Adding driving lights to E-450 (UPDATE)

I have the Aux Lights Mex posted above, in the spot beam pattern, rather than flood, that come on with my high beams, which are the 6054 5"x7" sealed beam of yesteryear. GE nighthawks.

Before I bypassed the headlight switch with thicker wires and relays, I had silvania sealed beams and the GE light distribution is way better. I was getting nearly 3 volts drop over the stock wiring, and upgrading the wiring for less than 0.3v drop, was good for at least 30% extra brightness.

The Cree spotlights mex posted, well the ones I bought needed some loving. The endcaps were not installed very well, the Orings on the bolts were dry and preventing the bolts from bottoming out and sealing the ends. Pretty easy to remedy though with some silicone grease and a hex driver. I was also not so impressed with the location of the LED emitters withing the reflector housing, but the beam is fairly concentrated in about a 7 foot diameter at 85 feet. Their Aim is extremely important.

I find with the halogen yellowish high beams and the whitish blue of the LEDs leaves some weird contrast issues, but there is a lot of light on the road when I do ask for the high beams.

I have issues with glare from other vehicles, even new models whose LEDs or projectors are designed around the LED or HID light source, and not just the widespread illegal drop ins. Even halogen projectors, since so much light is forced out of a smaller aperture, is dazzling/blinding, if ones eyes are in its path.

An old stone shipped and pitted windshield is also a big hindrance.

Many of the illegal LED bulbs in halogen reflectors have such poor light distribution, my highbeams with the Cree assist allow me to show my displeasure at their choice of forward lighting.

Glare to oncoming drivers, and adequate ability to see the road ahead will always be at odds, but so many of the LEd drop in kits have such poor light distribution in so many vehicles, it is dangerous to everybody on the road, even the person behind the glare.

For slower speed driving, yellow lighting at 150' is useless to me. OEM bulbs, relays, ceramic sockets, Silversnot miracle bulbs, whatever, was useless. I changed to CREE LED bulbs and now the first 50' is lit with white light. The thirty dollars I spent in California was a waste of money to get the headlights aligned in a state approved lamp alignment facility. Yeah, the voltage at the sockets is within .2vdc of battery voltage.

BUT BUT BUT

The new bulbs do not light up the road at a distance. I would guess beyond 100' the lighting is the same or poorer than 100/80 Hella El Maximo incandescent lamps.

My lights never did offend oncoming traffic when on low beam.

After suffering years of blinding HID brand new car blue dazzle, I am convinced regulations governing car lighting aren't worth two honkers of snot. BMWs and Ford lighting seem to be especially obnoxious.

I am going to install focused SPOT LED aux lamps to light up distance lighting. Rather stupid to try and illuminate beyond a quarter-mile distance (with OEM lamps) to blind other drivers without helping to see. The new intelligence in government regulations.

Now try and convince me, looking at a welding arc of approaching car lamps makes me safer when on the road.

I have since changed the original bulbs in the headlights to LED. The new LED's light up the area close to the front of the rig that used to be dark, the light has changed from orange to white and I can see just fine. The new bulbs plug in and are easy to install. test driving a few nights ago and I got no flashing from on coming vehicles and at first I though I would. I noticed that some new vehicles have brighter lights than mine, it's a sign of the times I guess.
For 120 bucks, i say this project is a success.

Here is a lamp that will simply knock your socks off. It operates with an integral voltage regulator so the lamp is fully bright at 10-30 volts. I have purchased and sold over 100 of them.

They use CREE (3) watt chips x 6 for 18 watts.

But in reality at 12.00 volts the draw is like 1.1 amperes

IP67 waterproof and when they say these lights are submersible they mean it. Under three feet of water. Lit. For 2 weeks.

Light one up

"One amp? NO FREAKING WAY!"

way

An insane amount of light. Color is white but the amount of light is darned close to that of a 7" 6013 halogen headlight!

way

I am hyper fussy about LED lighting since I make my own. And the output of this lamp is stunning. No burnouts in 6+ years.



The price is unbelievably low. If it impresses this dour engineer, I can just about guarantee it will do the same to you.

Just remember, a bit over ONE AMPERE.

eBay

Thank you for explaining that!

Gdetrailer wrote:
DRLs typically used either the headlights (low beams) at a reduced voltage (does not burn at full brightness) or a separate low brightness powered, which MUST AUTOMATICALLY turn on anytime the vehicle is running.

Gdetrailer's info is generally right on.

I just wanted to add that, while some vehicles do use the low beams (either at low power or very occasionally at full power), it's also common--I think perhaps more common--to use the high beam lights at reduced power for the DRLs. Certainly that's been the design used on the cars I've had with DRLs.

The high beams have a couple of advantages here: they aren't designed with a cutoff generally below the eye level of oncoming drivers, so they're more visible, and typically people use the low beams more than the high beams on headlights so the low beams tend to burn out more quickly. Using the high beams for DRLs thus doesn't impact the life of the headlight bulbs as much, particularly when it's a single dual-filament bulb and both low and high must be replaced simultaneously. (I'm talking about incandescent bulbs here, of course, and not newer technologies such as LEDs or HIDs.)

I think a few vehicles used the parking lights, too.

Harvey51 wrote:
Vehicles imported from USA to Canada must have driving lights. I learned on the Siennachat forum that all Toyota Sienna vans are manufactured with driving lights. For sale in US the driving lights fuse holder is left empty and the modification to allow them to be imported is simply to insert the fuse. Very sensible. Our 2004 E350 has no obvious post-manufacture modification so maybe the same thing applies to Fords.

I think you are mixing up things a bit.

I suspect the Canada requirement is for DAYTIME RUNNING LIGHTS or DRL.

Per Wiki (although not the greatest source of info it was handy to find) HERE

A daytime running lamp (DRL, also daytime running light) is an automotive lighting and bicycle lighting device on the front of a roadgoing motor vehicle or bicycle, automatically switched on when the vehicle is in drive, emitting white, yellow, or amber light to increase the conspicuity of the vehicle during daylight conditions.

DRL and "driving lights" are two entirely different functions.

DRLs typically used either the headlights (low beams) at a reduced voltage (does not burn at full brightness) or a separate low brightness powered, which MUST AUTOMATICALLY turn on anytime the vehicle is running.

"Driving lights" or "Auxiliary" lights are typically add on aftermarket lights which typically only supposed to be burning with main low beam only.. and are added on to aid the existing OEM low beam lights.

Some of these aftermarket lights are not allowed to be used for "on road" purposes since some exceed wattage/brightness limits for forward facing lights..

These are not required to turn on automatically but now days they are supposed to automatically turn off whenever the high beams are turned on.

Not to be confused with "Fog" lights which have a special purpose beam pattern which has a sharp top cutoff..

And yes, many vehicles may already have DLR harness in place, but may lack other needed parts like fuse, resistor (reduces the current through the low beams), relay(s) or in most new vehicles BCM (Body Control Module) programing enabled... So, your mileage may vary if trying to use the OEM wiring harness for DLRs..

Op did not really mention the reason for the driving lights so one can only guess that it is either for helping the OEM pathetic lights or possibly DRL.. My bet is fixing the OEM lights..

Vehicles imported from USA to Canada must have driving lights. I learned on the Siennachat forum that all Toyota Sienna vans are manufactured with driving lights. For sale in US the driving lights fuse holder is left empty and the modification to allow them to be imported is simply to insert the fuse. Very sensible. Our 2004 E350 has no obvious post-manufacture modification so maybe the same thing applies to Fords.

Check out https://www.nilight.com/

An OP here has a light bar set in the bumper of the late model Ford under his Phoenix Cruiser. You might want to look into that setup.