ewarnerusa

OK, I want more light. It'a a guy thing. I've got little fog/driving lights already. They are great for fog, but as far as driving lights I want some more. But I don't have a bush guard or anything to mount them to. You can see where I put my fog/driving lights on my factory bumper, but that is only good for narrow lights. I was looking into some 6" off road lights, but don't really know where to put them. I have a roof rack, but I like to take that off from time to time, plus with the ski racks on there in a winter it would be a pain. I don't want to put them up there.

So what are some options? I've seen alot of stuff attached to plastic on the grills, but I personally want the light attached to some metal, something solid. How about light bars that mount in front? Any opinions, ideas, and PICS (!!!) would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

L33T35T 4Runner

well if you get a roofrack...



here's what monkeynuts' 4runner looks like. when there was a truck stuck in the sand at night, he lit up the entire place with just his truck

Tacoma Dude

yeah, that rig did look impressive...

Actually, the Tacomas don't really have very good mounting spots for lights unless you do go for something on a new bumper or roofrack. Maybe look into replacing your fogs w/ driving lights and getting the small round fog lights put in at the corners?

Sorry can't help you there.

Hyperlite

I mounted my Hella 500s on my factory bumper between the headlights the lights are plenty bright to sit that close together. My TJM bumper did not have a plac to put lights either so I mounted them the same way. I made a light bar by using a light bar with six Hellas from a 2001 mastercraft x-star and welded aluminum legs to it, attached it to the fatory cross bar(the flat ones, not the raised one. It is attached via 2 thumb screws and suppoted by extra strenght cords (support and can take small impacts. I used a 2 prong trailer wire connector for the power and 12 gauge wire to wire them all to one switch. It is tall enough that I can still mount my hilift to the cross bars. It can be easily removed by detaching the cords, removing the tumb screws and disconecting the wire, i takes under 1 minute.

ewarnerusa

Well, my lights are a combo (2 lights in each lamp) fog/driving. sort of like hi beam/low beam. Both lights are 55W H3's. I want to keep them low on the truck since the fog light is their best feature and I think fogs should be as close to the road a possible. I want to spread them out someday, if I ever get the nerve to take all that plastic off again. I had an idea though..... 100W bulbs are available that fit into the same socket, cheap at Wal-Mart. I did some math and if I replaced the bulbs with 100-watters, I would be pulling (100W)/(12V)=8.3A per bulb, so ~17A versus what I'm pulling now 2(55W)/(12V)=9.2A. The fuse in the power line to the lights is 15A, so I could easily upgrade that. But would the relays be able to handle that extra current? I'm sure they are not top of the line relays, but does anyone know?

Corey

iTrader: (1)

I was going to say drill through that metal on your bumper, but I guess it's not as wide as on a '91?
That is what I did with my first set of Hella 500s.
Drilled one hole for each light, and it worked out great.

But of course I don't have the stock bumper on right now.



You always could get a TJM 16 for your rig.
I had looked into this several years ago, but went with a new bumper instead.



Or have a local custom shop weld something up for you.

ewarnerusa

check out what this guy did with my pic. What do you think of this idea?

Tacoma Dude

Looks pretty sweet. Good luck to you if you decide to do it.

Do you think it would be okay to take up that much space in front of the radiator?

EDIT:
Looks like you'd have to change the grille too!

ewarnerusa

Yeah, one of those billet grills. I think they look alright, but I'm not too excited about doing to my truck. I'm not sure about blocking the radiator, I don't think it would be an issue.

Hyperlite

You do not need to upgrade your fuse to run that much power. My six 55w Hellas are on a 25 amp fuse and have no problem. I have Hella 500s w/ 100 watt bulbs and rear 55 watt Pilot lights on the same 20 amp fuse.
A couple of guy around here have put lights behind their grill with no problem with radiator cooling, so thats not an issue.
Cory had the same idea on how to mount one set and hats probible easier then mounting them behind the grill

ewarnerusa

That's crazy, you're pulling more than the fuses are rated for. But sweet, good to know that just being a few amps over won't blow things up. I may start easy then, and just beef up the driving light portion of my fog/driving light setup. I don't want the fogs to get too bright because I use them more often for just normal night time driving. But we'll see how the driving lights look with 100W bulbs. I think it is illegal to drive with lights (other than the headlights) greater than 55W, I thought I read that somewhere on a post. Anyone know? Thanks.

OicnaiC

These are cheap and just bolt on for a place to mount lights: They come in black and crome.

Yoter

I see those getting ripped right off there when approaching an incline. They look way to low to the ground. Thats just my opinion though.

wimpywade94

i have one of those westin things on my tacoma and i love it and hate it, i love the looks, but its flimsy, if you got something like that you would have to reinforce it to go wheeling, i dont wheel my tacoma so im good though....later
wade

OicnaiC

I also would think they'd be a little weak for wheelin, but I'm just throwing out ideas. Personally I'd make me one of these bumpers:

Yoter

Thats either just like or is a prerunner bar aka baha bar.

ewarnerusa

Well, I decided just to swap the 55W bulbs out of the driving lights and replace them with 100W H3's. They were $5/ea at Wal-mart. It is hard to tell the difference in the attached photo, both shots were daytime shots. Both were taken with camera set at F2.8 1/50, and then I reduced the brightness to 20% since they were actually daytime shots. We'll see if I can see any difference next time I get out at night. No fuses blew, even though I kept it the same 15A, and I found it clearly labeled on the relays that they are rated to 30A. I hope the bulbs don't get too hot in those small housings!!

The pic is before/after with 55W on top and 100W on bottom. The second pic is halfway through, with the bulb on left 100W, bulb on right 55W.

ewarnerusa

The second pic is halfway through, with the bulb on left 100W, bulb on right 55W.

OicnaiC

Yeah it's a prerunner style but this is what I was looking for, the site was down the other day and that was the closest pic i could find.

Yoter

That doesnt look quite right. I thought the base bar was spose to be inline with the bumper. That just looks like its sagging. IMO