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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 03:31 PM
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Head Light Bulbs

Hello Everyone,
I have a 2000 F-250 Superduty Lariat and I need a recommendation on which light bulbs I can replace the stock bulbs with that will really brighten up the road for me at night as I am getting a little older (65 years young) and about to make a 6000 mile round trip from Washington State to Texas, Arkansas, Ohio and back.

I did the light bright mod on my old 86 idi but not sure if I can do that on my 2000. Also I generally buy parts online since Motorcraft parts are usually to be had online a little less expensive than local auto parts stores.

Thanks for all your help.
 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 04:44 PM
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Update your housings to the non-fluted 2003+ design. You won't get much improvement from bulbs with the OE lenses.
I got mine off wrecked trucks on Ebay 10 years ago, but rock auto has some decent repops for a decent price I put on someones truck last year. Worked great.

These are pretty good drop in bulbs...

Phillips X-Treme Phillips X-Treme
I don't remember if our trucks have 9004 or 9007 so get the right ones.

Also, if you can wire a relay so your bulbs get battery voltage Through heavier wiring and better plugs instead of the original stuff you will see a difference.

 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 04:52 PM
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The TYC Brand in this link

I usually go with the CAPA certified, but I'm not sure that it makes a difference besides cost.

I guess I'm assuming you have composites and not sealed beams (H6054)


EDIT: You mentioned Lariat, pretty sure they al get composite headlights.
 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 04:56 PM
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https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...y-upgrade.html

Amazon Amazon
 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 05:07 PM
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Thanks kbeefy and all who reply. I will look into replacing stock composite and I will probably do the so called light bright mod with heavier gauge wire hooked up through 5 pin relays for each bulb.
 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 05:37 PM
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@pete500 as has already been mentioned by @kbeefy , two of the best upgrades you can do is get a clear lens housings and a relay harness. Below is my journey with a similar harness that kbeefy posted.

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...-pictures.html

The OEM headlight wiring is a joke. The bulbs kbeefy recommended are great bulbs as well, another FTE'r here ( @SkySkiJason ) recommends HELLA 100/80 bulbs which are very cheap to purchase.
 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 06:34 PM
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Yep. ‘02-04 lenses (Eagle Eyes brand is fine), relay harness from www.rallylights.com - just call them, awesome customer service!!) and HELLA 100/80 watt bulbs. About $250 for everything. Installs easily in about an hour.

This makes your 2000 go from DANGEROUS to drive at night to pleasurable. I’ve put this combo in literally dozens of trucks. Everyone loves it. If you WANT more light, add some driving lights. (I like to put them on a 3-position switch / ON/OFF/ON w/high beams.)

DOES NOT blind other drivers like drop-in LED/HID bulbs do.

Here’s a couple I’ve done recently.


 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 06:35 PM
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What do you think about adding some auxiliary lighting? Like maybe adding a good set of aftermarket lights to compliment your headlights. I've done the 2002-2004 headlights and even gone so far as to add some very high quality LED bulbs to the headlights. I'll be honest....nothing has made as much a difference as the set of KC driving lights I added. Just something to think about.
 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 06:40 PM
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Originally Posted by F0rdc0wb0y
What do you think about adding some auxiliary lighting? Like maybe adding a good set of aftermarket lights to compliment your headlights. I've done the 2002-2004 headlights and even gone so far as to add some very high quality LED bulbs to the headlights. I'll be honest....nothing has made as much a difference as the set of KC driving lights I added. Just something to think about.
The LED’s just don’t put light down the road like a good halogen bulb in a lens designed for it.

The LED in stock housing scatters thd light making it annoying AF to other drivers while not projecting lightcas far down the road.

We’ve ripped those sorry LED/HID drop in bulbs out of trucks and tossed them in the trash after customers see what the relay harness and 100/80 watt bulbs can do.
 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 07:20 PM
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Originally Posted by SkySkiJason
The LED’s just don’t put light down the road like a good halogen bulb in a lens designed for it.

The LED in stock housing scatters thd light making it annoying AF to other drivers while not projecting lightcas far down the road.

We’ve ripped those sorry LED/HID drop in bulbs out of trucks and tossed them in the trash after customers see what the relay harness and 100/80 watt bulbs can do.
The LED's that I am running are not your run of the mill LED's. I completely understand what you are saying about the scattering light that's attributed to HID'S and even some poorly designed LED'S.
 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 07:45 PM
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Originally Posted by F0rdc0wb0y
The LED's that I am running are not your run of the mill LED's. I completely understand what you are saying about the scattering light that's attributed to HID'S and even some poorly designed LED'S.
I have not seen a drop-in LED bulb that could perform as well as the halogen bulb I recommend. Some that went in the trash were not ‘cheap’. If they had decent light, they were OBNOXIOUS to other drivers. Still no comparison to high beam output of good halogens.

The HELLA bulbs are very economical AND do not annoy other drivers at all.

https://www.summitracing.com/parts/hla-900710080w





 
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Old Apr 18, 2020 | 07:58 PM
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The LED's I run are not OBNOXIOUS and in fact they mirror the beam pattern of a factory halogen. Even run them in my fog lights. I would not recommend them however. All that they offer over a factory halogen is "whiter" light. This doesn't really translate into brighter light. Just a different shade. The usable light it just about the same. I don't doubt the ability of the HELLA bulbs. I do know that you can only get so much out of the headlights. Nothing beats a good set of driving lights or even a lightbar....
 
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Old Apr 19, 2020 | 12:19 AM
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Another happy customer here with eagle eyes + harness + hella 80/100w bulbs
 
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Old Apr 19, 2020 | 06:27 AM
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In addition to the aftermarket headlight harness the others have mentioned, if you want to try something that takes a little more work but lasts longer than halogens and puts out way more light, you can try LED sealed beam bulbs.
In XL style sealed beam buckets: https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...tes-led-s.html
Hacked into aero housings: https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...-take-2-a.html
 
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Old Apr 19, 2020 | 03:56 PM
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Originally Posted by F0rdc0wb0y
The LED's I run are not OBNOXIOUS and in fact they mirror the beam pattern of a factory halogen. Even run them in my fog lights. I would not recommend them however. All that they offer over a factory halogen is "whiter" light. This doesn't really translate into brighter light. Just a different shade. The usable light it just about the same. I don't doubt the ability of the HELLA bulbs. I do know that you can only get so much out of the headlights. Nothing beats a good set of driving lights or even a lightbar....
I've had these LED/HID/Halogen bulb discussions with many people over the years and here as well. So many folks have been exposed to and or used or seen cheap Chinese garbage LEDs, so its very hard to get folks to understand the difference in the cheap LEDs and the High Quality LEDs. It not about how much you pay for the bulbs, its the Technology that makes the difference, that back up the claims. It reminds me of in recent years where guys that had made the transition to a T4 SXE line of turbos and trying to get people to understand that the T4/SXE line of turbos where far superior to the 38r and any 7.3 drop in Turbo for that matter. Everyone swore up and down that it wasn't true. Now that so many guys have done the T4 change over and posting up there results, guys are understanding and it's catching on.
So too has the LED technology changed drastically in the last couple of years. No 2 LEDs bulbs are the same. An LED is an LED is an LED no longer applies. This is my Testimony on my case for the LEDs. I run TRS/Morimotos 9007 LEDs from TRS lighting within 03 headlamps, as well as their TRS/Morimoto fog lights on 2 of my trucks and the lighting is far superior to anything that a Halogen bulb can ever do with in the our stock Headlamp buckets. This is the company that I've spoken of in the past. TRS lighting/Morimoto. I'm sure that there are a few and I mean very few other companies out there that have invested so much money into the R&D that TRS Lighting/Morimoto has in to development of these LED bulbs for the market. The only option that I've found that offers better lighting than the TRS/Lighting LED swap would be a TRS/Morimoto Projector bulb conversion. But I'll post it up, and it's to everyone else to do their own research as I have done over the years in order to understand the differences that I've mentioned here.
https://www.theretrofitsource.com/90...007?quantity=1
 
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