Hot Rods Headlight's on early cars & trucks ~ what's your thought's?

Stock A headlights with a dropped bar and turn signals in the housing

 

1936 Ford

 

Man, That's a beautiful color. HRP

 

Don't care much for big, prefer smaller and don't car much for any mount below center line of grille.

 

I replaced the snowmobile seal beams on my hated E&J's with 4" motorcycle halogen units. I installed illegal 120 watt bulbs. Wow! Greg

 

I love the "percolators":



I tried stocks and 903-Js:



But, ultimately, small headlights (5-3/4") won out:



They're small, a bit awkward looking (to most) and they absolutely have that 60's strip vibe that isn't popular on most hot rods...

 

I like the stock or dropped bar and big lights on full fendered 32's.

 

I prefer the look of the large lights myself, regardless of application.

 

Hello,
In my first 1940 Ford Sedan Delivery, I was so happy to have my own surf transportation vehicle that I did not care whether it was underpowered, or that it had nothing in the rear chamber behind the seats. It was just a way to go to high school and to the daily activity of making runs to the beach, during the off season/no practice days for football and basketball.

I was so happy that I overlooked plenty of things that in this day, would bother the heck out of daily driving to school, work or vacations. At night, the headlights were on and the road was lit up. Not much in the way of a wide spread lighting system, like the current high tech station wagons and cars.

But, for the times, it was just so much fun having a form of transportation that it just flew by as we were driving at night, cruising around with friends. Beside, we could not go very fast, so a poorly lit up empty road down the coastline was not a problem. At least we got there late and were usually the first guys in the water.

Jnaki

Then after high school, almost 10 years later, being married to a cool person that also was supportive of the photography hobby and hot rods combination, we both searched for another hot rod to help in the presentation of our abilities in photography. So, another station wagon was on the search parameters.


When we finally settled on another red 1940 Ford Sedan Delivery, it was like a memory running wild. But, this time, the sedan delivery had a 327 for power and for my wife, A/C. it was a project car due to the fact that it started and got to where we were going, but the drivability was for the crapper. It took weeks and several professional wheel alignment, tires, and brake people to get the sedan delivery to handle correctly and go straight.

But, as the Cal Rake, lowered, sedan delivery was sitting, there were plenty of nights of headlight adjustment on the white garage wall ahead to make sure there was a great beam of light covering the most street possible.

It finally got adjusted and the road ahead was clear enough for my wife to tool around in it without me worrying about her being able to see at night, when driving alone. But, as 20 somethings, it was enough to get over going down a dark road. Those stock headlights were not the brightest and we thought about adding some clear high beam lights like I had on the 65 El Camino (illegal 3rd and 4th headlights). It was for naught, since a new arrival interrupted the continuing build and detailing of the old 1940 Ford Sedan Delivery.

Today’s choices for adding better powered lights in the stock position or adding a couple of bumper light additions would do the job. YRMV

 

Sometimes the line between eye catching and cartoonish is pretty fine. I prefer the 2 headlight look.