100 watt high beams
 

Looks like it's deer season.
One of the mods I have done to avoid running over ciders at night is upgrade or install additional 100w high beams on our 2 cars.

I never posted these mods on here. But I can see how not running over animals can be very economical.

There are 2 ways to do this mod.
1, replace a 55w bulb with a 100wide bulb of the same type and up grade the wiring to handle the additional power.
2, add more lights.
3, do both.

In my wife's hyundai i did the type 1 install. These cars use H1 bulbs for high beams. And there are 12v 100w upgrade bulbs available for H1.
To up grade the lights all I did was install the 100w bulbs and that was done.
Then I had to upgrade the wiring. The factory wiring was some metric size between 18 and 20 gauge. Perfect for the 4 to 5 amp load the stock H1 bulbs draw. No way the stock electrical would support double power bulbs.
So I took the old high beam circuit and used it to slave a 30 amp relay. Power came straight off the battery, via 12 gauge wire, over current protection provided by a 25 amp inline blade fuse.
I ran 12 gauge to the drivers side light, then branched off 14 gauge to go around the back of the engine compartment. Grounded the bulbs with 14 gauge near the head light.

On the firebird it uses sealed low/high beam pop up lights. So I couldn't swap out the high beam bulb.
I did replace the stock lights with LEDs.
This car got the type 2 install, removed the blinker housings and stuck some small after market 12v 100w lights for a tractor trailer. I used the existing high beam circuit to power a 30 amp relay, 25 amp fuse coming off the alternator this time. Then wired the lights pretty much the same as on the hyundai.
I'm going to put blinkers back on there soon.
With the double high beams on this car I was able to clearly see a tabby cat run across the road over 200 meters ahead of me last night.
The high beam power requirement is around 26 amps.

On the suburban I built a new all stainless steel bumper and included a spot to mount a 100w LED light bar.
Which is probably equal to around 1,000w of incandescent light.
Then I will likely stick 1 or 2 more 100w lights on top of the cab later on.

You might want to think about it.

Any link to a 100W H9 bulb? You know, just in case they decide to fix my Malibu...

Go HID.

You get 3 times as much light as a 55 Watt halogen bulb for just 35 Watt.
Chinese HID replacement sets can be had as cheap as about $25 including shipping, that is for a complete set with bulbs and ballasts (like this one and this)

I replaced the halogens in my (projector) low beams because I could hardly see at night, and got overlooked by other road users too :eek:
HIDs took care of that, and the pattern was perfect.
The discharge chamber in the HIDs was actually slightly smaller than the filament of the halogen bulbs and located in the exact same position.

I would not recommend using HIDs for low beams in reflector housings designed for halogen. High beams though - all the way :thumbup:

Apparently a H9 bulb is a H11 style lamp with a slightly modificated connector. The difference is the slightly higher power use (65 Watt) and light output.
See http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/...-and-H11-bulbs
That said, a H11 HID set should outperform any halogen H9 set with ease.

Many 'H11' sets do not have connectors at all; they come with 2 metal pins that need to be plugged into the (female) H11 connectors of the car. The H9 to H11 conversion should be quite easy on that one ;)
If you go with a loose pin set mind that they are +/- dependent.
Check which end is + with a volt meter or simply swap the pins if the light won't shine.
As with halogens, never touch the glass. Clean with paper and pure alcohol if in doubt.

There are HID kits in any color.
Mine are 5000K which means white with a slight hint of yellow (much whiter than halogen tho).
6000K is most common, which is white with a hint of blue.
8000K are distinctly blueish, above that verges to purplish and attracts the attention of the law.
I've seen 3500K, which are much like halogens, just 3 times as bright - or 5 times if you go with 55W HIDs (which seems like overkill to me).

Building on a good idea
 

Have you considered a dual Hi/ Low configuration as well. Ca allows 6 forward facing wight lights 2hi+2low+2fog/drive don't know about Nm . This helps to fill the holes in the patern caused by the shadow of the low beam element in sealed beams . On my Dodge if I hold the dimmer switch half-cocked it dues hi+low lights up the road pretty well . But this overloaded the system after about 2hrs and lights out for 3sec. @60 mph till something reset got lucky theas trucks are known for light switch fires. So I recommend using relays +diodes kit or diy .
-high-beam-conversion-kits
My 06 Subaru Forster was set up as push to switch on hi off low and pull for both+fog/drive. Most of my night driving was in pull mode. Was going to flip flop the signal wires ,except this bypassed the light switch/ +auto light control/ + warning buzzer allowing me or others forget the lights on.
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What kind of range are you giting out of your leds what pattern did you decide on,spot/ flood/fog?
Tip:
If you have an animal in the road flash your lights . Most my Dodge is an exception, have a brief moment of no light in between hi and low , this gives the animals a chance to get there bearings and get out of the way. With my Dodge the contracts in the switch overlap, so I have to turn the head lights off briefly at the light switch as hitting the dimmer is useless . This was passed down from my grandmother who lived near Yosemite National Park 100'sof deer killed yearly on loacal roads and hiways she went 53years without incident using this trick and quick reflexes. Its saved me more than once.

Ah, one thing with HIDs to warn for is that they take time to go to full strength.

They start with a flash, then go dim, then slowly build up to about halogen level in about 10 seconds, to full brightness in half a minute.
The flashing at start can be handy to warn the deer, but it is not a controllable feature. Can't do it twice in succession.

If you buy after market lights chances are they are going to come with 55w H3 bulbs.
You can find 100w H3 bulbs at local auto parts stores.

I was able to find 100 watt H1 and H3 bulbs on amazon and ebay.

NM has few laws and no vehicle inspection's here. They don't enforce any laws.

I though about using hid lights but didn't go with then exactly because of the low brightness startup.

Then there's this:
http://www.dx.com/p/joyshine-s7-h11-...t-bulbs-444842http://img.dxcdn.com/productimages/sku_444842_1.jpg
At 30 real Watt they should be almost 3 times as bright; specs say 3200 lumen(s) - that would fit 30 Watt for high yield LEDs.
The price ($40 for a pair at the moment) is tempting, I may try them out as I can always put them in my fogs, they're H11 too.

I considered LEDs also. I already put LEDs on the fire bird and suburban. I found LEDs will ice up in a good winter mix storm even when they are on, they just don't make enough heat to prevent ice build up.

With that giant heat sink the head light housing cover wouldn't fit. If that heat sink ribbon did fit under the cover, putting the cover over the heat sink kind of defeats the purpose of having a heat sink.

Very good point about the startup time. My factory hid lights in my Lincoln are low beam and very nice and bright. The high beams are a halogen bulb that fill in the high beam area. The hid lights stay on in both low and high modes.

The only trouble I see for me is some lifted truck tailgating me with high beams on. I can flip my mirror, but it is annoying to adjust my side mirrors until they finally go around.

Then I would have brighter brights than they do...