Dual low beam headlights?

[kp texan]

I'm about to do the headlight wiring upgrade with relays to my '88 K5 and was wondering if any of you have wired all 4 of your headlights to be on during low beam. I know there are only single filament high beam lights on the bottom, but what if you were to put dual filament bulbs in their place and wire them so that they would be on for low beam as well? Do you think this would be any improvement or is it just some stupid idea that I've come up with? I'm just fed up with the light ouput of the sorry sealed beam headlamps and was thinking any little bit might help. I will soon be doing the H4 upgrade but was also thinking that since the H4 is a dual filament bulb, I could just have them wired up the same way.

Thanks so much for the help,

Wes

 

[Mikey von]

Wes, If it is a stupid idea, then call me stupid too. I would like to do the same. I was thinking about upgrading to some 100/55 H4's from here http://www.rallylights.com/hella/165mm_lo.asp

I would like all 4 bulbs to light Hi and Low. My Sub is an '89, not sure if it 165mm or 150mm. I hope it is 165mm as there are many more choices.

I just checked and it looks like my 89 suburban has the 150mm size. Can anyone confirm this?

 

[4X4HIGH]

I bought the painless wiring relay kit which allows low and hi beams on at the same time. The kit was something like $20.00 from summit racing a few years ago.

Mikey von, the headlights starting in 1989 are the smaller version lights so i would assume the 150mm is what they are.

 

[kp texan]

I've been doing a little research on this subject and finally got around to doing my H4 headlight swap yesterday. It probably took a lot longer than it should have but I think it was well worth it. I soldered pretty much all of the connections, with the exception of a couple. The reason I went with 3 Bosch type relays was because I needed 1 for the low beams (220 watts total) and 2 for the high beams (400 watts total) since I was using 100/55 watt H4 bulbs all around. Another good thing about running 4 H4s was that I could also wire all 4 to be on during low beam rather than having just 2 on. The conversion lamps I bought were just like these: http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/165mm-H4656-H4-EUROCONVERSIONHEADLIGHTS_W0QQcmdZViewItemQQcategoryZ33710QQitemZ7915995553QQtcZphoto . After looking around at my options for awhile (Hella, Cibie, JC Whitney), I decided that these were the best for the money. I run Hella E-spec H4 conversions in my Corvette but, to be honest with you, these Autopals seemed to be on the same quality level (construction, light pattern) as the Hellas. Autopal is not a new company and if you read around you'll find that they have a pretty decent reputation. Plus, on a K5 you have 4 lights to replace rather than 2 so cost is a factor for me. Running high wattage bulbs, you'll need better bulb sockets than the stock ones so I figured out that the best easy to obtain socket is the NAPA p/n LS6235 (about $4 each). The LS6235 is a H4 connector with 14 awg leads and made of Bakelite in order to handle very high temperatures. Also, I discovered that the stock headlamp connector on the K5 is wired completely wrong for the H4 bulb. On an H4, the top terminal is low, right terminal is high, and left terminal is ground. The stock K5 (the '88 model at least) is not wired this way, so those of you that have plugged this into an H4 don't have it wired correctly. I used harnesses for the relays (Parts Express p/n 330-075) in order to make them easy to replace and one in line fuse holder (Parts Express p/n 070-675) for each relay. It seems like I had tons of wiring to make this work and I wish that I could have done it a little bit cleaner than I did. Once I did get everything hooked up, I was completely blown away by the difference that it made. My low beams used to be entirely useless but now they’re better than most newer cars, maybe with the exception of HIDs. The high beams are what impressed me the most because they literally light up the whole road. Thus far, the H4 upgrade is honestly the best single upgrade I’ve done to my Blazer and it’s probably the smartest for safety reasons. I’m really starting to wish that I took before and after photos for you guys to see because you would be pretty amazed at the difference. Hopefully this will give ideas to some of y'all who are thinking about doing this upgrade.

-Wes

My lights are pretty much wired like this schematic that I drew up. I know it's small but how do you make an AutoCAD file look like a decent jpeg??

The blazing 100 watt high beams.

 

[sled_dog]

you know I believe it isn't legal to have all 4 on at once... you can get away with it on high beams because you aren't driving around shining them on people since they are high beams...

 

[kp texan]

I see cars driving around all the time with 4 lights on during low beam. They normally have the stock low beams plus an annoying, poorly aimed, set of "fog lamps". Also, anyone running H4 bulbs and non DOT spec lenses is doing something illegal so I'm not really going to worry too much about it. I think the main thing is to have properly adjusted headlamps in order to prevent blinding oncoming drivers.

-Wes

 

[Cmoe]

The motor vehicle reg in AZ and CA according to the DMV is that you can not have more than 4 clear lights on at one time. I got a ticket for having all 4 headlights on and my driving light on at the same time when I owned my Nissan.

 

[kp texan]

I can't find anything in the Texas Transportation Code that states a maximum number of low beam lights. All that is specified for low beams is a minimum performance to see a person at 150ft and that the high intensity portion of the beam does not shine into oncoming drivers eyes. I suppose that they could also technically serve as the 2 allowed auxiliary driving lamps under section 547.330.

-Wes