H1 Bulbs (Help!)

I now realize that I have already made a significant downgrade in headlight output by getting aftermarket headlights. These use H1 bulbs, but I am unsure if it is just one bulb or one for high beam and one for low beam. I will check later, but right now it is 30° outside and I don’t like the cold.. anyone have any experience with these or just know which bulbs I should get the best output?

 

I’m not sure about those exact models but my tacomabeast spyder headlights also use an h1 bulb for hi or low(idr off hand). I always get sylvania mid grades and I’d compare the quality of output to the same as stock.

 

Thanks for your reply, these are also made my Spyder I believe. What do you mean by mid grade? I’m not familiar with this, as you can tell..

 

An H1 is a single filament bulb. That said, you must have separate low and high beam bulbs. Fairly common.

As far as what bulbs will give you better output, remember, a bulb doesn't significantly change a pattern that sucks.

 

Sylvania has a few different grades of bulbs. The basic bulb, silver star, and silver star ultra I believe.

Also like Too Stroked said. If the headlight is designed poorly and not dispersing the light correctly then the bulb choice is irrelevant

 

I just installed these in my truck:

They are pretty similar to yours. They use an H1 bulb for high beam and H7 bulb for low beam (although both bulbs are illuminated for high beams). When I first installed them, the light output on low was subpar at best. Also, my high beam indicator was always on. After checking relays and grounds, I noticed that Spec-D had wired the male 3 prong connector wrong so my highs and lows were both on all the time and both were dim because they were sharing the power meant for the lows. I switched the ground and the corresponding hot wire and now only the H7 bulb is lit on low and it's much brighter. It's a different kind of light spread. The projector focuses all the light from the ground up to the eye level of an oncoming vehicle. So, theres not as much light spreading upwards to where you dont need it.

Im not sure what bulbs are running what for that style but you might want to check that only one bulb is illuminating on low. If both are on, then they will be dim.

 

Thanks for your reply, I understand bulbs won’t change patterns, but surely it wouldn’t hurt to have the best bulbs since I’m already fighting bad output.

I just assume these headlights didn’t come with any sort of top notch bulbs in them, so looking to replace.

 

I see the differences now, so you run the silverstar which is between basic and silverstar ultra. Any reason you don’t run ultra or just doesn’t make that big of a difference?

 

I’d be one mad cat if they wired my stuff wrong before I even got it!

 

Haha yeah mistakes happen though. I just happen to see the ground wires on the truck running on the opposite side of the ground wires on the Spec-D harness. Super happy with them now.

 

I ran the silver stars and they did just as good or better than stock so I didn’t see any point in paying the extra for ultras. I already had people that would flash me for my low beams. I’ve always been fortunate with headlights on this truck preforming well. It did eat low beams every few months though for some reason. Several members have had this issue with any brand bulb though

 

Gotcha, thanks for your replies!

 

I think you're going to find any Silverstar is overpriced, short lived and not really that much better. Go to the Lighting forum here and do some searching on the topic.

 

If it takes H1, I’d suggest the Osram Nightbreaker Laser +150 as likely the best stock wattage H1 bulb on the market. However as mentioned a good bulb doesn’t fix a bad headlight but should be an improvement over a standard bulb.

 

Thanks!

 

You have now changed from a reflector based headlight housing to a projector based headlamp housing. With that change means that the most effective setup to utilize the the light beam and distance will be an HID bulb setup.