I was driving my mercury last night for the first time when it’s been dark. I just recently redid the headlight wiring so the headlights are turned on by the factory steering wheel switch instead of an aftermarket gm style switch. I also added relays at the same time. When I was driving the low beams worked pretty good but the hi beams were terrible. I switched back to the low beams and just used those. I had yet to align the headlights so I thought maybe that was the issue. I marked off the wall to align them and turned the hi beams on. Attached is the pattern I got. I’m thinking the round, unlit spots are due to the turn signal bulbs being mounted in the reflector so there’s no light there. Is that a possibility? This is the way the lights were when I bought the vehicle. Any other possible causes? I did have the lenses off so I could get to the adjustment screws.
You could remove the turn signal bulbs and see if the pattern changes. I don't think that is the problem. I think the old fashion cone shaped reflector, designed for a very ancient incandescent bulb is not well suited to the halogen bulb. Bob Drake had a new reflector engineered for halogen bulbs. Unfortunately, it looks like he no longer has them available.
Id agree with the above comment. Changing the bulb doesn't change the geometry that the housing was originally designed for on a different style light.
Just looking at the pictures. If the one is with the high beams. I'd think you're not getting good reflection from the upper side of the housing. Your high beam filament sits further in under for low beam shield. I don't know if moving that in or outward if it is possible wouldn't help with that. Or go to a led version that isn't dot approved so it's not regulated and is just 360 degree of light. Then the reflector might act for as a projector assembly. If that makes sense.
Those look VERY similar to the Vintique reflectors and bulbs in my '31 roadster PU. They are terrible! Bright but have a big black hole in the middle of the beam, low or high. Those bulbs are too long for the reflector so it can't be focused. Dave
The high beam reflects off the bottom of the reflector. The dark spot you see with the bright lights is where the turn signal has replaced the reflector. If the turn signal was removed, and the reflector was replaced where the turn signal used to be, you would get the full light. If you simply remove the turn signal, without replacing the missing reflector, the hole in the high beam light will still be there. The hole you see is the missing part in the reflector.
If that's the pattern on high beam, there's two things wrong. One, that slight 'V' cutoff is supposed to be on top of the pattern, not the bottom so the lamps are in upside down. You need to turn them exactly 180 degrees. Two, that's the low beam pattern so the lights are wired backwards. On high beam that cutoff line should vanish. The adjustment looks fairly close otherwise. Once you correct the lamps/wiring, adjust the low beams so the top of the left side, 'flatter' half of the cutoff line on each lamp is even with your wall lines and you should be good to go. There may still be a small dim spot from the turns on high beam but it will be much reduced.
You were correct. I did exactly as you suggested and the pattern is alot better. The H4 bulbs are held in with 3 screws so I had to reclock the bulbs and drill new holes. Thank you for your suggestions! As others have stated, there might be better options out there for this. I'll see how these are for a bit and see if they get the job done.
There are better options, but those will require a complete lamp/reflector/lens change. You have one of the better conversions, but the lens design is holding it back. That 85 year old design is simply not optimized for a halogen lamp. If you want to get every last bit of performance out of this combo, swap out the reflector for one without the turn light and move the turn down into the white area. Cibie was the gold standard for years, with Hella a distant second. Easily the very best headlights I've ever used. I had a full set of Cibie 5.25" lights in an OT car years ago, those would light up road signs at almost a mile out on high beam. But Cibie allowed the tooling for the 7" and 5.25" round lights to wear out and due to the now-low sales volume discontinued them... The new player is Koito from Japan. Supposedly equal to or better than the Cibies, these have precision metal reflectors and optical-quality glass lenses for maximum light transmission and minimal 'scatter'. I'm not a fan of HID or LED lights for various reasons. There's just too much snake oil in the marketing... and there's been a lot of complaints about LED headlights, so much so that the NHTSA is reviewing the current standards.
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