Headlamp question

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4spdcuda66

4spdcuda66

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I have a 67 Plymouth Fury with quad headlamps. My local auto parts supplier does not stock OEM style incandescent headlamps, but they carry Wagner H5001 and H5006 headlamps. These are a Halogen replacement that has the two and three prong connectors like the originals have. Are these safe to just plug in and use, or will they fry my wiring? I'm not educated in auto wiring or electricals, so any advise you have to offer, please dumb it down! Thanks.
 
Do yourself a favor and order a set of Nighthawks for it. There are a few threads about headlamps if you search for it. I think Slantsixdan had some great info on headlamps that were a waste of money as well as the best bang for the buck. Consider reading the threads on the advantage of relays too.
 
Any lamp, even stock, is "marginal" so far as the wiring for these old girls go. Look up Crackedbacks headlamp relay kit. The whole deal is, the wiring on these cars was pretty marginal.

I somewhat disagree with stuff like the nighthawks, "depending". I think it depends on how much night driving you do. For me the generic halogens work just great
 
Wiring in relays is not an option right now. I just need to replace a couple lamps. Can I use them off the shelf without mods and without doing damage to my electrical system?
 
It's an old car.
Manually operated switches fail.
Majority of the headlight switches replaced had a failure in only the dimmer feature. So put the halogen bulbs in and expect all to work just fine until something fails for some other reason not related to the halogen bulbs.
and by the way... all the headlight relays and crap does not save the dimmer rheostat.
 
4spdcuda66 said:
Can I use them off the shelf without mods and without doing damage to my electrical system?
Click to expand...

"Maybe." If the factory wiring is in good shape, and you don't drive that much at night..........
 
67Dart273 said:
"Maybe." If the factory wiring is in good shape, and you don't drive that much at night..........
Click to expand...

Wiring is in good shape. Night driving limited to about an hour so. Do the lamps get hot? Does the power draw get the wiring hot? There is nothing wrong with the switch or dimmer, just a couple of burnt out lamps. Are you running yours with or without relays?
 
You can find nos original type bulbs on ebay , and last time I looked they weren't expensive
 
Interesting questions. From what I have found, the H versions draw the same current as the non-H tungsten filament versions: approx 3 amps each for the 4001/H4001 high beams and approx 4.7/3 amps for the low/high beams of the 4000/H4000.

You can check it out here with searches for GE or Sylvania 4000 and the 4001/H4001: http://www.donsbulbs.com/cgi-bin/r/b.pl/4000~sylvania.html

Sooo, H's should not do any more damage than the originals.
 
I bought the nighthawks and I'm not that impressed, they're too focused. I think plain old halogens will work just fine.
 
4spdcuda66 said:
Are you running yours with or without relays?
Click to expand...

My car is (was, it's down for paint) a poor example. It has a generic harness, and I've added a relay box for several heavy loads, EFI, ignition / regulator, headlights, etc

I used a box out of a Voyager mounted on the fender apron

image.php
 
Thanks for the info guys. After reading your responses and doing a little research, I'm going to just run them for now. I plan to install relays for the low and high beams sometime in the future. The incandescent lamps are hardly enough to see twenty feet in front of me. I pulled up some old threads on FABO that show how to install the relays, and there is some info on what to buy as far as quality is concerned. I'll put the Halogens in today and see how they compare sometime this weekend. Thanks again FABO.
 
The thing you might not be "getting" is that the reason you may not be seeing very well with your old lamps is the wiring problems themselves. Deteriorated contacts in switches, at the dimmer switch connector, through the bulkhead, and the lamp sockets themselves.
 
67Dart273 said:
The thing you might not be "getting" is that the reason you may not be seeing very well with your old lamps is the wiring problems themselves. Deteriorated contacts in switches, at the dimmer switch connector, through the bulkhead, and the lamp sockets themselves.
Click to expand...

OK thanks. I'll spend some time checking that stuff out.
 
Just for the fun of it you might want to wait till nighttime then turn your headlights on and jump a temporary wire directly from your battery to your headlights to see how much brighter they get. Just a one or two volt drop makes a lot of difference, that's why relays make sense.
 
cudajim said:
Just for the fun of it you might want to wait till nighttime then turn your headlights on and jump a temporary wire directly from your battery to your headlights to see how much brighter they get. Just a one or two volt drop makes a lot of difference, that's why relays make sense.
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Can you post a picture of that setup? Pos or neg? Right to the lamp itself? I don't have a clue as to how to do this.
 
The stock wiring is horrible for voltage drop.

The test is a good one, just be careful that you don't energize the wrong terminals. Post about 66, the low beam wire is violet, high beam is red Maybe use a 10 amp fuse in line on your test wire just in case. A bad ground will hamper out as well.

The halogens will usually work better than the old style bulbs. Low voltage is a curse. Light output does not degrade linear to voltage drop. It's exponential, which means output loss is greater than voltage input drop. Hook up a std 12v headlight to a 6 volt source and the output isn't going to be 50% of rated, it will likely barely warm the filament.

Additionally, the relay kits tend to improve light output in the cabin/dash and marker/turns because the headlight load is no longer taxing the system.

For those that are interested, if anybody thinks those cheap relays units are the same quality of products, design or workmanship/end termination as my kits, they are not. There is a reason, MB, BMW and others don't use those chinese relays in their cars. It's not because the tyco/boschs cost more, it's failure rates.
 
Cracked is correct. A good example is, we used to use 220V lamps in our 120V socket in my Mom's wellhouse in winter. This created a very low power heating element that lasted a very long time. It didn't need much, as the wellhouse was insulated, so only the coldest nights were a threat

Example.......a 220/240V 200W lamp is about .9 amps

The very same bulb operated on 120V draws 1/2 the amperage at 1/2 the voltage

So 120 X .45A is 54 watts, about 1/4 the wattage that it generated on rated voltage

Both is true of either light or heat. As the voltage sags, so does the amperage, so the wattage doesn't drop by 1/2, it drops by a factor of 4 (or 1/4)
 
Thanks for the info Crackedback and 67Dart273. I took the car out tonight with the Halogen lamps and found that they are somewhat brighter and definitely whiter. I need to adjust them so they project a little further out. After reading about voltage drop, I need to check that on my car. More than likely an issue. I am interested in a relay package, so Crackedback, what info do you need for my car to fix me up? Or are you even interested in messing with it. It is a quad headlamp system.
 
I use halogen lamps in my 65 C-body w/ quad lamps. Only type I found, and didn't even question it. Aren't halogen still "incandescent"? Stock-pile those smaller bulbs (1D & 2D, I recall) because they are getting rare.
 
BillGrissom said:
I use halogen lamps in my 65 C-body w/ quad lamps. Only type I found, and didn't even question it. Aren't halogen still "incandescent"? Stock-pile those smaller bulbs (1D & 2D, I recall) because they are getting rare.
Click to expand...
Yes they are..... good point on the smaller bulbs... never thought about that.
 
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