Driving Light suggestions?

"RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars" (rallydarkstrike) 11/03/2016 at 19:35 • Filed to: Lighting

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Hi all!

As many of you have possibly seen me mention in a few previous posts and some comments, I’ve been on the hunt for some auxiliary lighting to brighten up my dim headlights on those dark rural roads here in Nova Scotia, and also in inclimate weather. (By driving lights, I mean long range spots that go on and off with your high beams.) I’ve ordered some new brighter Philips H4 bulbs - my previous Sylvania bulbs both burned out in the last two weeks, so my dim OEM bulbs are back in at the moment.

To go along with the new headlight bulbs, I was looking into LED lighting on Amazon, and various lights at Canadian Tire, but lighting on Amazon is a crapshoot/many aren’t technically street legal. As for Crappy Tire - most of their lights have incredibad reviews, so I want to stay away from those.

I really like !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , as they look cool, are well built, are street legal (SAE approved!), are very bright and effective, and are nice and compact (3" square)......but they are hella expensive at like $300 CAD (lawl, lighting pun! :P)

Anybody have any suggestions for cheaper, decent quality alternatives? Shape doesn’t matter so much, but I would prefer a driving/spot beam to get the longer range sight lines. The mounting system I would be going with would require the lights to mount with one bolt each. There are a few LED solutions on Amazon that are at a decent price, but .I would worry about their legality.

Cheers for any suggestions! :)

TheTurbochargedSquirrel > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 11/03/2016 at 19:39

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I have a pair of Hella 500s mounted to my Mini. I have only really used them once so far but they work well. They are also affordable at ~$50 for a kit (includes lights and wiring, you have to figure out how to mount them to your car) to install a pair.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > TheTurbochargedSquirrel 11/03/2016 at 19:49

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Hmmm...would be a good option! $50 US isn’t too bad...wiring them shouldn’t be that hard as long as their instructions make sense. I already have a switch, some heat shrink and some wire (which I think is a good enough gauge). Would need a relay, wiring guide and would have to brush up on my soldering as this would be the first auto wiring I will have done...

TheTurbochargedSquirrel > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 11/03/2016 at 19:56

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The kit comes with a full harness including wiring, relay, and switch. The instructions aren’t the greatest and basically amount to a picture trying to show how it get wired. It is simple enough once you figure out what they are trying to say though. I was able to do my install without soldering as I used butt connectors to connect the lights to the harness, circle connectors for the lights ground (which I just connected to the bolts for my brackets, and spade connectors to connect the switch. The harness already has a socket for the relay to connect to.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > TheTurbochargedSquirrel 11/03/2016 at 20:23

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Very nice! Do yours go off when you turn your high beams off?

I already have the switch, as mentioned, but also drilled the switch location hole I want as well, so all I will need to do is run the wiring into the cabin and wire the lights up. I’ll probably try to solder as I would think it is more solid/vibration proof than connectors...? Maybe I am wrong! :)

Do they take a standard sized halogen bulb?

Dusty Ventures > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 11/03/2016 at 20:43

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U need dis

TheTurbochargedSquirrel > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 11/03/2016 at 20:56

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Mine are wired into the high beams. They take a H3 bulb and it is super easy to swap them. One philips head screw allows you to get the lens off and then you can just pull the bulb.

jkm7680 > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 11/03/2016 at 21:40

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Honestly a lightbar is gonna be your best option.

Berang > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 11/03/2016 at 21:56

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Hella spots or driving lights are not that expensive. And a larger reflector means better lighting than you’d get with some dinky LED get up. You can get the round 500, or rectangle 550 lights for relatively cheaply. Or just look up some vintage brands, Cibie, Lucas, Marchal, Pathfinder, etc.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > jkm7680 11/03/2016 at 22:47

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Not sure...they are bright, but the legality would be questionable around here for on-road use (I think the law says you need two separate, distinguishable lights in a pair to be legal on-road). Also, I much prefer the aesthetics of having two separate lights on a car...light bars only look OK to me on pickups and SUVS....I’m weird. :P

I was possibly thinking of going with two small ‘lightbars’ though - something like this , this or this in spot/driving beam.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > Berang 11/03/2016 at 22:54

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True! Sadly, vintage brands are not common to find here, and I’d be a bit worried about buying used older kit as you have no idea how well it was treated or installed.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > Dusty Ventures 11/03/2016 at 22:54

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Well, Hyundai does have Rally pedigree now.....and I DO have a WRC shift knob from my old Subaru in the Accent now....