headlights!

i have the oem headlights, they suck, are the rampage lights worth the money? if not, whats a good choice. ive got an 89 xj.

h4's only better with upgraded harness. and only better with upgraded bulbs.

these rampage lights i read about out of jp magazine say they are pretty much plug and play with much better performance. are you saying that thats not necessarily true until you upgrade the above mentioned items?

Any upgrade in lamps on these Jeeps will stress your existing wiring and haedlight switch. An inexpensive and easy to install harness can be purcheased from www.eautoworks.com. The harness alone will make a significant improvement to your headlights and will save you from melting a headlight switch should you decide to upgrade the lamps themselves.

X2 on the wiring upgrade, it's a must.

I would recommend searching the forum, there are countless threads devoted to headlight upgrades. But as a short summary, here is list of upgrades going down in effectiveness:
1. H4 headlight upgrade ~ $60
2. H4 headlight upgrade + wiring harness ~ $85
3. HID kit, lo beam only ~ $110
4. HID kit Hi/lo ~170
5. HID kit with real projectors ~ $500 plus custom work.

Using these as search terms will really help you gather some info. The prices I listed could vary a high amount, but should give you a good place to start.

Hope this helps.

I just installed IPF harness and lights and they rock. I had to aim them real low but still do very well. Even on wet roads. I spent 250 shipped on RRO.

i have the rampage lights, they are not that much better. as mentioned you gotta upgrade the wiring harness, which i plan to do next

Best to start with the $25 harness upgrade. You'll be surprised how much better stock lamps will shine.

I did a DIY bi-xenon HID headlight setup for my other car. Grand total was about $200. The same thing could easily be done for an XJ. Here's a link to get you started:

http://forums.rennlist.com/rennforu...-xpost-diy-projector-hid-setup-for-200-a.html

Go to bajahids.com for your HIDs if you go that route. Run by tcm_glx, he's a member here.

Search mod tech and street & performance forums. There's lots of info on headlights as Cherbear said.

I ran conversion housings with a wiring kit and Silverstar bulbs for a long time and they were way better than stock. I recently upgraded to the HID kit from www.bajahid.com
It is an awesome upgrade for a great price.

Running HID's in a standard halogen housing is a good way to blind everyone in oncoming traffic and cause accidents. Plus i just think it makes you a jerk.

Porch951 said:

Running HID's in a standard halogen housing is a good way to blind everyone in oncoming traffic and cause accidents. Plus i just think it makes you a jerk.

Click to expand...

We're all entitled to opinions. Gotta say mine never get me flashed by other drivers and the light output is great!

before you upgrade the lamps, unplug the stock bulbs and then plug them back in. Seriously.

The connectors get all full of corrosion and crap, doing this scrapes it off again. You'll probably be shocked by the improvement.

do the eautoworks.com harness before you upgrade the lights, I did just the harness and was pleased with that and my sealedbeam silverstars.

kastein said:

before you upgrade the lamps, unplug the stock bulbs and then plug them back in. Seriously.

The connectors get all full of corrosion and crap, doing this scrapes it off again. You'll probably be shocked by the improvement.

Click to expand...

Good advice here. The factory harness is marginal at best.

Or, you could clean those connectors at the same time you install an upgrade harness and be really impressed.

Darky said:

We're all entitled to opinions. Gotta say mine never get me flashed by other drivers and the light output is great!

Click to expand...

I hear this a lot online ("Well nobody ever flashes their brights at me!"). The problem is that the HID bulbs don't put the light in the same area as a halogen bulb (in other words, the reflectors and cutoffs are worthless) and the light output is 2-3x as much. The two are simply not designed to work together, and that's why they blind people. Plus, you're losing your brights.

If you really want brighter headlights without the expense of HIDs (done right), pick up some e-code headlights with a decent bulb and an upgraded wiring harness... bajahid.com sells the e-code headlights.

Otherwise, DDM Tuning has the HID bulbs and ballasts for $35 and they're very reputable (lifetime warranty, too). You can search for the Morimoto Mini H1 projectors (~$125) so you don't blind everyone with them...

Porch951 said:

Running HID's in a standard halogen housing is a good way to blind everyone in oncoming traffic and cause accidents. Plus i just think it makes you a jerk.

Click to expand...

Not sure who that was aimed at but mine are in Autopal e-code housings and do not blind oncoming drivers.

clean4drxj said:

do the eautoworks.com harness before you upgrade the lights, I did just the harness and was pleased with that and my sealedbeam silverstars.

Click to expand...

Dumb question but which harness is needed? There are three on eautoworks.com- 9005/9006, 9008/H13, or H7.

Years back when I first bought my Jeep, I upgraded my housing's to IPF's + Magic J bulbs. This was back in the year 2001 when I bought it... So these bulbs lasted 10 years and 150,000+. Not bad.

I'd like to get the wiring harness (hopefully it isn't hard to install) and obviously I need new bulbs. I know nothing about bulbs, except that I have the IPF housings and will have the upgraded harness, so I'm curious which bulbs to order.

Thanks.


1st post info- 1999 Jeep Cherokee Sport, bought with my own money at age 17 (used with 30,000 miles on it), was CLOSE to getting rid of it recently but decided to spend 2x what its actually worth to get it back to as close to like it was when I bought it as possible, and use as a secondary ride. She has 190,000 miles on it now. Crazy amount of work had to be done. A week after it is almost complete (just gotta do a 2inch lift, replace rear bumper, pull out dent in rear gate, door prob) one of the headlights go out. So I figure hey if its only $20 more to get the harness upgrade and it makes a big difference, lets do it.

thanks for any help