Lighting Upgrades

[Gary Lewis]

David - Good to know that the Hellas are working for you.  I've run Hellas for many years on things from motorcycles to Chevy vans w/o problems, so it doesn't surprise me that they worked for you.  Thanks for that input.

Rembrant - I hadn't realized that the Canadian Bullnose trucks have DRL's, but that makes sense.  So, it might not be difficult to implement it on the State-side ones.  But, given that the module also gives the blinking side marker light I think I'll go that way.  Except, Ray sent me the DRL module for the '96 from which he took the harness I'm going to use on Dad's truck, so maybe I'll go that way.

Anyway, I do think it is a good-to-have safety feature.

[PetesPonies]

Add me to the list of one's that don't care for stuff like that, DRL. To me, it's Big Brother getting in my business.

[Gary Lewis]

Every once in a while Big Brother comes up with good things.  And DRL's might be on that list.  I know that when I rode motorcycles I created a module to run the turn signals all the time to provide more safety, long before the industry did that.  So why not on our trucks?

[PetesPonies]

Just me, I like to control the systems . . it's called DRIVING  :) I don't want to be told to put on a seatbelt. I don't want a noise to tell me something is behind me. I don't need anyone or anything to park for me. I don't need to be told I'm about to hit something, etc. I like the complete driving experience. If the manus want to make a switch so you can use this option or decide to turn it off . . . .  I'd be fine with that. Don't leave me no choice.

[1986F150Six]

Dyn Blin wrote

What bulb do you use?

The original Hella supplied bulbs are going strong after several years. I believe it would be this one: https://www.amazon.com/HELLA-H4-Standard-Halogen-Bulb/dp/B00IKM61MQ/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1515080718&sr=8-1-fkmr1&keywords=Hella+6054+DOT

[Rembrant]

Gary Lewis wrote

Rembrant - I hadn't realized that the Canadian Bullnose trucks have DRL's, but that makes sense.

Well, I guess I should clarify...my headlights are on as long as the truck is on...but maybe my headlight switch is broken...lol. I checked Google, and it looks like DRL's weren't mandated in Canada until December 1989. Now, perhaps Ford was installing them voluntarily prior to that, but who knows.

I have the full factory manual for my truck (PDF on CD), but I'm not sure if there's a wiring diagram in there or not. I must take a look.

[Gary Lewis]

I don't see anything in the '86 EVTM about DRL's, and the headlights don't look like they are supposed to be on all of the time.

[Rembrant]

Gary Lewis wrote

I don't see anything in the '86 EVTM about DRL's, and the headlights don't look like they are supposed to be on all of the time.

I will have a look at the switch and wiring and comment on how it's wired later. It may not have DRL's, but rather a bad switch or a modification from the previous owner...who knows. All I know is that the lights are on when the truck is on, and I can't turn them off;).

[Gary Lewis]

Headlight wiring shows in Electrical/EVTM/1981 EVTM/Headlights.  The reason to use the 1981 EVTM is because in 86 Ford dropped the dots and hash marks.  So the 1981 should be used for your '84.

[kramttocs]

Interesting thread. Glad you recently referenced it Gary.

Gary Lewis wrote

But, given that the module also gives the blinking side marker light I think I'll go that way.  

 
Does it? After seeing the side marker and drl page both reference the same module (DRL-1) I assumed you could use one for both purposes but I haven't drawn out the diagrams to see where they overlap. Hard to flip between the two pages on my phone.
If it does and there is no need to buy two, that makes it a lot more tempting.

Wrong thread from where you referenced them, but please post a photo of the ceramic sockets when you get them. Really interested in those and if I place an order for the module, might as well get those at the same time.

[Gary Lewis]

I just bought some ceramic headlight sockets from Daniel Stern and asked him what the latest in lighting is for our trucks.  Here's his response, which is an update to the first post in this thread:

Halogen headlamps:
Cibies are no longer made in this size. Koitos are excellent and I will eventually have them in stock, but not for multiple months yet. The best pick that can actually be bought is one particular, specific unit made by Hella (they make several different ones in this size, all of decent quality materials, but only one of them is well enough focused to be worth using): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0002M9QRE/?tag=2402507-20

There's a great deal of junk on the market, too. Delta, Roundeyes, Adjure, Eagle Eye, Eaglite, Maxtel, Eurolite, Neolite, Autopal, Rampage, and dozens of other off-brand units mostly from China or India. Avoid all of it.


Bulbs
Bulb selection matters a _lot_ to how well you can (or can't) see at night. Please see bulb test results posted by my colleague Virgil at http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?392498-Interesting-headlight-bulb-test-results. Note how the only advantage the overwattage 100/90w bulb gives is in amount of light on high beam; seeing distance on low beam is inferior to that from a premium 60/55w bulb.  Also note the large difference in seeing light between an ordinary 60/55w bulb and the 60/55w +80 or +90 premium type.  The current best pick in 60/55w H4 bulbs is made by Tungsram (GE of Europe); it is a +120 item that is a few developmental iterations improved over the +80/+90 bulbs in the linked comparison. I keep them in stock for $43.18/pair.

Important note: any of the bulbs claiming to produce "extra white" light (or super white, hyper white, platinum white, metal white, xenon white, etc) as its main promotional "benefit" is best avoided. It doesn't matter whose name is on the bulb -- Sylvania SilverStar/Ultra or ZxE, Philips BlueVision or CrystalVision, Wagner TruView, anything from PIAA or Hoen,, Nokya, Polarg, etc. -- all the same scam. They have a blue-tinted glass, which changes the light color a little, but blocks light that would reach the road if the glass weren't tinted, so they give you _less_ light than ordinary bulbs (not more). To get legal-minimum levels of light through the blue glass, the filament has to be driven very hard so these bulbs have a very short lifespan, and there's nothing about the tinted light that improves your ability to see -- the opposite is true (less light = less seeing, no matter about the tint). Sylvania got spanked (see
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?388252-Sylvania-taken-to-task-for-their-false-claims-of-headlamp-superiority) to the tune of thirty million dollars(!) for false "upgrade" claims on their Silver Star bulbs -- and theirs are among the least-bad of an overall bad product category, so the math kind of does itself.


HID headlamps:
There are (still) no legitimate HID headlamps to fit your vehicle (just headlite-shaped toys/junk), and "HID kits" are (still) a zero.


LED headlamps:
The "LED bulbs" now flooding the market, claiming to convert halogen headlamps to LED,  are not a legitimate, safe, effective, or legal product. The failure is at the concept level, not the implementation level. These are a fraudulent scam, just like "HID kits". They cannot produce light in the right pattern for a halogen headlamp's optics to collect, amplify, and focus it correctly, so you get an unsafe, random spray of light: too much light in some places, not enough light in others, and way too much glare and backscatter. And there's also a mountain of unsafe junk in the form of trinkets claiming to be complete "LED headlamps", as well.

But there's a number of engineered LED headlamps on the market -- they range in quality and performance from pathetic to excellent. The king daddy of them all is the JW Speaker item in chrome https://www.amazon.com/dp/B077S6TZSG/?tag=2402507-20 or in black https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0784NV3FK/?tag=2402507-20. If those aren't in the budget, then get these specific Truck-Lite item https://www.amazon.com/dp/B077V1TG3K/?tag=2402507-20 (they make several different onces; these are the ones to get. These LED headlamps are *not* advisable if you do a lot of wintertime driving with heavy snow and slush; the LED headlamp lenses run cold so snow and ice build up on them instead of melting off like they do from a warm halogen lamp lens. There is now a heated-lens version of the JW Speaker lamp, that is this one: http://www.jwspeaker.com/products/led-headlights-model-8910-evolution-2/utm_source=homepage&utm_medium=image&utm_campaign=8910%20Evolution%202%20Launch&utm_content=slider1  By all measures this is definitely the king-of-the-hill headlamp, the best one that will fit your vehicle.  Expensive, but well worth it if you do much night driving.  They come in chrome: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0784PRXJM/?tag=2402507-20  or in black: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B078C4WXTV/?tag=2402507-20


Lamp aim:
Lamp aim is by far the main thing that determines how well you can (or can't) see at night with any given set of lamps, so this is crucial: you will need to see to it that the lamps are aimed carefully and correctly per the "VOL" instructions at http://www.danielsternlighting.com/tech/aim/aim.html .

Whichever headlamp option you choose, result of this upgrade will be modern-car levels of headlamp performance: broad, even, bright white (NOT brown, NOT blue) well-focused low and high beams instead of the dim, narrow tunnel of brownish light from the original sealed beams. Also total elimination of backscatter in rain/fog/snow. Modern cars have a range of headlamp performance; your headlamp selection determines how high in that range your upgrade will get you.

Other upgrades:

Can make your reversing (back-up) lights nearly 100% brighter for $9.20/bulb .

Can also make your front sidemarker lights 80% brighter for safer all-around visibility of the vehicle, $4.59/bulb.

Your turn signals are presently invisible from the side, but there is an easy modification you can make to the front side marker lights' hookup so that they do double-duty as side markers _and_ side turn signal flashers, see http://www.danielsternlighting.com/tech/markerflash/markerflash.html. This is a very good safety improvement, as your turn signals become visible to the side (cars in the next lane, bicyclists, pedestrians) instead of just front- or rear-on.  It is also fully road-legal, and the brighter bulbs make your newly-activated side turn signal repeaters visible in bright daylight, too, not just at night.

With your two-wire side marker lights you have two options for how to do this, both described at the link. Use the logic module method (module kit $59) if you want the side markers always to flash in phase with the front and rear indicators, or use the cross-feed method (no module required, just a couple of wire connectors) if you don't mind opposite-phase flashing of the front side marker light when the parking lamps or headlamps are lit. Either way is legal throughout North America; elsewhere in the world, international rules do not permit opposite-phase flashing because it's considered potentially confusing to an observer who can see both the front and the side flashers at the same time.


Daytime running lights:
Daytime running lights -- legitimate ones, configured appropriately for automatic operation -- are good to have.  They significantly reduce your risk of being in a crash during the daytime, and are required equipment in Canada, throughout Europe, and in a large and growing number of other countries throughout the world because they are a very cost-effective safety device (i.e., they work). You can easily enable them in your vehicle using a DRL-1 module ($59); see http://dastern.torque.net/Mods/DRL/DRL1.html for instructions and demonstration videos. This is the best way to put a daytime running light function on a vehicle not originally equipped (or which has had its headlamp-based DRLs disabled for installation of headlight relays). The module enables the steady-burning operation of both front directional signals as daytime running lights (except, of course, when you're signalling for a turn). They produce a light distribution with a wide view angle, are generally well located for DRL service at the outboard edges of the front of the vehicle, consume considerably less power than any headlamp-based DRL implementation, use light sources of generally much longer life than a headlight bulb, do not encourage improper nighttime use of lights, and do not require additional lighting devices to be added. A large variety of vehicles from a wide array of makers use this kind of DRL as original equipment. It is steady-lit operation of the bright amber turn signals (except when they
are flashing to signal a turn) -- it is not steady operation of the dim parking lamps; parking lights are not bright enough and don't have the right view angles to serve the daytime running light function. Turn signal DRLs comply with US and Canadian Motor Vehicle Safety Standards #108 and are approved in all states, provinces, and territories.


If you wish to discuss other lighting upgrades (auxiliary high beam "driving" lamps, etc.) I am at your service.

[Gary Lewis]

Scott - Let's take this back to the Big Blue's Transformation thread.  See you there.....  

[Gary Lewis]

Time for an update from Daniel Stern on lighting upgrades.  (Get a cup of coffee and set back for some reading.  )

I've been emailing with him in the background and asked some questions, and he's set the questions out and then answered below them.  But I have to fill in a bit of background as he once told me that he is working to get Koito headlamps to sell.  However he doesn't yet have them and is currently recommending the Bosch ECE headlamps, which he stocks for $168/pair. And he recommends filling them with +120 60/55w bulbs made by Tungsram (GE of Europe) which he keeps in stock for $43.18/pair.

My questions are in bold with his answers indented below.

I can wait for the Koitos if they are that much better than the Bosch ECE's.  But, are they a lot better or just marginally better?  Worth waiting for?  And how might the costs compare?

Can't really answer most of this helpfully, because I don't yet have an availability date (even a vague one) or a price for the Koitos. As to the performance comparison: they're pretty tightly clustered above the Hellas, on par with the no-longer-available Cibies.

On the bulbs, what is the "+120" of which you speak?

The filament changes required to make a long-life bulb tend to reduce the beam focus, which shortens seeing distance makes the light browner -- but lifespan is lengthened. The opposite filament changes are made to create the "Plus" (+30, +50, +80, +90, +100, +120…) types of bulbs: Lifespan is shorter, but the beam focus is better so seeing distance is longer. Light color is whiter and less brown. And the lifespan difference is less stark than it might seem, because the long-life bulbs not only start out dimmer, but they last (i.e., keep lighting up) long enough to lose _significant_ amounts of their original output. The higher-performing bulbs burn out before they drop much of any intensity.

The attached page from a Hella technical paper goes into some detail on the performance difference between a standard bulb and a "plus" bulb. When it was written, the state of the art was +30, so this is a comparison between a long-life and a +30 bulb. Additional research and development has brought us to the present where we have +100, +120, +130, +150 bulbs. Two things to keep in mind:

1. This won't continue forever; there are certain hard physical limits of the technology.

2. A bigger plus-number doesn't necessarily mean a better bulb. Most all of the +130 and +150 bulbs have more and deeper blue tint on the bulb glass, especially in the area surrounding the high beam filament. Any amount of blue filtration sharply reduces the amount of light reaching the road in exchange for no benefit at all except a bogus appeal to fashion. Headlamps are life-safety equipment, not fashion toys, so this is a bad deal and those bulbs are best avoided.

Now, what about the blue ring just below the tip of the good +120 bulbs?  That's actually completely different. The marketers say this is there to make a fashion statement with your headlamps, but it's really there for a stealthier reason: to cut the mean spherical output of the bulb down to legal levels as tested in an integrating sphere (the machine used to measure light output from a bulb to determine if it falls within the legally required range). The blue ring filters a part of the bulb that has nothing to do with beam formation because it's not located between the filament and the reflector. So it cuts down on the total light output from the bulb when _all_ directions are considered, as in the sphere, without reducing the light output in the _relevant_ directions as in the headlamp. In other words, the filament is pumping mad lumens through the uncoloured glass where the reflector is looking. Clever trick. It works.

On the LED issue, one of my degrees is in physics and I can easily see how an LED can't work in a housing designed for a filament light source.

Yay! A lot of people run the equation [wish really hard] + [believable marketeering] = they work great.

I was just wondering if people have come up with "normal", or maybe I should say "halogen", looking LED headlights.

No sir, and I don't anticipate it happening. Imaging vs. non-imaging optics…!

Speaking of LEDs, I don't see them for things like brake lights on your site.  Do you sell them?  Recommend them or against them?

Here's what to know about LED retrofit bulbs in vehicle signal lamps (brake lights, tail lights, parking lights, turn signals, etc).

First, the quick nutshell version:

-Answer to "Will it work?" is a whole lot more complicated than is commonly understood.

-Fundamentally different kind of light source, so unlike with filament bulbs, physical fit doesn't guarantee optical compatibility/acceptable performance.

-Giant mountain of unsafe junk on the market, all fraudulently hyped as an upgrade.

-A few legitimate products that work OK in _some_ of the lamps they fit in; important to check the actual function carefully.

-Optical compatibility isn't the only issue; there's also electrical compatibility and thermal concerns.

Now here's the long, detailed version:

Let's start with how signal lamps (parking lamps, turn signals, side marker lights, brake lights, tail lights, reversing lamps) have to work. It's a lot more complicated than just "Yep, that lights up and looks good to me". Please take a look at this post, which I wrote years ago, in re someone who was very ambitiously making his own LED taillights for an old Dodge Dart: https://www.forabodiesonly.com/mopar/threads/66-dart-led-prototype-working-for-now.169147/#post-1635365

This info applies no matter what kind of light source we're working with; I point you at it not because I think you should go to the trouble of the involved measurements I describe (that was more for his build-from-scratch project), but just so you get some idea of the complexity involved beyond "Yep, it lights up".

Bulb-type lamps (brake light, tail light, parking light, turn signal, side marker, DRL, whatever) rely on a point source of light, a glowing filament, that radiates more or less equally in all directions—a sphere of light—collecting and distributing that light with optics in the lens and/or reflector. A group of LEDs arranged in a tower/pyramid/globe/cluster/other formation can't exactly duplicate such a sphere of light at the required scale, so the light distribution from bulb-type lamps equipped with "LED bulbs" like this is often seriously damaged.

LED substitute bulbs have been evolving toward legitimacy. The first generation Sylvania Zevo product was a pathetic, completely unsafe sick joke, disingenuously marketed as "for interior and off-road use only" (yeah, because gosh, there are just all kinds of vehicles where red 1157 bulbs are used in the interior…). The second generation Zevo product, marketed outside North America as Osram LEDriving, has a whole lot more and better engineering behind it.

The few legitimate LED bulbs that exist work well in _some_ of the lamps they fit in. In others, they work poorly. Their performance has to be carefully assessed in whatever particular lamp they're installed in, by comparing them side-by-side with the original incandescants as reasonably well described (in an accessible DIY manner) at http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?452592-How-to-Evaluate-Safety-of-LED-Bulb-Retrofits-in-Brake-Signal-Marker-Lights.

And in still _other_ lamps, they don't work at all, because all the legitimate LED retrofit bulbs have only rear/side-facing emitters. That works in some lamps with a reflector bowl behind the bulb to gather and magnify the light, but there's a whole other kind of lamp that doesn't use (or doesn't only use) a reflector bowl. Instead (or in addition), these lamps have Fresnel-type optics, the kind where the lens has a central magnifying area directly in line with the filament of the installed bulb, and spreader optics surrounding that magnifier. Often the magnifier is a round bullseye and the spreaders are a series of round prismatic rings surrounding the bullseye (as in your front turn signals), but sometimes the magnifier is square or rectangular and the surrounding prisms are rectilinear. If there's no light directly out the front of the LED bulb, there will be minimal to zero output from the lamp. If you have lamps that use both a reflector and fresnel optics (again, your front turn signals) the lack of forward output will drop the lamps' output below safe levels.

Philips used to make some LED bulbs that did have significant frontward light, but they discontinued them and now they market two different product families, both of which are inferior to that first family. Which is unfortunate, but that's the world we live in.

There are also thermal issues with LED bulbs. Unlike with previous light sources (light and heat coincident out the front of the lamp), an LED puts out light from its front side and heat from its back side. The light goes forward, the heat goes back. As the LED heats up, its light output drops (it's called "droop"), so each LED must have an adequate heat sink to carry the heat away from the emitter and prevent it heating up high enough to drop the output low enough to put the lamp's output below the minimum requirement. LED vehicle lamps (designed and engineered as such) have to pass tests for output maintenance with prolonged operation, because that's a real-world situation (stuck in traffic with foot on the brake, tail/parking lights operating for hours on end, etc). This is a challenging requirement for even legitimate LED lamps, and it's a really difficult challenge for such a thing as an LED bulb, because there's a very limited amount of space for any heat sinking, and all of it's going to be inside the lamp there with the heat-emitting LEDs—there's no way to use outside air to cool the LEDs unless you have a big honkin' rear housing on the LED bulb. There are some out there like this, and they create physical-fit problems (not enough room behind the lamp for the big honkin' housing) and other issues related to improper fit in the bulb hole.

With all that said, these will likely work well in stock Ford taillights: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01A77TV4Q/?tag=2402507-20

You'll need to assess their performance per the link above. And you'll need to swap in a new turn signal flasher: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001GF1A0M/?tag=2402507-20 (2-prong like original; connect its ground wire conveniently). Also note these recommendations are quite specific -- they are the only
legitimate LED retrofit bulbs. There's a mountain of unsafe or fraudulent product on the market, too, so best to stick to these specific LED bulbs.

[ArdWrknTrk]

Thanks for checking back with Mr Stern.

On the +120 bulbs you don't seem to be able to pin him down on any kind of lifetime, or even a suggestion of how much it is shortened.

I'd want an answer before I dropped $212 on headlights.

[351FUN]

Putting in my $.02, I have the Rigid 5x7 led headlights and the performance is pretty good.  Very clean cutoff and if I had the factory headlight plugs on both sides it'd be a plug and play install.  Low beam uses 1 diode and high uses another 10 or so.  The best part is they look like standard bulbs from a distance, unlike most cheap led headlamps.

[Gary Lewis]

Jim - You are right that he wasn't very explicit on length of life.  But it isn't $212 for the bulbs.  Instead it is $43 bulbs and $168 for the headlights themselves.  I think I'm going to give both of them a try.  I don't do much night driving so the bulbs may last plenty long enough for me.

351FUN - I'm glad that the Rigid headlights are working out for you.  I don't doubt that at all as Rigid has an excellent reputation.  But I don't consider them "normal" or "halogen looking" headlights, and I want my headlights to look like the ones that came out on these trucks.  The pic below from the Amazon page shows they don't look like the standard headlights.

That's just a personal choice, and that limits me to halogen headlights as Daniel Stern doesn't think anyone is going to come up with approved LED headlights that look like halogen.  (Note that LED bulbs in a headlight made for a halogen bulb will not work properly due to the geometry involved.)

So you probably have better lighting than I'll have, but I'll have the looks that I want with improved lighting over what I have now.  

[351FUN]

I agree completely, that's why I said from a distance lol.  They look much more natural than the honeycomb looking ones.

[ArdWrknTrk]

I said "headlights" as in lamps and housings/lenses/reflectors. Don't work for me anyhow, as I have body styled plastic housings not sealed beams anyhow. Is that a Cherokee?

[Gary Lewis]

351FUN - Those look pretty good.  Still not my cup of tea, but far better than many.

Jim - I do think that's a Cherokee.

[Gsmblue]

I have posted it elsewhere, but I will make the comment here.

I have the Hella reflectors paired with the Philips "150% racing bulbs" and the HD wiring harness from LMC.

I got the hella reflectors from the halogen thread:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0002M9QRE/?tag=2402507-20

And I got lazy on the bulbs so went with these:

https://www.amazon.com/Philips-RacingVision-Headlight-12342RVS2-Upgrade/dp/B01LYNVQBC/ref=sr_1_2?crid=9LGMIOO5HGYR&dchild=1&keywords=philips+h4&qid=1603774238&s=automotive&sprefix=Philips+h%2Cautomotive%2C234&sr=1-2


This combination, now everything has been aligned, exceeds my expectations. The low beam is nice and wide with a good cut off, the high beam has great reach.

The video I took on my iPhone is worthless unfortunately, with no control over the exposure settings it is impossible to use the phone for this stuff. If people really want to see what it looks like I could get my DSLR out and put it on the dash and take some video.