb fits through the bucket no problem.
Hella designed their conversion lamps to fit in old cars.
Cheers.
Click to expand...
Yeah... by looking at Amazon, there are like 6 different 5 3/4 housings that Hella makes for the H4. All of them look the same from the front, and none of the dimensions are given on the rear measurements for clearance, etc. The Hella website doesn't even show anything in their catalog for retro-fitting H4 halogens. I'm not sure where to go from here...

-Gregg B.
 
Gregg Benedict said:
Yeah... by looking at Amazon, there are like 6 different 5 3/4 housings that Hella makes for the H4. All of them look the same from the front, and none of the dimensions are given on the rear measurements for clearance, etc. The Hella website doesn't even show anything in their catalog for retro-fitting H4 halogens. I'm not sure where to go from here...

-Gregg B.
Click to expand...
Will look it up and pm you.
 
I liked my home-rolled harness and still do. #10 audio grade wire for good ampacity and surface area at contact points, ceramic sockets, gold plated terminals, Tycho-Bosch relays, 1.25" x .25" glass fuse holder with breakers meant to plug into those now, w relays controlled from the old headlamp sockets, and brand new, NOS Westinghouse incandescent lamps powered from that fat wire off the battery all make a nice, DOT* approved lighting system that provides plenty light at a spectrum optimal for human retinae at night.

While I love LEDs for all the signal and marker lights, I'm not impressed with what has been done with them for main headlamps. They're too blue shifted, too bright, too expensive. When folks develop an LED headlamp that lights EFFICIENTLY at the old luminosity and spectrum devised as best for night driving 50+ yrs ago, using a fraction of the current these modenr monstrosities use, then I'll buy some.

*Back when the DOT had some legal force behind it. Now, these gutted, toothless agencies just adorn the corporate crap sold to the masses
 
I loathe the new headlights - their brightness and intensity is painful, and 90% of the time they're not aligned properly. The aftermarket upgrade ones are the WORST. People don't know how to install them properly, and for oncoming traffic it's actually dangerous.
 
Ross Wooldridge said:
I loathe the new headlights - their brightness and intensity is painful, and 90% of the time they're not aligned properly. The aftermarket upgrade ones are the WORST. People don't know how to install them properly, and for oncoming traffic it's actually dangerous.
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Couldn't have expressed myself any better. Of course, excepting a couple companies, the rest of the new stuff all gets excreted by asiatic crapitalists. Worst of all though are the BUYERS! You're SOOO RIGHT that these FOOLS don't know the 1st thing about how to aim and align their headlights, and will never be competent to do so, as this involves geometry and the ability to read a yard stick. So, they careen around the roads at night, blasting electronic tom-toms while toking up their Primo-Blunts and swilling Buttwiper Ultra Blite soda-beer, and blinding all oncomers or even folk in front of them via rear view mirrors.

Ah, but lasers are cheap....... :)
 
I despise driving at night, and it's all about the absurd lighting on vehicles! I really need to upgrade both the Coronet and the Imperial, because its like driving in a cave with the old lighting on both. I might find the need to illuminate a gnat's *** at 500 yards sometime.
 
Gerald has a way with words! Probably 40 years ago I found a pair of halogen sealed beams. They are hi-beams for the four lamp system. I had them on my 64 Fargo, and now on the Fury. They are great for my driving. They light the road without being hazardous. I just wish I could find the lo-beams to match. Lindsay
 
patrick66 said:
I despise driving at night, and it's all about the absurd lighting on vehicles! I really need to upgrade both the Coronet and the Imperial, because its like driving in a cave with the old lighting on both. I might find the need to illuminate a gnat's *** at 500 yards sometime.
Click to expand...

I actually LOVE night driving, on country roads or even the Interstate, once its clear of der arschlochers. Just 2 daze ago, I finally installed 4 little blue LED lamps pointing down from the dash skirt or above the ashtray in our '83 Dodge D150, NICELY illuminating the lower interior without spoiling my night eyes above. Admittedly, the old instrument lamps are yet incandescent, but I already have LED 194s in some quantity, and plan to obtain green ones for the instrument panels on both of our Old Mopars. All my added gauges save one in each vehicle have LED lamps, bayonet based little ones which also serve as side markers for Trudi. I use truly BRIGHT ones from superbrightleds.com, which give the sidemarkers roughly equivalent luminosity with the front fog/turn signal lamps, or the rear brake/turn signal lamps. With the colored lenses clean, these shed good light without blinding anyone, as they should!

I recently installed my relay harness on Trudi, along with brand new, 50+ yr old Everready/Westinghouse 4000/4001 sealed beam incandescents, and plan to make a similar harness for the D150, with its 600X halogen lamps. I like their light well enough, and think with good conductors feeding direct from the charging terminal on the battery, they'll shine all the light I could want.

I keep searching for EFFICIENT LED headlamps which use LOW POWER, instead of ridiculous high, BLINDING LIGHT AND POWER, but people have been conditioned like Skinner rats and Pavlov's pooches to buy stupid, dangerous ****.

Domine Deus, miserere nobis.
 
Gerald Morris said:
I actually LOVE night driving, on country roads or even the Interstate, once its clear of der arschlochers. Just 2 daze ago, I finally installed 4 little blue LED lamps pointing down from the dash skirt or above the ashtray in our '83 Dodge D150, NICELY illuminating the lower interior without spoiling my night eyes above. Admittedly, the old instrument lamps are yet incandescent, but I already have LED 194s in some quantity, and plan to obtain green ones for the instrument panels on both of our Old Mopars. All my added gauges save one in each vehicle have LED lamps, bayonet based little ones which also serve as side markers for Trudi. I use truly BRIGHT ones from superbrightleds.com, which give the sidemarkers roughly equivalent luminosity with the front fog/turn signal lamps, or the rear brake/turn signal lamps. With the colored lenses clean, these shed good light without blinding anyone, as they should!

I recently installed my relay harness on Trudi, along with brand new, 50+ yr old Everready/Westinghouse 4000/4001 sealed beam incandescents, and plan to make a similar harness for the D150, with its 600X halogen lamps. I like their light well enough, and think with good conductors feeding direct from the charging terminal on the battery, they'll shine all the light I could want.

I keep searching for EFFICIENT LED headlamps which use LOW POWER, instead of ridiculous high, BLINDING LIGHT AND POWER, but people have been conditioned like Skinner rats and Pavlov's pooches to buy stupid, dangerous ****.

Domine Deus, miserere nobis.
Click to expand...
A gent who was in the same car club that I was, had a Datsun 510 that he slalom raced. He installed aircraft landing lights in the high beam spots. Talk about an illuminating experience!
 
Many thanks to Wyatt as he did a video on the harness and H4 bulbs on his 71Polara 2door.
He uses Octane bulbs and are very bright!
As for the " clocking" of the left high beam..same issue I have with the Hella H1's so it may be a car thing?
Linky:
 
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