Any one interested in buying pre-made head light upgrade harnesses?

[Jimbos76cj]

Ive talked with a few YJ and CJ buddies and they have suggested making the head light upgrade harness and selling em. I like the idea but Im not sure if there would be enough interest in em to go forward. Ive got a few friends with stock CJ's and I figured Id make a test kit off one then try to install it in a few others to make sure the wire length is correct to be a direct bolt in. For a stock CJ I should be able to make em so the only thing the purchaser would have to do is relocate the stock low and high beam wires to the relays, make the crimp connections, and wire the power supply into the solenoid.

the kit would consist of all new
high beam relay
low beam relay
2 water proof fuse holders
all power and ground wires for the lights upgraded from 18/20ga stock to 12 ga.
new head light connectors.

Any thoughts or input??
was thinking in the range of $55 shipped. If your interested let me know and the first couple of set ups Id let go for the cost of the material and shipping just to get some real world input.

 

[Petescj]

I'll step up to the plate. What headlights should I be looking for? I go in to work at 3am alot and many of the roads have no lighting whatsoever. Id like to upgrade for sure.

 

[Jimbos76cj]

You get to pick your headlights.. Or use your current ones. This would upgrade your wiring so that all the head light power does not go from your solenoid, through your fuse block, to you head light switch, to your dimmer switch then Back through your fuse block and out to your head lights through your horribly thin 27-37 year old wiring then finally ending up at your head light.. By upgrading the wire to a larger gauge and getting the power from the solenoid/batt lug you get at least a full 12 volts. Ill try to dig up the article and chart but in pretty sure with the stock gauge wire running to the head lights your getting around 60% of your lumens from your bulbs.. What I want to make eliminates all the running round sourcing parts and building the wiring harness your self.

 

[Jimbos76cj]

In many cases, the thin factory wires are inadequate even for the stock headlamp equipment. Headlamp bulb light output is severely compromised with decreased voltage. The drop in light output is not linear, it is exponential with the power 3.4. For example, let's consider a 9006 low beam bulb rated 1000 lumens at 12.8 Volts and plug in different voltages:

10.5V : 510 lumens
11.0V : 597 lumens
11.5V : 695 lumens
12.0V : 803 lumens
12.5V : 923 lumens
12.8V : 1000 lumens ←Rated output voltage
13.0V : 1054 lumens
13.5V : 1198 lumens
14.0V : 1356 lumens ←Rated life voltage
14.5V : 1528 lumens


The Europeans take a slightly more realistic with their voltage ratings; they consider output at 13.2v to be "100%". The loss curve is the same, though. When operating voltage drops to 95 percent (12.54v), headlamp bulbs produce only 83 percent of their rated light output. When voltage drops to 90 percent (11.88v), bulb output is only 67 percent of what it should be. And when voltage drops to 85 percent (11.22v), bulb output is a paltry 53 percent of normal! It is much more common than you might think for factory headlamp wiring/switch setups to produce this kind of voltage drop, especially once they're no longer brand new and the connections have accumulated some corrosion and dirt.


Stole this from here..
Daniel Stern Lighting Consultancy and Supply


Also if you ask around I bet you can find many of jeep owners that have had issues with thier lights due to the switch over heating, plugs melting or just funk and corrosion getting on the contacts. By changing it over this set up the oy voltage drawn through the switch is the minute amount needed to trip the relay.

 

[Petescj]

Thatll work. I'll get some good pics showing the before and after with stock headlights then Im going to add these.

IPF 920H - IPF H4 Headlamp Upgrade for 45-06 Jeep® Wrangler TJ, TJ Unlimited & CJ - Quadratec

 

[Jimbos76cj]

PM sent.

 

[Jimbos76cj]

Thatll work. I'll get some good pics showing the before and after with stock headlights then Im going to add these.

IPF 920H - IPF H4 Headlamp Upgrade for 45-06 Jeep® Wrangler TJ, TJ Unlimited & CJ - Quadratec

Do you know what the watts for the lights you will be using are? Only makes a difference for sending the right fuses.

 

[DHugg]

Ive talked with a few YJ and CJ buddies and they have suggested making the head light upgrade harness and selling em. I like the idea but Im not sure if there would be enough interest in em to go forward. Ive got a few friends with stock CJ's and I figured Id make a test kit off one then try to install it in a few others to make sure the wire length is correct to be a direct bolt in. For a stock CJ I should be able to make em so the only thing the purchaser would have to do is relocate the stock low and high beam wires to the relays, make the crimp connections, and wire the power supply into the solenoid.

the kit would consist of all new
high beam relay
low beam relay
2 water proof fuse holders
all power and ground wires for the lights upgraded from 18/20ga stock to 12 ga.
new head light connectors.

Any thoughts or input??
was thinking in the range of $55 shipped. If your interested let me know and the first couple of set ups Id let go for the cost of the material and shipping just to get some real world input.

The only downer I see in your plan is crimp connections. I keep away from these as they are not really water-proof and will collect dirt, hence corrosion. The price quoted is well worth the convenience, materials bill OK, but I would run away from it solely because of crimped connectors.

 

[Jimbos76cj]

The only downer I see in your plan is crimp connections. I keep away from these as they are not really water-proof and will collect dirt, hence corrosion. The price quoted is well worth the convenience, materials bill OK, but I would run away from it solely because of crimped connectors.

The only connections that would be crimp would be the 2 for the relay triggers. Every thing else is crimped soldered and sealed with adhesive shrink wrap. I was even going to add 2 adhesive shrink butt connectors for those connections. It would be up the the installer to make the connection as weather tight as they want it. Considering the connections that are currently there are crimped from the factory and not water proof running the full amperage of the lights.the factory splices the two headlights off the same line.. So for stock cj 55 way lights the main line and first crimp connection are pulling about 10amps. It takes .1-.2 amps to trigger the relay.

I can add 2 spade connectors for the relay so the cj head light wires could be hooked right into relay.. But then it would need to be crimped on.

If you never had the opportunity to go through a cj harness the. Your missing out on factory crimped wires insulated by duck tape.

Trust me I don't like butt crimp connectors either.

Thanks for the crunstructive critisism..

 

[Jimbos76cj]

So update on the harness making.

I was able to dig up a female connector forthe head light plug so now this is a plug and play set up.

Im still waiting fer a few connectors to come in but heres how its looking so far



The tan and green wire plugs into the stock head light housing, the fuses will attach to the batt side of the solenoid the ground should go to either the batt or groung terminal on the motor that goes to the batt. plug the new grey head light plugs in onto your light bulbs. Im hoping to get em tested and a few ready to go out mid july

 

[Dan86CJ7]

any thoughts on price? I did just do H4 upgrade and then read about the harnesses and had plans to make one at some point but this would deff save time.

 

[Jimbos76cj]

any thoughts on price? I did just do H4 upgrade and then read about the harnesses and had plans to make one at some point but this would deff save time.

Trying to keep it around $60 shipped.. to do the wiring upgrade your self your looking at around $40 in parts and having to but connect every thing together. This is made out of all 12 gauge wire for the power, relay to the head lights and ground. The 2 switch wires and relay grounds are 16 gauge. All terminals are crimped and soldered. the ring terminals will be crimped soldered and shrink wrapped.

 

[jdarg]

I would suggest putting some split loom around the wires for abrasion resistance. You might want to also consider just selling the parts as a complete kit for folks to solder them up themselves for a little less $$$.

Its a good idea - wish you luck.

 

[Jimbos76cj]

I got split loom on order with the ring terminals.

 

[Jimbos76cj]

Parts are all in.. Once I get back from my trip Ill get the first few trial harnesses out. after about 2 weeks of them being installed Ill start listing them up for sale.

 

[Jimbos76cj]

I would suggest putting some split loom around the wires for abrasion resistance. You might want to also consider just selling the parts as a complete kit for folks to solder them up themselves for a little less $$$.

Its a good idea - wish you luck.

that would be a option also.. only thing is the relay terminals and all the factory style terminals take a special tool to crimp em.. could they be crimped with regular crimpers probably.

 

[ROB03HD]

Ill be waiting on this. My connectors are crapping out. Have to jiggle the connector at the headlight about once a week to get it back on.

 

[Jimbos76cj]

Ill be waiting on this. My connectors are crapping out. Have to jiggle the connector at the headlight about once a week to get it back on.

Rob I sent you a PM.

Im almost finished with Pete's.. unfortunately I some how forgot to orger black wire for the ground so Ill need to pick up a roll tomorrow. heres how it looks.



It will go out tomorrow so hopefully I will get some feed back from him in a few days as far as installation goes. I have another one going out to a YJ owner this week so if any one has a YJ and needs one made up I should be set on those also.

 

[ROB03HD]

Just pmd you back.

 

[tarry99]

NICE harness