Headlight upgrade

Looking to change out my headlights but not really wanting to spend 900+ on some. Looking for something along the lines of the pics posted.

 

If you read on here, the consensus is the only headlight housings that will last are OEM ones. Everything else is prone to failure. They'll leak, build condensation, etc.

 

If you wait they go on sale from time to time. This is what Black Friday pricing was like this year.

 

If the goal is better night visibility, I'd stick with OEM halogen housings and get the yellowest halogen bulbs that I can find (short of straight up yellow fog light style).



But if you just want your truck to look like a newer truck.. it's a problem not worth spending money on. Just trade in for a newer truck with factory LED.

 

Get what you like. None are the same quality as OEM. You can get some clear coat to protect them from UV fade. I use Mothers Aluminum polish with a Mothers Powerball attachment on my drill on my faded OEM lights and they look good for months.

 

I wasted a lot of money to make my truck look like a newer truck. Still looks old and performs exactly the same as when it looked older.

 

Mine have been great! Amber for the win though

 

pshhhhhhh, why newer?!

 

I got sold on the facelifted truck look.
if I could go back Id still replace the arb bumper for a pelfreybilt, but keep the prefacelift front end. paint the grille white + clean up and do the black headlight mod for $800 less

I do like it though

 

So the first picture is your truck now?

 

nevermind i understand now, I think it looks sweet! I didn't know what you meant exactly by newer. I personally do like the 2.5 gen front end more. That bumper is a lot nicer too. They changed the ARB bumper a lot for the 2.5 gen

 

That might be the "consensus" on this forum, but it's certainly not fact.

 

Do you have more to add or just the contrarian post?

 

Did that rub you the wrong way or something?

It's not simply "contrarian"; just adding additional information: non-OEM doesn't necessitate an item being "prone to failure", even for headlights. Plenty of people have run aftermarket options that don't fail and in many cases perform better than OEM. Plenty of cases where it's the opposite as well. But blanket generalizations like the one I quoted tend to not be true.

 

Do you have proof or is this just your opinion?

 

Please define "perform better." Personally, I've seen many, many aftermarket headlights that don't come close to putting down - in the right places - the light that OEM headlights housings do. Scatter light everywhere? Oh yea. Occasionally, I've seen aftermarket housings that flood the foreground with light - at the expense of any distance lighting. Many folks take this increase in foreground light to be "improved performance" - right up until they nail a deer at 65 MPH that they never saw.

I think the important thing to remember is that "performance" can be a tough thing to define. I will tell you that as an employee of a Toyota dealership, I've never seen aftermarket headlights last nearly as long as OEM.

 

Proof of what? That non-OEM doesn't equate to an item being "prone to failure"?

I didn't think that needed further explanation—but apparently it's a surprise that non-OEM parts have a range of quality based on their specific design and MFR: some better, some worse, some equivalent, etc. But if you need humoring, there's literally one in post #7 in this thread. You can find other examples by searching on this forum as well. Personally, I've used and abused many OEM and non-OEM products for many vehicles that haven't failed; I've also used and abused OEM and non-OEM parts that have failed.

I'll leave it at that as it was just a simple statement about the blanket generalization made. Take it or leave it, doesn't matter to me.

 

The OEM H4 halogen lights seem like the best halogen lamps I've encountered on any vehicle with halogen headlamps. I can't recall driving too many vehicles with halogen projectors to compare. If you want a different style lamp with extra features LED and DRL bars aftermarket is your only option. I like the look of the Morimotos with the DRL bar. I wanted to get some aftermarket F-150 LED lamps, that were pretty fancy with extra features, but they seemed to have issues out of the gate and had extensive lead times. Too be fair some of the OEM LEDs also had issues.

 

Nope, luckily you haven't rubbed me at all.

And yes, you're just trolling offering nothing but snarky replies. In headlights specifically, non-OEM options tend to have shorter lifespans with suboptimal performance.

 

This. Sure some people luck out, but if you want to buy a headlight for a 2nd gen, and you want it to reliably last, get OEM. I've had great luck with aftermarket taillights, so I'm not ragging on all aftermarket lights, but I just think from what I've seen online that front facing lights take so much more abuse and high pressure water and such that they don't last long term (ON AVERAGE), like OEM do.

But some people would prefer to ignore this huge database of people trying to help others make an informed choice.