This is my first post to the forum, though I've been sand-bagging for almost a year, great info!

I am planning on swapping the foglight bulbs from stock to 9005 100W or 65 watt bulbs. Am I going to notice much difference from 42W to 65W, or should I go with the 100W bulb? I searched and found mention to cracked lenses when using the 100W bulb. Is this something that only affects Lightnings?

Thanks.

 

they will MELT your lenses..........................................!! !!!!!!!

 

Hi,
They MIGHT melt your lenses and/or wiring harness...
The lenses are good up to 214F - I just went through a nice article (below) - IF they are plastic...
You might want to calculate how much current you'll drain from the battery with your new bulbs. To be able to guess if your harness could support the current... and would not melt....
For me, the harness is more important thing to consider because it'll take more money to replace
Any way you might want to go through the link below even though it's for Taurus. It has some info you might want to think of...
Hope that helps...
Alex.

http://hanker.tripod.com/headlights.htm

 

OK, I've been quickly steered away from the 100W bulbs. Good article Alex. Is it safe to assume the 65W bulbs will plug in without much worry of lens/wire melt?

 

Hi,
I would say yes...

I am not sure if I need to say that here… but some one might be interested and listening…
Unfortunately for me I did some investigation on the subject after I bought 100/80W 9007 bulbs for the truck…
Here is the summary:
1. Your best bet is stock wattage bulbs – 65/55W. You should be very picky about the bulbs because some of the stock wattage bulbs could give you more output then some of the high wattage bulbs. So do your search depending on light output and appearance you want to achieve. Eurolite makes good stock wattage bulbs.
2. There have been reports that high output bulbs can melt out either housing or wiring harness. For instance PIAA 5120 (am not sure on the number though) with 5000K has the history.
3. If you decided to go for high wattage bulbs your best bet is to install HD wiring harness. That'll give you maximum of what the bulbs can produce and will protect stock wiring harness. The harness should have relays on it.
Here you could buy the harness:
http://jen.liu.tripod.com/suvlights/id14.html
or here:
http://www.hioutputbulbs.com/compt.htm
4. With high wattage bulbs you probably should not use high beams while car is not moving, just to prevent possible melting…
5. You might consider installing fog or driving lamps instead

For me, as for now I use stock harness and don't have any problem but will install HD harness soon. I added Hella FF100 fog lamps and, man, what a difference!

Hope that helps,
Alex.

 

Advanced Auto had the 9005 65 watt Sylvania Super Blues for 12.97. I popped a set in my fogs and they are much brighter.

have had them in for a week with no issues thus far.

No I'm off the do the "foglights with Auto-off" mod - found here in older posts

 

Thanks guys, going with 65's.