[ROVERNET - UK] More on Lights - 2 from Fletcher

Glen Wilson rovercar at comcast.net
Sat Feb 10 13:38:44 GMT 2007


Relaying for Fletcher:



-------- Original Message --------
Subject:     More on LIGHTS - 2
Date:     Thu, 08 Feb 2007 03:08:07 -0500
From:     Fletcher <gofanu at usachoice.net>
Reply-To:     gofanu at usachoice.net
To:     rovernet at lyris.ccdata.com
References:     <E1HElT1-0006hi-02 at tachyon.nipltd.com>


Gents-
Well, once again Rovernut has eaten my post I guess. I posted an 
extensive reply last night under "More on LIGHTS" 3:36AM, with an offer 
for an even more extensive tech article. It hasn't appeared in the 
digest, and nobody has requested the article, so I will resend it 
separately. While the preceding will answer many questions, the 
clarifications I will give here may be more valuable if read first.

 > The big problem I have found is at night some people will actually 
find themselves forgetting to turn on their proper headlights ...they 
can see fairly well but the system only turns on the low intensity 
daytime lights but not the running lights ...I often find myself coming 
up behind a car without the tail light on because the driver has only 
the daytime running lights working and forgot to switch on his regular 
lights.
 >
 > Regards
 >
 >  Dennis Brooks
Daniel Stern told me that this is a major problem in Ca. I suggested 
that running/tail lights should be ON with DRL. He said that the 
regulatory argument was that having the taillamps ON in daylight 
decreased the contrast of the brake lights, hence it is not done and may 
(can't remember)not be allowed. I think that is excessive, considering 
that all new vehicles have third brake lamps. Making the brake lights 
bright enough to be visible in daylight with adjacent tail lamps ON 
causes them to blind drivers at night. I have a cure for that, which I 
was supposed to send him some time ago - thanks for the reminder.
 >> If manufacturers seriously intended for them to be *daylight* running
 >> lamps :-
 >> 1. they would have included a light or headlight activated interlock 
to disable at night.
 >> 2. Not mounted them 100 - 150mm from the road surface.
 >>
 >> Dave South Oz
 >>
 >> Paul Smith wrote:
 >>> DRLs are meant to be Daytime Running Lamps; why are they the size of
 >>> spotlights, and mounted in a useless location for anyone to notice 
during the day?
 >>>
 >>> PVS
I don't think the things you are referring to are OE DRLs, as they ARE 
interlocked with the headlamps, and are NOT mounted low. The only lamps 
that are correctly mounted as low as a foot above the road are real fog 
lamps. Real DRLs are not "the size" or at least intensity, of spotlights 
- they are as Dennis says, about 1/2-2/3 of low beam.
 > A borrowed "Roo Shu" ... I noticed not much seemed to be happening, so I
 > carefully approached a grazing roo so he didn't see me and activated the
 > device. I didn't even get an ear quiver!  Maybe his iPod was turned up.
I take it this is an electronic device ? Never saw such.
 > I find my diesel Land Rover Defender on approach scatters sheep far more
 > readily than any of my mate's petrol vehicles. Must be a Defender thing!
Does it have a turbo?
 > Date: Wed, 07 Feb 2007 05:56:44 -0500
 > From: Glen Wilson <rovercar at comcast.net>
 > Message-ID: <45C9B06C.3010808 at comcast.net>
Glen-
No offense, but you are missing the reality here. I will go through it 
point by point. If you had my "missing" post you could get it, but maybe 
it will help if I relieve you of some misperceptions first.
 > First of all, I driven across Pennsylvania numerous times on I80 where
 > Fletcher lives. I wouldn't really mind so much having a 500,000
 > candlepower lighting system out there because for most of the way the
 > eastbound lanes are out of sight or the westbound lanes behind 50 yards
 > of forest or a mountainside. There are no lights. But if you're going to
 > share the road with other drivers, you can't be permanently blinding
 > herds of deer in the adjacent woods.
Don't have 500,000 cp. wouldn't use it, don't recommend such, spend a 
lot of time telling people to NOT do dat. Such would totally blind 
opposing traffic, even with a mile separation between lanes.
 >
 > Unless this is a hunting technique Fletcher's using, which is a definite
 > possibility in Pennsylvania.
Good for that!
 > Ouch! If I'm on the wrong side of the damn road, it's probably not the
 > fault of my headlights.
Since you are driving blind, how would you know?
3 kids from daughter's school killed here last week, wrong side of the 
road when the log truck got there. Bad snow and slippery to be sure, but 
neither driver had a clue there was oncoming traffic, until they made v. 
heavy contact. Maybe some light would have helped, maybe not.
 >> Did you ever hit a fallen tree, or even a single branch?
 >> Did you ever hit a rock in a rockfall area?
 >> Or a piece of something off a truck, like a tire tread or a 10 ton
 >> ingot, or 20 tons of rebar?
 >> Did you ever hit a horse, cow, deer, bear, moose?
 >> Person?
Me in my million miles? One deer with bad lights, one deer with good 
lights in a situation where I saw it but couldn't do anything about it. 
All the rest avoided because I could see well outside the range of OE 
lights. Several would have been definite hits at well below legal speeds.
 >> For that matter, how much for the cars you don't really need?
How much to replace the bad lights on any newish car"? Taurus crap 
lights were $165 each several years ago, Pontiac 6000 15 years ago - 
$1000 worth of crappy lights after a deer encounter that did nothing but 
break off the plastic locater tits on all 6, Audi A8 (maybe good lights, 
I never was in the car) something like $900-$1200 (x 6)each according to 
my brother-in-law. Toyota van "dimmer module " something like $800 each 
plus labor, located in the fenders, a couple hours labor, two of them.
 >> With a pair of Cibie Bobies
DOT and PA legal and so marked, correctly aimed, with standard & legal 
60/55W H4 bulbs, good wiring but not up to what I now know. Used instead 
of my usual E-codes because big trucks are subject to draconian 
inspections at the whim of any bored cop. I have several times been 
detained/inspected for in excess of 1 1/2 hrs, when the law states 15 
minutes max if there is no obvious problem, under the story "truck this 
old gotta have something wrong with it" Never a ticket, And they looked 
at those lights a lot. Cars don't have this problem generally.
 >> and a pair of Cibie 195 fogs,
Likewise, correctly mounted low and aimed dead level as fogs are 
supposed to be. Using them with headlamps ON was a violation per PA  but 
not Fed regs at the time. PA until recently required Fog or "driving" 
lights to be wired such that taillights were ON and headlamps OFF when 
aux lamps were in use. Considering the plethora of apparent OE vehicles 
running fogs/driving/aux with headlamps today, this must have been 
superseded by Fed regs, I don't care anymore.
 >>  I have watched thousands of deer over a hundred miles of I80, and 
been vastly amused and considerably frightened when the driver in front 
of me started yelling on the CB "One deer by the road, mile marker 207". 
A dozen drivers answered, wanting to know exactly where the "One deer" 
was. I told them what the real situation was; that the "one deer" was 
only about 2 feet closer to the road than the rest of them, that there 
were several hundred deer visible at that location, and that there had 
been similar numbers for a hundred miles.  After a ten minute argument, 
one other driver out of a guesstimated couple of hundred in radio range 
came to my defense, nobody believed us.
 >> I pulled up beside the guy so he could see with my lights, then I put
 >> my high beams on, and he damn near crashed.
 > Doesn't sound like such a good thing to me.
It was because he was a-scaret by all them deers he now saw and never 
had before! The deal with the Cibie and E-codes is that they have a v 
sharp cut-off, above which there is no light. Likewise if the fogs are 
correctly aimed. So, I can only see deer legs, unless the surrounding 
ground is lower than the roadway. Gotta count 'em and divide by 4 to get 
the number of deer. People don't recognize all those vertical "sticks" 
as deer legs, unless they know. When I put the high beams on, he got it.
 > If you're illuminating herds of deer in the woods along the highway, it
 > doesn't sound like a well focused and properly aligned system to me,
 > especially if you're sharing the road with other drivers. Are we talking
 > about lighting up the road or blinding pilots who end up landing their
 > 757s at the local aerodrome? Full rally lighting is great for the guy
 > behind the lights.
Hope it's clear now.
 >> It costs about $200 for me to straighten the light circuit wiring out
 >> and put in the relays, and you need this whether you upgrade the lamps
 >> or not. If you can do it yourself, it's like $50 and a few hours. The
 >> good lights will not work as expected if this is not done; the crappy
 >> lights also don't work as they should without these repairs. On a
 >> older typical car, the combination of good quality 60/55W H4 lamps and
 >> the wiring work can result in approximately an order of magnitude
 >> increase in useful illumination. There is no need for overwattage and
 >> illegal bulbs, and they will aggravate poor wiring. I've got the
 >> numbers. Stay home at night if you are too cheap to buy good lights,
 >> we don't need to loose any more cars. It has absolutely nothing to do
 >> with how old the car is - it's still several thousand pounds of junk
 >> guided by a blind man when it hits me.  And do n
 >>
 >> ot try this "Moral" BS on this subject. It is irresponsible and 
stupid and immoral to drive with bad lights; and, it is equally so to 
have regulations which permit, encourage, and in some cases, require 
less than optimal lighting. End lecture, keep your good humor, and have 
a brighter ride tonight.
 > Why would you suggest that someone pay $500 for an illegal system that
 > will most likely blind oncoming drivers when you can buy a system that
 > meets your specs for $80?
My system described above is legal, DOT compliant, and the last time I 
bought lights (2yrs) the only equivalent DOT legal headlamp -Hella VP- 
were $40 each. The 195 fogs are also NLS I think, were about $75 each 
when bought, much more now. You don't need the fogs unless you are in 
(and out, inout, inout) of fog, like you are on I-80 so often.  E-codes 
are not DOT compliant, by regulation, not operation. They would be 
compliant were it not for the stupid "uplight" requirement, which only 
the US thinks is a good idea. It is really a way to penalize everybody 
for the benefit of those few who are trying to find their way among 
certain poorly designed highway signage environments. Those signs are 
impossible to read in daylight, since you have to take your eyes off the 
road repeatedly in heavy and unfamiliar traffic - else you would not 
need to read the signs. See Pittsburgh expressway bridges and many others.
 > Fletcher, I know you're in the business and I didn't mean to endanger
 > your livelihood.
FYI, I do not make any $$ on parts. I buy parts as a service to 
customers only. Stupid business move and why I am here writing, instead 
of buying stuff for me and working on my own cars. I have few enough 
customers due to my isolated location, that I don't need to loose any, 
and I consider them all as freinds. I want and need my customers to love 
driving their cars, so they wear 'em out, since I already fixed 
everything around here.
 > I just don't believe that a headlight costing $109 plus
 > $20 for a bulb is thirteen times better than one costing $10.
I don't know what lamp you speak of, since your link to DS was to the 
site, not to a specific item. I can certainly tell you that a $40 Hella 
is 10 times better than any sealed beam, that a $ 75 Cibie is at least 
twice the Hella, even if I haven't been able to buy any lately - but 
I've got some oldies around, since all my real cars have 7" rounds. It's 
all about optical systems - a $40 telescope will not do what a $500 one 
will. Lights are the same.
 > I'd be interested in exactly what configuration your lights were 
since the H4s you mention are for a two-lamp system, not the four-lamp 
system that the 2000 TC has. How many lamps are on when you're in low 
beam mode and what's on when you hit the high beams? Do you use four H4 
lamps, drive with all four on for low beam and then have four H4 high 
beams when you hit the switch?
Two 7" lamps system as above.
4 lamp 2000 system in 1970s: 2 60/55 H4 outers, 2 55W H1 inners
2 Outers only on Low beam, all 4 on High  - this was max standard E-code 
at the time, probably still is. The switching is original and the same 
as any 2000 I ever saw = many.
I aimed these so that outers were standard aim, and inners level and 
crossed about 1/4 mile out. That gives a hotspot at 1/4 mile, and a wide 
dispersed general illumination farther out. Gotta be good about your 
dimmer switch! Easy driving at 100+ in clear weather - Nevada, Montana, 
1972  Very good even in fog with just lows, but not as good as real fogs.
 > A standard $6.49 halogen low beam for a 2000TC (H5006 2C1 35 watt C-6
 > element) is 15,000 candlepower.
 > A standard $6.49 halogen high beam for a 2000TC (H5001 1C1 50 watt C-6
 > element) is 55,000 candlepower.
 >
 > I assume that these are the H1 single-element sealed beam lights that
 > became legal in the USA in 1997.
No sealed beam is an H1, as H1 is a replaceable bulb designation. The 
only known sealed beam with a replaceable bulb was the H4 Bobi, NLS, 
RIP, alas. No sealed beam is worth the effort to drop it on the floor. 
On a 2000, the scattered rays from the recessed lights will bounce 
around the reflective grillework and blind the other guy.
 > If they were all on, you'd have 140,000 candlepower which, by
 > coincidence, keeps you just under the Pennsylvania legal limit of
 > 150,000 total candlepower for headlamps and auxiliary lamps on the front
 > of the vehicle. As far as the restrictive laws are concerned, all of
 > these new cars with advanced lighting systems (which I've seen listed on
 > some cars as a $1600 option) must be below 150,000 candlepower, or they
 > wouldn't be legal. So, the legal limit of 150,000 candlepower can
 > definitely yield superior illumination without necessitating breaking
 > laws designed to protect your fellow drivers.
 >
 > Daniel Stern states that a standard H1 four-sealed beam system on high
 > beam produces about 90,000 candlepower total (all lamps), and a stock H4
 > or sealed beam two-lamp system produces about 110,000 candlepower total.
 > Those $109 lamps put out 142,000 candlepower PER LAMP
 >
 >  with standard H1 bulbs and 164,000 candlepower PER LAMP with 
upgraded H1 bulbs. Oh, and the bulbs are not included in that $109. So, 
for $218 for the assemblies (2) or $436 for the assemblies (4) and the 
cost of upgraded bulbs, you get some excellent lamps that are illegal to 
use and won't pass inspection because you're putting out about three 
times the legal candlepower.
Whatever, you can see better and there is muvh less glare. All this 
about candlepower is useless drivel - not your fault, BTW. Candlepower 
is an obsolete way of measuring, which I believe is only still used 
because it gives BIG numbers, and the uninformed think it means 
something exact. Whether you use CP, lumens, candelas, watts per sq 
meter, or whatever makes little difference, until you understand that 
all of the regs refer to testing procedures. Regulators try to delimit 
something they don't understand, using vested interest "experts". - 
light and car companies. The manufacturers try to meet the regs that 
they and the politicos settle on, at least cost, and use the numbers 
that make it easiest to do that. The sellers/advertisers use the bigger 
numbers in the range, to sell more stuff, at higher prices - frequently 
the same stuff. All testing procedures measure light in certain ways, in 
certain areas of illumination. The distribution within those areas is 
indeterminate, and much of the area outside those specfied is 
unregulated. Light color and point intensities are regulated only within 
broad limits, with little regard to actual visibility needs. European 
regs are much more real world, and seem to be under much less control of 
light and car mfrs, or they are more competent.Some light mfrs try to 
make lights based on real world performance, then worry about the regs. 
Cibie seems to be best at this, though there are a lot of other good 
lights, but I find less consistency within other brands.
American sealed beams give random rays outside the controlled area, and 
spotty distribution within it. Later lights like Ford's 9004 give the 
same but worse; GM has a set of lights that I hear are even poorer than 
9004. Good E-codes give very even distribution within spec areas and 
virtually no scattered light outside it. The actual light output of any 
60W bulb is going to be about the same; it's what happens to the light 
that matters. Nearly all modern standard tungsten or tungsten-halogen 
bulbs are 60W on high, 55 on low. 9004 apparently got an exemption for 
there lousy distribution, as they are 65/55W, though I have some that 
are 65/45. If all the light goes in the general area where you want it, 
then you have to distribute it evenly to avoid out-of-spec subregions. 
Do that and you get good illumination, little glare - very different 
than just a lot of light. 60/55H4 put out all the light you need or can 
legally use, it's the lamp's job to spread it out right. ***It's all 
about optical systems***
 > Go crazy. Install four H5001 sealed beam halogens in your 2000TC and you
 > get 220,000 candlepower (well above the legal limit) for $28. You might
 > have to change two plugs.
NO  very bad idea, hell of a lot of glare, and I guarantee not as much 
useful light where you need it as what I had. What I have thought of is 
4 E-code H4s, revised switching, with one set aimed a bit low. The low 
aimed lights would give a passable heavy fog light on low beam, a "mid" 
beam on H. The normal aimed lights would give regular on both high and 
low. You would then have "heavy fog = good illumination for a very short 
distance", reg low beam  with the two normally aimed lights on L, "mid" 
beam with the low lights on H, and high beam with both sets on H= 
spectacular close up light and good longer range. Never tried it.
 > There are halogen headlight conversion kits available that allow you to
 > get rid of the sealed beam headlights altogether and replace them with
 > modern lamp assemblies with modern reflectors that use standard H4
 > halogen dual-filament hi/low bulb. That's the 55-watt H4 halogen bulb
 > you mentioned in your post.
Conventional to put the high filament first. Standard H4 are 60W high, 
55W low. "60/55W"
 > Again, that's a two-lamp system, so you'd
 > have to do some rewiring of the 2000TC, but that wouldn't be rocket
 > science.
No. As stated previously, standard 2000 wiring is 2 outers are two 
filament H/L, inners are single filament H only. 2 L and 4 H. If yours 
is different, somebody changed it. If you only wanted two lamps, you 
just leave the inners disconnected.
Rover shop manual 1968 pre halogen:
UK-Out 50/37.5, In 37.5W; export, incl NA Out 40/45, In 37.5; Italy 
(think Autostrada) Out & In 40/45
US"special" -read "nobody else would do this stupid sh*t"
Rover parts. 1974 post halogen.
 through suffix B Out 50/37.5, In 50; after suffix B- Out60/37.5, In 75W
 > These conversion kits are available at several places on the
 > net (including JC Whitney) for $39.95 for the pair. The H4 bulbs are
 > $6.99 each for 3200 Kelvin or $19.95 each for 4000 Kelvin Sylvania
 > Silverstars.  So, for roughly $55 you can have a two-lamp sys
 > tem.
 > Splurge for the Silverstars, and you're talking $80 for the whole
 > system. Then maybe put some auxilliary fog lights in the other two
 > headlight positions, and Bob's your uncle. As far as I can tell, this
 > would be a legal system in the state of Pennsylvania where we both live
 > and would meet your specification for a 55W H4 system.
Just use the appropriate Cibie or other E-codes for good light = same 
system I had in 72. If you are really concerned about PA specs, you can 
get less than normal bulbs like 50/40W H4 or 35W H1 from Stern. The 
lamps are more important than the bulbs, which are mostly all the same. 
Asian bulbs can be crap, I only use European ones. Silverstar are 
probably good. There  are +30% and +50% 60/55H4, and I think the 
silverstars are in fact +30%, since they are now marked Sylvania-Osram - 
they are Euro bulbs! The +30/+50 is obtained by making the filament 
shorter but thinner = hotter = brighter (but not necessarily more) light 
AND better optics, since the filament more closely approximates a point 
source, which is what you really want. The +30 actually have better bulb 
life than standard due to quality control necessary to make them, but 
the +50 less, since the filament is fragile. It is not clear if the 
+30/+50 actually give "more": light - that is implied to get you to buy 
it without this long-winded tech discussion. But they do give better and 
more accurate light, which is what matters.
JCW is interesting, but be careful. They sell a lot of obsolete, etc., 
and a lot of junk. A few years ago they had the old Cibie convex lights, 
not seen for years, at really giveaway prices. If I'd had any money, I'd 
have bought dozens. They recently and maybe now, sell the Hella VP DOT 
legal light - same price it is everywhere = $40 ea. They sell Wipac 
lights sometimes, some are supposed to be great, but the only ones I 
ever had were truly awful. In the 70s, a friend wanted a tach, and 
started by getting the cheapest one they had, about $5. Didn't like it, 
so he sent it back and ordered the next cheapest. At $19.95 he got one 
he liked - the very same Smith's tach supplied in TCs, with a neat 
housing to mount on the dash or steering column. They cost about $150 
from Smith's at the time.
 > Why would you suggest that someone pay $500 for an illegal system that
 > will most likely blind oncoming drivers?
Dint do dat, oh no! "the driver you blinded is the one that is just 
about to hit you" "It ain't cool to heat crack the cop's windscreen"
 > Be a good steward and put that
 > extra $400 in a college fund for your grandson or some needy kid you
 > don't even know.
Lucky to feed me kid, me wife, meself!

Gettin' goofy, gotta sign off, cheers
FRM








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