Lighting

[ArdWrknTrk]

That's really outrageous.

I bought this Ford blower relay kit with probably 24" of heavy sleeved harness, mounting tab socket, hardware and a genuine Bosch relay for $7.71 from U-techcenter.

[Gary Lewis]

Two of those kits =$26, plus two headlight sockets @ $2 each and you are now in the ballpark of the LMC & the JBG.  But you'd have good relays.

But the thing I see missing in these kits is a fuse or, as I like to do, an auto-reset breaker.

[ArdWrknTrk]

U-techcenter combines shipping... so only the basic $4.95.

As you know my lights are fused and relayed through my mini PDC.
I've sent my LMC harness, 3G Megafuse, random relays and a pair of LED backup lights off to Frank Wyatt in Tennessee.

I'm not sure if I could fit one of my Bussmann breakers into the fuse slot area under that lid, but I'm going to have to look into it.

Edit: actual Bosch relay is about $6. No way I could buy the socket and wiring for $1.71.
Not trying to compete with China. This is a real quality kit by an a American contractor with a Ford part number...

[Machspeed]

Thanks for the information fellas. I'll look this over and make a decision later today.

Have some more problems, see my post on fan shroud and broken bolt......it never ends  

[FuzzFace2]

All this talk of tombstones and cutting wires, removing ballast and rewiring I think is more work than I want to put into changing them all out.
Dave ----

[Gary Lewis]

Got my first pair of LED replacement bulbs in the shop.  Took a bit more than I expected as the tombstones I bought aren't an easy fit.  Here's a shot showing how I had to modify the bracket to accept the new ones.  You can see where I've cut one side out and marked the other side to cut.




As for how bright they are, let me say BRIGHT!  But, I can't prove that via the camera, as you'll see below.  If you look directly at the LEDs they hurt your eyes, but the fluorescents don't.  Maybe it is because the LEDs are point sources and the fluorescents aren't.

The LEDs are very white and crisp.  I really like them, and given the improvement from this I want to convert more of them, soon.

Here's the best pic I could take, but that doesn't show what my eyes see:

[ArdWrknTrk]

That's looking good, Gary!

But I don't really understand why you have to go through all that.
When I've used the Hyperikon "tubes" they swapped right into the existing tombstones.

Did you buy T-8 style bulbs when you had T-12 fixtures???
Otherwise, I've just snipped the wires, left the ballasts bypassed, put the reflectors back on and popped the LED's in.

I was back at my buddy Theo's house yesterday, where I installed seven of those Wal-Mart fixtures.
I didn't think to take a picture....

[Gary Lewis]

These particular tubes take non-shunting tombstones.  All of my tombstones are the shunting style, which means that the tombstone connects the pins together on that end.

Instead, these tubes want positive and ground to come in on the same end, and there are no connections to the other end.  So I have to change out the tombstone on the end to which there will be power.

Perhaps I bought the wrong style tubes?  Perhaps there are shunt-style tubes where you put power on one end and ground on the other?  That way I'd just have to snip the wires as you said.

[ArdWrknTrk]

Thanks for the explanation.
I've never had to do that.
But again, I've stopped doing it entirely.

It's been 4 years or so.

[MarkF100]

The Walmart Hyper Tough fixtures are impressive. As of now there are four of them hanging in the barn. The barn is 40x50. They light the place up. The floor is dirt at the moment so, not very good reflection. In two weeks the cement will be poured. Should really brighten the place up. I'll never go back to florescent. I hate Walmart but, can't beat the price.

[ArdWrknTrk]

Mark, are you using the 3,500 lumen fixtures, or the 5,000 lumen fixtures with the pull chain?

Either way I'm surprised at the value of these things.
If I wasn't so skint I would have dismissed them as cheap garbage and never given them a chance.

[Machspeed]

Gary, I'm certain that there are tombstones out there that fit your fixtures without all the hacking and cutting. I'd put the brakes on that before I cut up any more. If time permits, Ill see if I can find the websites I looked through.

I too tried to photograph the differences in my old fluorescent bulbs vs. the LED but it's something you just can't capture.

[Gary Lewis]

Thanks, John.  I'll post up a pic of the original tombstones in a bit, so if you find better ones then please let me know.  But while it isn't too bad to do, I'm going to stop right here for a bit and enjoy what I have.  The difference is amazing.

[Machspeed]

Gary Lewis wrote

 But while it isn't too bad to do, I'm going to stop right here for a bit and enjoy what I have.  The difference is amazing.

I know, I was blown away by them! Post those pics with measurements. While I bought my lights off Amazon, I sourced the tombstones elsewhere and I had to do some homework to find them.

Here's a start for you........https://www.totalbulklighting.com/parts-accessories/non-shunted-tombstones-sockets.html?p=1

[Gary Lewis]

John - That's perfect!  I found this one, which is on the left below with one of mine on the right.  I just ordered 20 of them, which will make for a much easier conversion.  Thanks!

[Machspeed]

Awesome! Glad that worked out for you. You'll be excited to get them and fire that shop up. Get your sunglasses out....lol!

Now, if I may, I'm in a quandary on the headlight relay mod, mainly because I can't picture how it all goes together. I've searched and am not finding detailed pictures of this. In my web search, people that have done this mod and put together great illustrations with photos and such have lost those photos due to Photobucket issues. I like the plug and play thing I seem to be reading about on the LMK and BG websites but I find no instructions for doing it. Also, I like the idea of a fuse and convenient relays as you guys mentioned above. Gary, I've looked at what you've done here, but I'm still left a bit confused. Details?  

[Gary Lewis]

Are you looking for a schematic?  That's one thing that our writeup lacks, but I could create that if you need it.

As for the Photobucket problems, that's one reason I like Nabble.  When we upload pics they are "ours" and stored on our server.  Even if we just give it a link to another site in the Insert Image dialog it goes out and gets the picture and stores it on our server.  So we aren't subject to other sites going away.

In addition, unlike some other forums like FTE, when you put a pic on this forum you can easily copy it or a link to it and use it elsewhere, like Facebook.

Anyway, what do you need on the headlight relays?

[Machspeed]

I've seen the schematics at FTE, Gary. I guess what I'm wanting is step by step pictures where people tied into the existing harness. I'm not really following how the switch ties in to the rest of the harness.

[ArdWrknTrk]

The switch is in the dash....

The relays are triggered by the right side headlamp socket.
The relays then power the headlamps through their own harness, with dedicated grounds on each side.

[Gary Lewis]

ArdWrknTrk wrote

The switch is in the dash....

The relays are triggered by the right side headlamp socket.
The relays then power the headlamps through their own harness, with dedicated grounds on each side.

Yep.  Another way to say it is that some harnii have a plug that simulates the headlight and plugs into the right side headlight connector.  Another harnii have you remove the old headlight connector and connect directly to the wires.

Those wires trigger the relays by going to their coils, the other side of which is grounded.  If the low beam wire has power from the switch then the low beam relay pulls in.  And that relay is getting its power through a fuse that's tied directly to the battery, so the headlight comes on but it is powered by heavy wire directly from the battery and only triggered by the headlight switch.  Ditto the high beam.