I DETEST OEM fog/ driving/ auxiliary/ flood/ lamps

[67Dart273]

I hate people who shine them at me and would never purposely do that to someone.......unless they fail to dim

My Dakota has OEM "in the bumper" driving/ fog lamps. They are typical modern crap. Plastic lenses which deteriorate, and the "pattern" seems to be more like a "tractor flood" than anything useful. These are small lamps. I could fabricate new mounts

Anyone have a "for sure" lamp in mind to put something there that will help fill in the headlamps without blinding traffic? Something with some actual engineering and a pattern?

 

[Mattax]

I'm sure Dan Stern has some suggestions. If you don't want to deal with him, take a look at Candlepower forums.
The people in the automotive forum seem just as knowledgeable as Dan.
CandlePowerForums

Try searching with the lamp types/number and things like that as well.

 

[famous bob]

I hate people who shine them at me and would never purposely do that to someone.......unless they fail to dim

My Dakota has OEM "in the bumper" driving/ fog lamps. They are typical modern crap. Plastic lenses which deteriorate, and the "pattern" seems to be more like a "tractor flood" than anything useful. These are small lamps. I could fabricate new mounts

Anyone have a "for sure" lamp in mind to put something there that will help fill in the headlamps without blinding traffic? Something with some actual engineering and a pattern?

I have been looking at a pair of fog/spot combination , led lights on ebay. Thinking about putting them in the bumper of my 2014 ram express.

 

[Mattax]

I have been looking at a pair of fog/spot combination , led lights on ebay. Thinking about putting them in the bumper of my 2014 ram express.

That seems like a phycisical contradition. Fog lights are supposed to help you pick up the edges of the road in really dense fog, wheras I understand a spot as a long distance pencil beam light.
Straight fog light discussions seem more plentiful.
Do fog lights add much benefit?
CandlePowerForums

 

[67Dart273]

I think what I need at this point would be fog. I can no longer drive at night on narrow, or conjested unlit roads. Oncoming traffic, especially on secondary highways is my problem. So I need something to "fill in the corners."

My idea was to find something small, fab/ mount them in the OEM location and use the OEM wiring.

 

[diymirage]

I like the HID kit I installed on the family hauler
Only vehicle I have with better lights is the plow truck with a 54 inch light bar on the roof

But the HIDs fit in the stock housing and that determines the pattern and cut off of the lights

 

[Mattax]

I think some (rally people) call those cornering lights. Not cheap. Is it possible to get headlights with better light pattern?

 

[Tooljunkie]

My nissan has decent driving lights,tuened them on the day i put the car on the road. Original owner probably never knew they existed.
Fills the area right up front below where headlights shine.

 

[Mattax]

I think what I need at this point would be fog. I can no longer drive at night on narrow, or conjested unlit roads. Oncoming traffic, especially on secondary highways is my problem. So I need something to "fill in the corners."

My idea was to find something small, fab/ mount them in the OEM location and use the OEM wiring.

Maybe this of some help in looking for what you need.

The fog beam is basically only foreground light: wide (ideally, though some aren't), very short reach/range, with a sharp cutoff at the top of the beam.
The auxiliary high beam (so-called "driving") is very much like a high beam headlamp: a strong central hot spot surrounded by less intense light.
The "driving" beam may be wide or narrow; terms like "pencil beam", "cornering beam", "combo beam", etc refer unofficially to varieties of aux high beam lamp.

But maybe you want an auxillery low beam?
Same guy says

It's relatively hard to find good/legitimate auxiliary low beams

Those quote came from here
Recommendation for a DOT legal LED driving or fog light?

I ended buying a set of out of production z-beam headlights for the Barracuda just because I was doing so much driving on poor unlit winding roads. Of course after I finally got them, the job faded out. So it goes.

 

[75slant6]

I like the HID kit I installed on the family hauler
Only vehicle I have with better lights is the plow truck with a 54 inch light bar on the roof

But the HIDs fit in the stock housing and that determines the pattern and cut off of the lights

How many times have you been flashed with those HIDs? Just sticking an HID kit in a factory housing most times causes the light to scatter and not be properly focused.

 

[diymirage]

How many times have you been flashed with those HIDs? Just sticking an HID kit in a factory housing most times causes the light to scatter and not be properly focused.

Zero
The cut off on the original housing is amazing
(This truck had the option of factory HIDs so maybe the housing was designed with that in mind?)

I also made sure I aimed them properly after installing them

 

[famous bob]

That seems like a phycisical contradition. Fog lights are supposed to help you pick up the edges of the road in really dense fog, wheras I understand a spot as a long distance pencil beam light.
Straight fog light discussions seem more plentiful.
Do fog lights add much benefit?
CandlePowerForums

If u think so----the ones I was referring to have a row of led`s for fog, and 2 rows for spot.
I don't just want fog lights, my stock lights aren`t bright enough to suit me on the ram. I did have factory fog lights on my 2002 dodge p/u , they helped the edge of the road only, but did help--------

 

[jos51700]

I've considered this for my neon many times. Nothing is worse than neon lighting

 

[75slant6]

Zero
The cut off on the original housing is amazing
(This truck had the option of factory HIDs so maybe the housing was designed with that in mind?)

I also made sure I aimed them properly after installing them

View attachment 1715286250

Wow. That is an amazing cutoff! You may be right about the factory HID option maybe making a difference

 

[DustyDuster]

View attachment 1715286269 I've considered this for my neon many times. Nothing is worse than neon lighting

And it is daylight out!

 

[Mattax]

Zero
The cut off on the original housing is amazing
(This truck had the option of factory HIDs so maybe the housing was designed with that in mind?)

I also made sure I aimed them properly after installing them

View attachment 1715286250

That looks bright but doesn't look like a good headlight pattern. Also has a lot of light above the cutoff.
Be very interesting to get a factory HID and compare.

Here's a couple off the web that look good. (Text is theirs, not mine)
VOL or VOR pattern.

US VOL or ECE pattern?