The ultimate headlight upgrade H4 (not LED or HID)

I also would not overthink this. Plan on these headlights as consumables every 10 years and they still don’t really exceed the cost of LED assemblies. And they hold their own performance-wise.

 

So are you going to replace the DRL bulb with an LED? I may do the same. Let me know if you find out which size bulb we need to shop for

 

Will do.

 

Does anyone know if buying the Right #81110-04221 and Left #81150-04221 headlights plus new bulbs and running the original OEM harness that came with my truck will work? Have a '12 TRD OR. I cruised through a decent amount of comments but couldn't find any similar questions.

 

Stock bulbs or the Phillips Racing GT200 stock harness is OK
If you want to go high powered bulbs you need the upgraded harness

 

Crash, any intent to test and see how bad these mini-projector LEDs that fit in place of a H4?
I'm sure they are garbage but are they hot garbage?
I saw a video of one that looks like it actually had some up light, so I got a little curious

 

Pretty sure I know the product you are talking about, cause I’ve seen it make the rounds lately. But the concept isn’t new, it’s been around before, just has another new push on an old failed idea. But got a link?

 

not offhand but I'll try to grab one next time I see one

 

Assuming you are talking about this


How well is that going to work with a glare guard in an H4 headlight, directly in-front of the "projector"?

Shown with a bi-directional LED failing to illuminate the entire housing. That glare guard is going to result in direct obstruction and near-zero output. So you'll need to bake your headlights, remove the lenses and do a sudo retrofit to remove the glare guard then try to reseal it all in order to run some absolutely awful fake projectors. If you are going through that effort level, just do the real thing.



These products are just another Chinese snake-oil product praying on those that don't know better. Its going to be garbage, even if you go thought the sudo-retrofit efforts to remove the glare guards. Stick to products from actual reputable lighting manufactures for real performance gains.

 

that's the style I saw
not looking for myself, I like having snow melting functionality

 

Does anyone know where I could find two Osram AllSeason 85/80w bulbs?

 

They have been out of production for quite a while now and sold out pretty much world-wide. You can find some listings for them still for sale in Russia, hard to say if it is legit. But those were hard to get shipped out before 2022, I'd bet pretty much impossible now with sanctions.

 

https://parts.germaintoyotaofnaples.com/p/HEADLAMP-ASSEMBLY---LEFT/69343385/8115004210.html

https://parts.germaintoyotaofnaples.com/p/HEADLAMP-ASSEMBLY---RIGHT/69343306/8111004210.html

might have finally found them in stock for my 06! or am i reading the supersession section wrong? I called them, and they said this is the "post-tsb" part and I should be good. But not sure I trust the parts guys

 

Unfortunately that does not look to be the case. Correct new part number is listed at the top, with old part numbers as superseded, but then at the bottom it says this part has been replaced by the old part.

 

Does anyone have insight on the H4 version of the Morimoto 2Stroke 3.0 bulbs? I read a couple posts by @crashnburn80 recommending the H11 2Stroke 3.0 as one of the better drop-in halogen replacements but H4 LED bulbs almost universally underperform compared to stock. They appear to use Lumiled chips instead of OSRAM but more or less has the same design. The part that really interests me is the shade cup design that supposedly eliminates the 12 o'clock dead zone by reflecting some of the light upwards.

TRS explains the science here though I'm not fully convinced.
https://blog.theretrofitsource.com/tech-tip-2stroke-3.0-h4-shade-cups

 

I've not tested the H4 version of the 2stroke 3.0. I highly doubt the reflective cup design eliminates the dead points in the upper reflector so much as does a much better job than competing products at reducing the size of that dead area. You still have an opaque blade PCB that is not possible to illuminate directly above, unlike halogens, even if you use clever reflecting surfaces to reduce the dead zone above the PCB. Note the H4 isn't spec'd as thin as the H11, 2.0mm vs 2.4mm. While the Morimoto 3.0s look to be some of the best PnP LEDs, I would not recommend using a replacement LED in a reflector housing assembly, you will get better performance with performance halogen products.

 

Just added a ground-switched harness from Headlight Services LLC in combination with Osram 100/90W to my 01' DC. Huge difference. Most difficult part was following the factory routing by the radiator, but that isn't necessary. I still need to adjust the bulbs now that I can really see where the cutoff point is. I would consider this mod a MUST to any Gen 1. Thanks, Crash!

 

Wanted to pop in and give an update on the upgrade (been running it since February). This is by far the best upgrade I’ve done to my 03. Extremely easy and fast to do. Put all new light housings in along with it and the difference it made was incredible. I can actually see while driving now haha. Thanks to Crash for all the help!

 

Obviously, discussion of this upgrade is fine in either location, but wanted to ensure you guys are aware of the Proper headlight upgrade thread, that's 1st Gen-specific.

 

I view this thread as the conical home to the general upgrade since it is practically the same for both Gens, the 1st gen thread as more of an offshoot. I post all my 1st Gen stuff here as well, but follow both.