DRL... The hard way.

[after oil]

Sorry to revive such an old thread, but its a good one and I need a little advice. I'm having troubles finding the right bulb to use with this setup. I want it to fit in the extra socket on my headlight assembly. Just have no clue where to start figuring it out, aside from the socket type. Any thoughts?

this is how mine is set up and it works great. ive got 10w bulb in there and its fine for DRL.
look for a wedge type bulb thats all glass with just the metal contacts sticking out, no plastic

[Green1]

It might be worth looking for an LED bulb that will go into the city light spot and is bright enough.

LEDs are very directional, that socket doesn't really face forward... I don't think it's a good candidate for LED

[loki]

It might be worth looking for an LED bulb that will go into the city light spot and is bright enough.

LEDs are very directional, that socket doesn't really face forward... I don't think it's a good candidate for LED

I didn't say it was 100% that is would work. Not all LED bulbs are the same there are different configurations and different types of emitters, just think it might be worth a look.

[Erebus]

Mine has now become, to paraphrase the thread title, "DRL ... the even harder way". It now has 3, yes, count them, three, relays.

Okay, so Green1 soldered in his bulbs. I did it properly and replaced the base of the socket with dual-filament bases, and just plugged in the LED bulbs. Well, it didn't take too long for them to die. The bulbs that is. You could tell it wasn't the wiring, because one of the bulbs (a 9 LED one), you could see that 3 LEDs were off, 3 were flickering, and 3 were on. Then gradually they all died. (I'm suspecting they overheated, since the bright setting was only intended as turn signal, and therefore would never be on more than 50% of the time, and for short times anyway. (Ya, but why didn't Green1's burn out? Just because.)

I spent ages trying to find reasonably-priced external LED lights, to no avail. So finally, I went to Princess Auto and bought some small, cheap white fog lights (standard H3 bulbs). I mounted them on the bull bars (using hose clamps).

Of course, the wiring I was using for the old setup was 20-gauge, so no way it was going to support running two 50w bulbs. Therefore, another relay was called for, mounted on the underside of the body, above the skidplates, with power coming straight from the battery (via fuse) to the lights, with the old circuit now being the trigger for the new (third) relay.

I actually really like my new setup. The lights are very bright, and because they are really cheap fog lights, they aren't focused down the road with a flat top, they basically send light everywhere. In other words, they suck as fog lights, even from about 80 degrees off axis, you can see light. Therefore way better than minimum legal for DRLs. In fact, when it is dusk out, I will run with them plus parking lights, specifically because they aren't as well focused as the headlights. So I'm more visible.

Because they are in a small metal housing, they run very hot, so when driving in a snowstorm there is no way they will get covered in ice. So hot, that the headlight protective film I put on actually melted within 10 minutes.

I returned my parking lights back to factory single contact, so I could put the old single-filament incandescent bulb back in.

All in all, way too much work. But I do like the results!

[Erebus]

this is how mine is set up and it works great. ive got 10w bulb in there and its fine for DRL. Look for a wedge type bulb thats all glass with just the metal contacts sticking out, no plastic

I don't think 10w would be sufficient to be legal. Most stock DRL lights are equivalent (or actually are) to turn signal bulbs, which I do believe are 35w.

But I suppose it depends on whether you want to be sufficient you won't get a ticket; legal; or be clearly visible to other drivers. I've opted for the third one.