Driving The P15 At Night

[Tom Skinner]

Just make sure you have plenty of Liquor in your cabin before dark. Then there is no reason to go out after dark. LOL

Tom

[Plymouthy Adams]

Great Scott......thats really heavy......the trilogy was on the other night.....usually a good way to spend a wet rainy night.  

 

[knuckleharley]

1 hour ago, Tom Skinner said:

Just make sure you have plenty of Liquor in your cabin before dark. Then there is no reason to go out after dark. LOL

Tom

Nope! Not gonna happen.

 

I  reached the point in 1982 where the only choices were to quit or turn pro,and since I discovered I had completly "lost" a year or more once I got sober,I decided that was a good time to quit. STILL have a half a fifth of JD in the refr igerator,and haven't touched it. 

 

I am one of the VERY lucky ones who was able to just stop cold and walk away from it. No drugs,no meetings,no nothing. I just flat quit.

 

Unfortunately,not everybody is so lucky. Including some relatives and good friends I know.

[Sniper]

6 hours ago, TodFitch said:

Hmmm.

 

E = I * R and P = E * I

 

From the second, I = P/E. Substituting this into the first equation you get E = P/E * R or R = E*E/P (and P = E*E/R)

 

So for a 40 watt 12 volt bulb your R is 3.6 ohms.

 

Now putting 6 volts across a 3.6 ohm load you get P = 36/3.6 = 10 watts.

 

I think you will find that your 12v lights will put out 1/4 the power if on a 6v system.

 

On the other hand, that resistance is for when the filament is at temperature. Since a 6v system won’t bring the filament all the way up to the design temperature the filament will have lower resistance and the output will be somewhat higher. How much will not hazard to guess but will assume that 1/4 output would be at the extreme end, actual output will be a little better.

 

I have no idea what you did here.  But I think the point we both made is a 12v bulb running on 6v will not function as expected, not even close to it..

[greg g]

Neither will a 6v function at its best on 12v...

[Kilgore47]

First - where can I get one of those flux things.

 

The bulbs I installed on the P15 are halogen.  And on the top of the bulbs is stamped "2D1".  I don't know if that's the size of the bulb or if that's telling me it's 6v or 12v.  I have an old Jeep with sealed beams so I looked at it.  It is a 12v system.  The bulbs in it have the same "2D1" on the them.  Maybe I need to remove the P15 lights and look at the back of them to see if they're 6v.

 

The picture below are the bulbs installed in the P15.  

[soth122003]

27 minutes ago, Kilgore47 said:

First - where can I get one of those flux things.

I  contacted Doc Brown on the dark web, of course he didn't get the message till 2039. He also told me to tell you members living in California to move east of the San Andraes fault line by 2027. Said beach front property was cheap just before Aug 19.

 

Joe Lee

[Plymouthy Adams]

those flux things were outlawed....too many sonic booms.....

[greg g]

These for 20 bucks a Auto zone h6006

 

Halogen 6v

 

https://www.autozone.com/collision-body-parts-and-hardware/headlight/p/xtravision-headlight-h5006xv/954192_0_0?cmpid=LIA:US:EN:AD:NL:1000000:LIG:8360267458&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIpabT0u358wIVCWpvBB3q1wbLEAQYASABEgL5QfD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Edited November 2, 2021 by greg g

[greg g]

2 d 1 is code for a two filament bulb so high low in each bulb.

[Sam Buchanan]

1 hour ago, greg g said:

These for 20 bucks a Auto zone h6006

 

Halogen 6v

 

https://www.autozone.com/collision-body-parts-and-hardware/headlight/p/xtravision-headlight-h5006xv/954192_0_0?cmpid=LIA:US:EN:AD:NL:1000000:LIG:8360267458&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIpabT0u358wIVCWpvBB3q1wbLEAQYASABEgL5QfD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

 

The above link is for 12v bulbs.

 

Mine came from O'Reilly Auto Parts:

 

https://www.oreillyauto.com/detail/c/eiko-lighting/eiko-clear-h6006-halogen-bulb/eik0/h6006?q=6006&pos=4

 

Halogen, 6v, 40/50 watt, $12 each. Work well at P15 speeds.  ?

Edited November 2, 2021 by Sam Buchanan

[T120]

20 hours ago, Sniper said:

 

I have no idea what you did here.  But I think the point we both made is a 12v bulb running on 6v will not function as expected, not even close to it..

I didn't bother to follow Tod's calculation...I just know he ended up with the right answer....In a DC circuit - W = I² x R or,
W = V² / R   ?

[TodFitch]

5 hours ago, Sam Buchanan said:

 

The above link is for 12v bulbs.

 

Mine came from O'Reilly Auto Parts:

 

https://www.oreillyauto.com/detail/c/eiko-lighting/eiko-clear-h6006-halogen-bulb/eik0/h6006?q=6006&pos=4

 

Halogen, 6v, 40/50 watt, $12 each. Work well at P15 speeds.  ?

Those look like they would be a good bulb. The draw more current than the original stock lamps so you might consider setting up a headlight relay and running heavier wires to keep from overloading your original headlight switch and wiring.

[James_Douglas]

One of the things I always do on my old cars, 6v or 12v, is to use a long screw on one of the headlight bucket screws. I then attached a ground wire to it on the backside of the bucket and run them up to the battery cable (Positive or Negative as the case my be). This way the head lights have a direct ground path.

 

This helps a lot as it bypasses all the sheet metal connections.

 

James

[Sniper]

17 minutes ago, James_Douglas said:

One of the things I always do on my old cars, 6v or 12v, is to use a long screw on one of the headlight bucket screws. I then attached a ground wire to it on the backside of the bucket and run them up to the battery cable (Positive or Negative as the case my be). This way the head lights have a direct ground path.

 

This helps a lot as it bypasses all the sheet metal connections.

 

James

I did that with all my lights when I rewired the 51.  Nice bright lights all around.

[Bryan]

29 minutes ago, Sniper said:

I did that with all my lights when I rewired the 51.  Nice bright lights all around.

 I'm at that point right now. Looking at the schematics I might even run another wire to the park lights for later turn signals. I only have one yellow wire right now to each park light. Separate ground sounds good too.

[Plymouthy Adams]

by design these worked very well 60 years ago and will work again when 60 years of rust/corrosion is corrected and good connections established.  Dedicated grounds is a plus and recommended but I do not see a need to go all the way back to the battery for this.

[Bryan]

2 hours ago, James_Douglas said:

One of the things I always do on my old cars, 6v or 12v, is to use a long screw on one of the headlight bucket screws. I then attached a ground wire to it on the backside of the bucket and run them up to the battery cable (Positive or Negative as the case my be). This way the head lights have a direct ground path.

 

This helps a lot as it bypasses all the sheet metal connections.

 

James

Where during my teardown seeing a lot of tar paper or rubber gaskets separating the metal panels.  Wouldn't hurt..my battery ground is down under the generator.

['41 Fat Bottom Girl]

For what it's worth:

My lighting used to be scary at night also, and not significantly better even after I had rewired the entire car (had some corroded wire crimps at some connectors and old cracking wire insulation)- with all new proper gauge wiring, and new light switch and NOS dimmer switch with no resistances there. I had even taken the plugs to the headlights apart, cleaned the contacts and crimped and soldered new wires to those. I had then applied a little dialectric grease to prevent future oxidation, which a wise man taught me to do on all my auto connectors many years ago. 

In my case, measuring ohms from the light cans to the body showed showed no resistance there, so that path looked fine.  

I found that the problem with my 6 volt headlights was indeed grounds. Comparing the brightness of one of the  headlights installed in the car to the other headlight that I removed and directly wired to the battery was a perfect troubleshooting comparison. Didn't have to ohm it out, the difference was noticeable right away. 

I already had the cable from the battery to the engine block of course, but adding that extra grounding cable from the block to the body made the difference. Success! Even the tail lights brightened up nicely.

Very happy with it. I still peer down the road a bit with my 72 year old eyes, but I drive a lot more comfortably at night now.

Good luck and happy motoring!

[Sniper]

When I rewired my 51 I ran a separate ground to each light housing, tail lights, license plate light, turn signal lights, etc.

 

Head lights though, have their own ground built in to the connector. 

 

I also added a ground strap from the battery to the body as well as a ground to the voltage regulator and alternator case.  Heater blower motor as well, didn't do the horns though, they are loud enough, lol

[JerseyHarold]

I had dim headlights on a '52 Cranbrook I once owned.  I added grounds to each headlight bucket and the lights brightened considerably.