The ultimate headlight upgrade H4 (not LED or HID)

Ohhh I see. Well glad to see it worked out!

 

I installed my new headlights and the wiring kit. Bought the lights online from Seattle Toyota dealership, on sale in the Black Friday period, considerably cheaper than anything I could find in BC
The wiring harness from Headlight Services is excellent quality, if anyone wants a review. It seems expensive in $C and we thought about building a set. It goes in easily, excellent instructions, high quality parts.
New lights are excellent,,,
I waited too long ,, just the enormous price of new housings in Canada held me back.

 

If you're dead set on keeping the spider housings... TRS ( the retrofit source) has/ had at one point much better projectors that replaced the crappy ones that came in those housings as a kit. Not sure how much work is involved and if it keeps the h1 bulb or goes to different bulb type, but just an option.

 

I’ve lived the spider headlight projector life in my old truck - 96 Dodge. Even changed over to Morimoto projectors from TRS. My recommendation is don’t do it. Scrap the headlights and get stocks. The spider lights had the bowl molded into the light and changing to new projectors involved dremeling and epoxying the new lights in. The morimoto lights suck - great illumination but such a sharp cutoff that stop signs aren’t illuminated. Go down a dip in the road and the cutoff comes right in front of the truck. Absolute garbage.

 

Yep, no uplight, typical of most all aftermarket retro projectors. Not a legitimate low beam and downgrade from stock.

 

So the proper cutoff still leaks “some” light upwards?

 

All OEM lights have uplight, which is reduced intensity light above the cut off. This allows you to see beyond your low beam without blinding other drivers and illuminate things light street signs. Without uplight you are completely blind beyond your low beam cut off in areas without ambient light due to the high contrast at the cut off line where anything beyond it appears as absolute darkness, which as mentioned above in areas with dips or short hills you may find yourself unable to see very far at all. It is unsafe and not compliant. It is much cheaper though to make projectors without uplight, it’s less complicated and no need for optical engineers.

 

Are these wiring harnesses still available from Headlight Services?

 

Yes they are. Follow the links in first post.

 

Thank you. Just placed an order for one

 

I'm just noticing the OEM 2010 smoked headlights are $227 each right now. Is that a pretty typical price or they actually on sale?

 

were? just the housing of full assembly with new dust caps?

 

Yeah the assembly: https://parts.nucartoyotanorthattle...ssembly-8111004173?c=az0xJnE9ODExMTAtMDQyMTA=

 

well that's auspicious, I just changed my lamps and discovered that the latch is broken and missing on my drivers side
I'd be tempted to just get housings but they don't have the left smoked listed

 

a little cheaper at Toyota Parts Deal
https://www.toyotapartsdeal.com/parts-list/2007-toyota-tacoma/electrical/headlamp.html?pnc=81171A

 

Bought 4 of the 100/90W from BulbAmerica, along with the Headlight Services Harness. Installation was simple as everyone mentioned. Wish I had done this sooner as I was running the standard 60W in my pro headlamps.

Total spend was $33 for the 4 bulbs and $150 for the harness.

Much thanks to this thread!

 

Just got everything installed. Wow what a difference, I can’t believe I was driving like that before lol the high beams are insane! Anyways, I adjusted my lights to the best of my ability following the article @crashnburn80 posted, after driving the cutoff seems pretty low. The center of my lights are roughly 44” from the ground and that’s what I went off of. I set the driver side at 40” and passenger at 41” while 25’ from a wall, flat ground, half a tank of gas, etc. I took a ride on a dark road with no street lights and could see everything my lights shined on extremely well, but I feel as if I couldn’t see far out from me. I don’t want to be blinding any other drivers. Does it sound like I did anything wrong?

 

That sounds like they are adjusted too far down. Maybe 2” at 25’ would be better.

 

I suppose I could have adjusted too far down. It just seemed right on my tape line on the wall.

 

4” low at 25’ turns into 24” low at 50 yards