off road light housing

[punisher1130]

I never seem to get a straight answer to this, the lights I am referring to are the non led lights that come in round and rectangle housings. Cosmetically speaking I think rectangle off road lights on a dodge look perfect but I've always been an performance over fashion type of guy. Does the housing being round or rectangle effect how the light is thrown?

 

[Buliwyf]

Sometimes. There's so many, it's hard to know for sure. But it seems like rectangle lacks throw up, which can be handy when you're going down steep inclines and PA roads. Budget lights are all about the same to me.

But LED's change things up a bit. I prefer big round lights for throw, and LED's for close up flood. If you're trying to flush fit lights into your bumper, there's nothing wrong with square.

We're running Fyrlyts and loving them, and Liteforce on other trucks. The FL's are serious $$$$ though, but more flood than the lasers of the LF's. I usually get by with my high beams and some LED's angled out to light up corners. So far it seems like the Aussies make the best lights for Ohio conditions.

 

[punisher1130]

I'm not worried about the lights being flush, I'll be putting some on my bumper and over the top of the cab so flush is no big deal. I am looking to keep on a budget ( cant afford anything over $250) and I have heard rumors on taking the budget off road lights from part stores and outfitting them to accept hid bulb kits but I'm not sure if that is true or not. From the sound of it, it looks like rectangular housings are good for flood but not so much on rang while round ones are good for spot but doesn't have very good flooding ability's, that sound about right?

 

[Buliwyf]

I'd just wait longer and save up for one single Fyrlyt. $300.

These are fair:
http://www.4wheelparts.com/Lighting...=4242&t_pn=HLA005700891&Manufacturer_PQ=Hella
These little guys are great to angle out and light turns:
http://www.4wheelparts.com/Lighting...=4242&t_pn=HLAH71020171&Manufacturer_PQ=Hella

But are we talking about close up fogs, or high speed throw? Snow? it's also fair to note that my favorite lights can be really annoying, they reflect back painfully on street signs.

 

[punisher1130]

I am looking for bad weather performance and turning night into day ( but not so much I blind the rig in front of me on the trail)so I can see where I am driving in the woods at night, I'm not looking for a lot of high speed lighting only because I don't think I will be doing a lot of high speeds off road. Not worried about road signs shinning back at me, with the weather I have here in FL, if its raining hard enough to need all my lights on, I'd must rather then shine back at me so I can place my self on the road and drive safe, other than that I wouldn't run them unless I'm on a trail or something.

 

[4x4junkie]

Something I have noticed with the way the vast majority of rectangle light housings are made, there is an appreciable amount of what would otherwise be a round reflector that is "cut off" at the top & bottom of the housing, which I think would significantly affect the reflected light output. Round housings of course don't have these cut-off areas, so theoretically should have more light output for the watts consumed.

 

[punisher1130]

So they throw the same light per wattage at the same distance and the only difference is the cut off on the top and bottom for rectangle ones and the round just throws everything every where, theoretically speaking anyway.

 

[HotNotch]

General rule of thumb: the bigger the reflector, the more light.

If you're on a 250$ budget, its hard to beat a tried and trued technology as far as lights go: Aircraft landing lights. There are several 13 volt sealed beams available, and for the price its hard to beat. The PAR36 (4.5") and PAR46 (5.75") bulbs are readily available at your nearest NAPA or farm supply store, or even cheaper from rock auto. I ran 2 GE 4509 100w 4.5" spots on the front of Toyota for years tied into the high beams with a relay, and for the price at ~30$ a light, they were damn hard to beat. You can get flood bulbs too that fit the same rubber housing. NAPA part number 80374 are the 100w spots WITH the housing, and are 24$ each. I'm running dual filament GE 4700's in the bottom grill of my mustang, with one filament for spot and one for flood, both running when I hit the switch. I've since upgraded to Hella Ralleye 4000's, but for a true budget light, the old sealed beams are hard to beat. The rated life is only like 25 hours, but thats also in a sealed housing with no airflow. I've got at least 40 hours on the set I pulled off the truck and they were working when I took them off.

To answer your original question on the square vs round debate: square housings do tend to limit the output, both in width and height, due to the limitations of not having as much curvature for the light to reflect off of.

For roof or cab mounted lights, try to stick with spot beams as they won't tire your eyes by reflecting off of the hood.

I've had (and currently have My Big A** Hella 4000's) hid swapped, and while they are brighter than halogen, they tend to lose their beam pattern, resulting in less light where you want it.

Although the newer LED's are pretty nice for up close.

 

[tommudd]

Ran the 100 watt aircraft landing lights for years on every truck, 4x4 etc I had, always worked great and a long range beam
Now you have me thinking of going back old school and cheap again! LOL

 

[thethePete]

Hella Micro FFs are pretty solid and have that rectangle look you're after. Fairly inexpensive, and I retrofit them with slightly heavier wiring and run 100w bulbs. The bulbs for them are dirt cheap, and when you run them at 100w they put out a very respectable amount of light. Hella 500s are their round bretheren and cost around the same. Take the same bulbs and and can be retro'd for 100w bulbs also. Glass lens, so no issue with melting anything, I ran them for about 18h straight when I drove across Canada in my Jetta and didn't have any problems.

Aircraft landing lights are decent, but in my experience they have a much shorter lifespan.

 

[Hilldweller]

I'd use a Cibie César 175 with a 100 watt Flösser bulb...

There are good rectangular lamps and bad ones. Good rounds and bad ones...
It's all about the parabola, if it's really tuned to the bulb, what the designer was after, and whether they really committed to it or not.
The Cibie is a very good lamp and H2 bulbs are easy to source. Narva is also a good bulb for that lamp.

 

[lugueto]

It varies too much to know.

A friend of mine has a pair of huge rectangular KC lights that match my 8" round KC's. Both use 130W bulbs and have a spot pattern. I highly recommend both of them.

Another friend of mine has the same rectangular KC's but he has a flood pattern, and another one has rectangular Hellas (Much smaller) The Hellas are pitiful with 100W bulbs.

Its pretty much what everyone has said, depends on what the manufacturer was looking for. If you want halogen lights, I highly recommend KC's. However if you're into up close distance, get a pair of LED's, they'll be much smaller and will light up the front of the vehicle much better up close. IF you want longer distance, go Halogens. HID's are out of budget..

 

[HotNotch]

HID's aren't necessarily out of the budget, there are plenty of chinese or off brand hid lights on amazon that while they do a good job, aren't the most high quality. I've had a pair of them and they didn't leak water into the housing but the aiming system was a pain. They were bright but they took forever to warm up. The OP could get some of those, but they don't have the same bang for the buck as the aircraft lights due, IMHO.

 

[herm]

I have 2 Hella 700s and 2 500s on my truck, fairly cheap and work great.

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[Buddha.]

I have 2 Hella 700s and 2 500s on my truck, fairly cheap and work great.

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How do the 500 and 700 compare? Which one would you get if you only were getting a pair?