Sealed Beam Headlight Converisons?

[letank]

Hella H4 w relays (hi, low) and fresh wires from battery. And a spare light bulb in a plastic container for those surprises black out, it beat carrying a whole headlamp. You can replace the plastic socket too....

It really helped me w the upper angled beam to avoid that cow standing on the highway.....

[Grimjaw]

Thank you grimjaw for posting about my harness' above. IFSJA members get $10 off that price. There are a number of members running the harness and I have yet to hear a complaint about them.

Your harness is on my wish list for my J10, Darn that a long list, thats not getting any shorter.

[Spectre]

SilverStars plus Hella 550 driving lights on my GW:

[JeepStew]

the picture speaks LOUDLY

thas an awesome example.

[jsinajeep]

headlight converison

I got mine on ebay. Did the heavy wiring and relays ,everthing. When I got the new light they looked good.Got checking and they had the 60/55w blubs that will give the 130/100w brightness with the diamond cut lens [if you can beleive that]. The instruction said you can use the your regular wiring[why not with 60/55w blub]. I have the 77 Chero so I got the one with the flat glass lens and they do look good. One of these days I will get the brighter blub for it.

[crispyboy]

I did a search on the Hella Vision Plus headlamps - they use a hb2 9003 bulb. Is this different than the h4 bulb?

[crispyboy]

Here's an interesting article on light bulbs.

http://www.danielsternlighting.com/tech/bulbs/blue/good/good.html

[Spectre]

Here's an interesting article on light bulbs.

http://www.danielsternlighting.com/t...good/good.html

I have to disagree with Mr. Stern (and have before) on the topic. First of all, the SilverStars don't seem to be short-lived; I do a lot of night driving and I get at most a couple years out of bulbs anyway - these seem to be holding up just fine at a little over a year.

He is correct about the light appearing whiter; but what he does not discuss is the sealed-beam replacement units. He's talking specifically about using the bare bulbs in an OEM headlight unit like the kinds found on, say, a new non-HID Honda Accord or Toyota Camry or Dodge Ram. In that case, no, the SilverStars have no advantage whatsoever over a normal bulb other than cosmetic appearance. However, when a SilverStar bulb is combined with the Sylvania Performance reflector and lens (i.e., their H6054 replacement sealed beam, which is what is on my Jeep), it's an excellent upgrade, the best DOT-legal pattern I've seen. The reflector and lens is what makes the difference in this case.

That said, if you want excellent DOT-legal lighting performance that's identical to the SilverStars (right down to the lumen performance as measured by my photometer) save for the cosmetics of a whiter light, get yourself some Sylvania XtraVision H6054's. They're $5 cheaper apiece; they use a high-output 'unfiltered' halogen bulb in the same reflector and lens assembly. It produces "traditional" colored halogen light, that's the only difference. The pattern the Xtravision throws is identical.

If you're willing to put non-DOT legal gear on your truck and risk a ticket or failing inspection, then I'd go with some Hella or Autopal H4s. I do that on my Jaguar XJ sedans because since it's an unusual European car, *nobody* knows what it's supposed to have and you can get away with almost any modification on it. The Jeep is an American car with a common knowledge tech base, so there's less I can get away with - especially since I live a block from the local cop shop.

[Sbonley]

In my first Cherokee I put the Cibie' lights in with 55W low beam 100W high beam after several years of this everytime I hit the highs all of the lights, including dash, would go off. I blew the engine shortly after that so I never got it fixed. With the next Jeep I put the Hella's in with stock wattages. Both are a vast improvement over the stock lights but I prefer the Cibie' lights. Last weekend I put in the Painless H4 wiring harness and put the 55/100 bulbs back in. You could see the difference even with the stock wattage low beams over the stock wiring harness. Just a long way of saying Yes go with the H4 headlamps and a wiring harness with relays coming from the battery for full voltage to the lights.