Headlight Bumpski

Just a little bump.

There's lots of good hacks out there for rigging up brighter lights on mopeds. I've seen everything from adapting halogen bulbs into replaceable bulb headlights, motorcycle lights, automotive fog lights, LED's... etc, but nothing so far that was convincing enough to make me convert from running 1156 12v filament bulbs.. which are robust, work well and can be purchased at any gas station.

I was aimlessly browsing the asiles at my local Advance auto parts yesterday, waiting for the guy behind the counter to get the code scanner and scan my car, and I saw this little tiny halogen bulb.

 

I was looking at the base in the bottom and thinking of this sealed-beam headlight I drilled out the other day. I wanted to try to epoxy some kind of base into this light and adapt a halogen but the connector things for those are usually part of the headlight housing itself, meaning i was stuck waiting to find a broken headlight or something... rats. 

Anyhow, getting to this part was pretty easy, i drilled a hole through the center of the inner bulb and smashed it out, then I heated up the metal reflector where it was soldered to the original bulb, and yanked the bulb 'base' part out of the reflector with carful application of pliers and torch to melt the solder. 

I test-fitted the H3 bulb to the hole that was left and it was perfecto. Even just enough interference that it took a careful tap from a hammer and punch to seat it in there perfectly. Its pressed-in so you can still get it out by prying at it with a screwdriver, so I soldered a little blob on there to hold it in, and stuck a spade terminal to act as a secure ground. 

The whole thing took all of 15 minutes and cost 4.99. The H3 bulb works great, probably wont quite drive it with the stock 12v coil in my Sachs, but who knows. Probably brighter than the original.

The best part is, I'm reusing an otherwise thrown away sealed beam reflector and lens. The glass is way better than the modern stuff and the reflector is solid heavy metal with no corrosion (because it was sealed all these years!

Thats all for today, I'm working on tuning my Peugeot with the SHA so that article will be back up shortly with more details on how that is going. The Sachs is so close I can taste it. Just a few more things to wrap up and she'll be back on the road!

Plus there is a new ped in the stable for Caitlin. A general 5-star. Pretty sexy and much more stable. Its getting the treatment right away, so it will be rock-solid reliable for her and not break down all the time.

Just a lil' tease for now... ooh so nice working on engines with the MF engine stand!

Spring is exciting!