I decided to upgrade the headlights on the Cadillac using the JW-Speaker LED lights for Harley Davidsons in 5-3/4" size. The problem is the mounting brackets for the Cadillac are REALLY shallow - following the same shape as the backs of the original sealed beams. The LED lights have big heat sinks on the back of them and that doesn't fit. Not wanting to cut up the original brackets - I tried to fabricate my own on which work, but I'm not 100% satisfied with them... Before I try and revise the design on the home made ones - I'm wondering if anyone can recommend some brackets either aftermarket or from another vehicle that might be more suitable? End result is good though! Output is so much better than the old halogens. Where we live the temperatures are very high so enjoying the old cars is more of a night time activity - so good lighting is important! Some pictures of the first fitment with the home made brackets... Low Beams - just the outer two lights. High Beams - connected to all four.
Well unfortunately there's not a whole lot that I could find in the way of decent upgrades in the 5-3/4" size... The ones I really wanted were the Valeo Xsighting Xe5R's but they've been out of production for a few years... They were good quality OEM style HID headlights with high and low beam and a classic reflector style... Couldn't find any retaiilers with any stock left... Only other alternative I could find was Delta - which has a HUGE DELTA text on the lens and also states "Off road use only" because they are essentially HID bulbs in Halogen housings - which means bad optics / beam patterns that will blind everyone and you still can't see all that great. The JW Speaker / Harley Davidson ones... okay sure they don't look all that original but from the drivers seat, there's no complaints! At least being chrome, if I didn't point them out, they're not that obvious. They have the DOT markings so the beam patterns satisfy the requirements for road use. It's the same family of light that Icon4x4 uses in the 7" size on their Bronco vehicle - and having seen their workmanship on the FJ40s first hand I know if it's good enough for Icon it's good enough for me. At least in Chrome it's less obvious than the black on that particular vehicle. Add to that it being a Harley Davidson branded part - it should be something high quality. I should point out that just under the JW-Speaker name the 5-3/4 size only comes in black. Chrome are the ones they manufacture for Harley. I'm happy with it - it works well - I just want to improve the mounting method with some better mounting brackets... Otherwise I'll have to revise my home made design and try version 2.
A few more pics from a show and shine today for those that aren't convinced... When they're turned off they're not obvious if you're not looking for them... looking at the car as a whole they don't really jump out... only friends that knew I'd put them in noticed them. But when you turn them on... what a difference... very happy. Personally think they fit quite well with all the chrome that is on the vehicle... Just need a better mounting method!
Just thought I'd try asking one more time otherwise I guess I'll try to fabricate version 2 over the weekend...
Nice car but those headlights really detract from it IMO. Kinda like looking at a beautiful woman and then seeing she is really crosseyed ! Don
Such a nice car to have headlights make the frontend look so bad. Takes away from the classic look and makes it look like an aliens spaceship. Have you tried any of the larger truckstops for the lights,they have plenty of different setups in your size.
Not really looking for any different headlights after what these cost! Like I mentioned above - very few options jumped out when I spent a few days researching what was out there on the internet... certainly not with the kind of output that these have. Don't really have many options in the smaller 5-3/4" size. Lots more options in the more common 7" size. They really don't look that out of place to be honest... At the end of the day if you want that level of light technology you need an optical lens to do it safely and efficiently, and there's just no way to make them look like they're from the 50's. Here's a friend's 1957 Chevy with the headlights from a modern Mercedes G-wagen... looks good to me and not all that different to the lights I've chosen... but being 7" there's a lot of options available. My plan for this is to do quite a bit of modern technology / restomod features - but as much as possible try to keep the original look of the car... and I think complaining about the look of these lights would be like complaining that you can see disc brake calipers through the spokes in the wire wheels even if the calipers are blacked out... (the long term goal) - yes it may upset the purists - but at the end of the day it's meant to be driven and enjoyed... not parked and preserved... And for something this big, and irreplaceable, and in a country where the weather kinda dictates that we normally take the old cars out at night, and where we have some pretty bad drivers (no lights at night!) or debris on the road from the third-world-style trucks, I want good lighting. When I can solve the mounting issue perfectly so I can get them aligned properly - I'll take some before and after shots with the exact same camera settings so you can see the difference. And on that note - anyone got any experience with the 5-3/4 sizes and know of any alignment brackets from some other car that have lots of clearance? Or maybe any good aftermarket ones? My searches are coming up empty...
Is it that dark in Dubai that you need those kinds of lights ? Camels on the road ? Most of us on are running two regular lights and do fine, you had 4 on there. I owned a 59 Caddy, among a lot of other Caddies, and never felt the need to change the lights out. That truck you pictured looks like something is missing out of the light socket. Just wondering what the motivation was. Don
Put a pair of #4537 aircraft landing lights in the high beam spot ,you will see that camel att 100MPH. Them lights are fugly ! And I hate HIDs in non-aproved housings ,don't much care for them in the right housings either.
If you are intent on keeping them, and I don't think they look all that bad, what with the crazy looking parking/turn lights under them, I would look for a used set of stock headlight buckets and then cut the back out of them and make it work that way.
Yep - we have roads that are unlit and we also have roads where the street lighting has akward spacing on it, so you have some quite dark patches between the light spots... The real issue is how much there is to hit on the road... there's LOTS of stray / wild cats running around... along with wild dogs, goats and camels. Cats will just make a mess, but if your instinct is to swerve, or panic-brake when someone's following too close, that could mean body damage. Dogs / Goats could definitely do body damage. A Camel could actually be fatal for the people in the car, as the hood will take out the legs and then the body of the camel will slam through the windscreen. So being able to see these things at a greater distance is a definite advantage and lights with good optics that put out a WIDE beam will help you see these things before they run out in to the path ahead of you. The next issue is debris... on the highways that's a big problem. A lot of the truck drivers here simply aren't educated on securing their loads. I've seen old tires, mattresses, wooden objects, and even the metal crash-bar that would be behind the plastic bumper on a modern car, all lying in the middle of the highway. Very common. One guy hit a mattress that actually got stuck under his car and lifted the drive wheels off the ground. Granted the Caddy has a lot more weight and a lot more wheel travel, but that's still a fire risk if something like that gets wedged under there... The crash-bar - some guy hit that in a Nissan and managed to totally bend the rim out of shape and deployed his airbags... and then decided the best thing to do was leave the car in the middle of the 6 lane highway with the lights off at night... nearly causing countless other accidents. I used my Jeep and all it's auxiliary lighting to come back on the sand at the side of the highway and flood-light the stopped vehicle giving the other traffic a chance to see it... we were able to get the car and the debris off the road when there were gaps in the 75-90mph traffic but unfortunately by the time we could get everything cleared, 7 cars had hit that metal debris. I've also seen an 18-wheeler truck with a flat-bed trailer take a corner a bit too quick and dump it's entire load in an unlit area - it's load was 5 ton bags of cement. Again I went back and used my lights on the sports car to shine on the debris - because that would have been significant damage if someone came around the corner and hit these things... Good lighting out here will definitely reduce your chances of having an accident. Safety is definitely the motivation. Also that truck is mid-resto-mod-rebuild, there will be a trim piece around the headlight when she's done
Dang man if you have that much crap on the roads,just drive the car in the daytime and get you a heavy-duty truck for night driving. Like said the larger trucks use the halogen bulbs that are bright enough and don't have the spaceship look to them. The ones in your friends truck take away from the truck as bad as the Caddy.
Don't worry I have a heavy duty Jeep that has well in excess of a street legal amount of lighting ;-) Mine's the one on the left - the older generation. That over-head light bar has 100 LEDs on it with optic lenses and reflectors. It literally turns night in to day. Honestly - once you're used to HID and LED technology - road legal Halogens just aren't enough... At the moment my FJ-45 is now the only car still running halogens but that's more because the Cadillac is the current money-pit and will resume spending on the FJ later. But anyway = looks like there's no ideal solutions for the light brackets - so over this weekend I'll try and figure out a version 2 bracket system that will give me the ability to aim these things and mount them 100% securely.
You know, I'm interested in this for my '60, but have only come across this thread just now. Laurie - can you edit those posts and re-link the pics? I'm really curious how these look, and how far along you've gotten. ~Jason
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