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Aftermarket Driving Lights 200 1989

Some general guidance:

You need to consider the type of driving you do, in order to choose the appropriate auxiliary lighting. True fog lights have a relatively short-range beam with a wide-angle spread, and a very sharp vertical cutoff. They are mounted low, typically below the bumper, in order to minimize the reflection of light from water droplets (or snowflakes) back into the driver's eyes. Due to the broad beam spread, they are somewhat useful as 'cornering' lights, but they don't light up the road hundreds of feet ahead. Hence if you do a lot of high-speed driving at night, these won't help much.

Pencil beams are the opposite. These are tightly-focused, long-range beams, typically with a round (actually conical) beam pattern. These are great for lighting up the Lausanne Straight at LeMans or for driving relatively straight roads with no oncoming traffic.

Driving lights fall somewhere in between, but from what I've seen most are closer to pencil beams than fogs. Beam pattern is narrower than fogs and usually has a sharp vertical cutoff to minimize dazzling oncoming traffic - but you should still turn these lights off if you have oncoming traffic, unless you aim them downward, which then limits their usefulness for lighting distant objects. Driving and pencil beams are mounted at about the same height as the headlamps.

About 10 years ago, Hella marketed their "XL" lamps, which functioned as "extra" low beams. Although rectangular, their beam pattern emulated that of the European low beams (which we dearly covet for our Bricks) with a good beam spread, sharp vertical cutoff, and a 15 degree rise to the right. I mounted these on 3 cars, a Jetta and two 245's. The size was reasonable, I could mount them above the bumper to minimize damage from stones (and my wife's "park by Braille" technique). They didn't have quite the range I would have preferred, but with proper aiming I did not have to turn them off for oncoming traffic, and they gave me a pretty good carpet of light for maybe 30 yards ahead of the car. They enhanced - but did not replace - the stock, awful low beams on the late-model 240's. Sadly, these are no longer available except by chance on eBay.

Like so many other thinking and motivated Bricksters I have pondered other options for lighting. From available market offerings, if I had the money I would probably pick the PIAA dual-beam lamps (fog and driving) and take my chances by mounting them below the bumper. Absent oncoming trafic, a pair of Hella Super Oscars mounted above the bumper would be my choice.

As the other respondent mentioned, check out anything Daniel Stern has written re automotive lighting.






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