Headlight Upgrade For Ford Cargo Vans?

[Trekking]

Anyone do a headlight upgrade in their Ford cargo van? The factory old school glass headlights stink on the highway and back roads. Any suggestions on an upgrade?

Thanks

 

[LowTech]

What year is it? They changed the light style along the way.

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If you have 7" round these will work.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/7-STOCK-STY...05&prg=11353&rk=1&rkt=6&sd=330946545038&rt=nc

My Ford van is `70 w/ round. I know they changed to sqaure at some point.

 

[66788]

My 1989 Dodge van has rectangular Halogen quad lights and they are among the best I have had. I like the old sealed beams much better than the composite lights of newer vehicles.

 

[Trekking]

Sorry, the year would help. 2004

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My 1989 Dodge van has rectangular Halogen quad lights and they are among the best I have had. I like the old sealed beams much better than the composite lights of newer vehicles.

The newer Ford vans you can see a long way with the low beams and high beam lights the highhway really nice.

 

[SternWake]

Keep in mind that if you have built a van for dwelling, the beams need to be readjusted lower as the extra weight sends them into the trees


I just Googled 2004 ford van. These are Sealed beam bulbs in the 6054 size.

The BEST sealed beam replacements are GE Nighthawk.

The BEST h4 replacements, these are reflector housings in which one can change just the bulbs like in newer vehicles are Cibie.

Hella H4 in the 6054's are OK, but once the low beams are aimed correctly, the high beams are too high. Any 6054 sold on Ebay is absolute junk. Do not waste your money or time installing them

JW speaker makes excellent LED lights in this size, but they are like 1000$ for a pain
Trucklite are also very good, and about 600$ a pair

There are dozens and dozens of 6054 size h4 replacements sold on Ebay. They are all horrible. Horrible optics, horrible beam pattern, cheap plastic lenses. total junk. Avoid Avoid Avoid.

Get a Multimeter on the headlamp plugs, with headlamps on. Measure the voltage at the plugs and compare it to battery voltage with the engine running. I made a new headlight harness with relays reducing my voltage drop from 3 volts to 0.3 volts.

HUGE HUGE difference in light output.

Halogen bulbs do get dimmer over time.

I have GE nighthawk 6054s and when they get 14.4v they are better than 85% of the vehicles that pull up next to me.

Do not, NOT, try and put HID lights into halogen housings. Do NOT try and put LED lights into halogen housings. BOth are ineffective, illegal and blind oncoming drivers.

Headlights and signal lamps are safety devices. Humans are no good at determining how well they can see something, and in general any floodlight will make the human think they can see well, but there is a lot going on in a properly designed headlight to make them safe and effective.

Yes improvements can be made, No, they are not sold on Ebay.
Please read up on this site.

http://danielsternlighting.com/home.html

Daniel stern is the authority on improving vehicle lighting.

He responds to Emails fairly promptly with recommendations.

Candlepower forums transportation section is another great source on how and more importantly how NOT to, upgrade your lighting.

http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb...s-Included&s=b5a7ad5179ba74dd69ce79497c527cca

http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb...best-6-quot-x-8-quot-sealed-beam-replacements

http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb...hts-for-Ford-Van-than-stock-H6054-sealed-beam

Just keep in mind that how well you can actually see, can be completely different than how well you think you can see. And you will hear dozens of storied by those that did such and such and think their lights are awesome, but they are not. The inexpensive Ebay 6054s and other sizes, are a complete joke, and criminal.

Lots of "upgrades" are serious downgrades, as well as being illegal and annoying to other drivers.

Proper Voltage, proper Aim and getting rid of Wagner or Sylvania sealed beams in favor of GE Nighthawks will Yield impressive improvements. Sylvania are pretty much junk. the Silverstars....Well Sylvania got called on their BS marketing and have been fined huge sums for it. Their "whiter' lights, have a blue glass on the bulb which reduces Lumens, making it so the filaments have to be overdriven just to meet the minimum Lumen output standards, yet they make these ridiculous claims about how much better they are. These overdriven filaments blowout very prematurely.

Better would be Cibies with some Osram or phillips bulbs
Best would be JWspeaker 8800's

Trucklite LEDs are good, and they are now rebranded by GE

http://www.amazon.com/GE-NIGHTHAWK-...F8&qid=1418879618&sr=8-2&keywords=GE+LED+6054

Cheapest will be a relayed harness feeding properly aimed GE nighthawk sealed beams 6054's 14+ volts.

 

[LeeRevell]

My only experience with Sylvania Silverstar is the KLR-650 First Gen motorcycle. They are a major upgrade from the junk bulb that KHI uses for OEM headlights. They also last fairly well. A good thing as getting the bulbs in and out of the fairing is a PITA.

My new-to-me 1988 E150 has a funky headlight problem. They light the road about twenty feet ahead, and cannot be adjusted up any further! I am still working on that. No sign of front end damage. I will check deeper into it when I replace the radiator and rip out the nonfunctional AC gear. Maybe I can replace some parts from my 1986 parts van? My immediate quick fix is installing a pair of driving lights on the bumper to augment the headlights.
On prior cars I have always upgraded from incandescent headlights to halogen, and it is a major improvement.
Another point on the motorcycle systems is the harness. The hot ticket is to do as SW says, going with a new harness using a relay. It allows more power to the lights, by taking the switch and it's smaller wiring effectively out of the pathway for the headlights. Result is significantly brighter headlights! I will explore this idea for the van too.

 

[MikeRuth]

3 volts is a HUGE drop, holy smokes, I'm checking mine this weekend.

 

[Seeker]

I have the truck lite on my Chevy and absolutely love them. The jw speakers are maybe better but cost more.
A SEEKER

 

[SternWake]

The original current path for the headlights on my 89 dodge was
through bulkhead connector
through headlight switch
through Dimmer switch
back through bulkhead connector.
Low beam first went into driverside then back out around firewall to passenger side
High beam split shortly after bulkhead connector and went to each headlamp individually.

Now these wires( after the second pass through bulkhead connector) trigger relays, and the original current path only carries current for the signal lamps and the current required to hold the relays closed. I Did not cut original wiring, I just stripped some insulation and soldered wire to it for triggering the relays. i could plug in my original H4 connectors and have fully functioning, but much dimmer headlamps.

So now the headlamp switch no longer gets hot
The dimmer switch no longer gets hot
The contacts in the bulkhead connector no longer get hot
The Signal bulbs also get more voltage and are brighter.

I made my own harness from my previous 12AWG Ancor tinned marine 3 wire sheathed solar wiring.

I used new H4 connectors with 12awg pigtails( most are 16 or 18 awg)
I pulled power for the relays from the alternator to battery feed.

My lights are impressive. But I would love the TruckLites or JW speakers.

Since the LED lights pull much less current, they do not require the upgraded headlight harness. They are also regulated for constant light output no matter the input voltage.

Once I have a GE nighthawk fail, I will get the Cibies, as they still appear stock, and One can use higher wattage (offroad only) bulbs in them, but these higher wattage bulbs absolutely require the upgraded wiring harness.

 

[masterplumber]

Stern Wake, thanks for all the great info, I definitely echo not just trying to put a different bulb in the old housing (at least I think that's what I read into what you said). I tried that on my KLR. It was ok when I went back to a bulb with only slightly more output, but when I first tried to go to a really powerful bulb the lighting got worse. High beam was all but unusable as I think the output wasn't matched to the reflector and lens. You could actually see blank spots in the light pattern. My dad ran the Cibies in a couple vehicles back in the late 70s and they were excellent - I didn't realize they were still around.

 

[SternWake]

Vehicles that use replacement bulbs, which fit into projector housings, are those that should not have Retrofit HID or LED bulbs inserted into them.

Sealed beams like the 6054s are a different type of bulb.

Cibie, and many other outfits make a 6054 size bulb which allows one to insert a replaceable bulb into it. The Cibies are the best, the Ebay offerings are pure dangerous and illegal junk. the Hella's are OK but there is too wide a spread between high and low beam. Autopal makes a glass lens 6054, that are well marketed and a step above the cheapo Ebay offernings, but have a very poor beam pattern and a re a step down from the GE sealed beam nighthawk.

The reflectors for halogen bulbs are designed around the pinpoint source of light from a Filament, and putting in an HID bulb or an LED bulb simply cannot replicate the proper reflection of a filament, and the reflector sends a portion of light where not wanted or needed and too little light where it is needed.

There are some well marketed Aftermarket Halogen bulbs whose quality control is poor and they move the filament a MM or 2 in or out, and this kills the efficacy of the headlamp.

Generally Phillips and Osram bulbs are high quality.

Bulbs with Blue glass or blue bands on the glass are merely a putrid attempt to make the light appear whiter. Because the blue actually reduces output, the filament is overdriven to meet the minimum light output standards, So the mere fact that these bulbs claim to help you see better, is fallacy.

It is merely an attempt to get those fashionable, trend following people nimrods who have infiltrated society to make it seem like they have factory HID bulbs like which come standard on BMW Merc's and Audis.
The whiter the light, the worse the contrast when the road is wet.

Now there are those who goto great lengths to retrofit projector HIDs into their halogen housings. Since the projectors are designed around the HID light source, these seem to be a much better option. unfortunately implementation of these projectors into halogen housings can be very poorly done, and far from weatherproof, and far from being able to be aimed properly.

http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?380558-What-s-wrong-with-projector-retrofits

 

[highdesertranger]

again stern you da man. I already knew about cibie, but those were some great links. highdesertranger

 

[Bdog1]

+1 on the "Truck Lights" LED replacement units. The lower power draw avoids the need to add relays and the light output is excellent. Only drawback is the $.

 

[Trekking]

Thanks for all the info, I picked up a couple of GE sealed beam nighthawks, local for $30.00 for 2 sealed headlights.