I need better headlights....
 

I have stock halogen headlights on my 2012. Traveling back from a football game in the dark really showed me how "bad" my lights are. I kicked on my new 24" led light bar on the long stretches and man the light it produced was amazing. I could see into the barrow ditch along with a decent ways ahead of the truck. It made looking for deer a lot easier.

Is there a headlight bulb that I can install that will help? I know there is a ton of different types of bulbs and light outputs. I really don't want to replace the entire assembly. I would like something that is drop in and easy to install. I don't want to have to splice into anything. Plug and play.

I'm going to try and sift through the other headlight threads but figured I would ask to help speed up the process.

According to my LED light specs its running 6000K~6500K White. That was a nice clear color.

I would suggest getting some OEM HID Headlights. Huge difference! And they look a lot better too. I got lucky and snagged a mint set off Craigslist for 400 bucks. Then you just have to get a 100 dollar adaptor harness. The difference is unbelievable.

OEM HIDs are the best lights for these trucks, really. Love mine, even when dirty, they are brighter than halogens.

But if you don't want to replace everything, you should be able to find 5000k or 6000k halogen H13 bulbs. That whiter light should help a little. I wouldn't go above 6000k, starts really showing blue and road illumination will begin dropping. There are also higher wattage bulbs, but I have no idea if they work well on these trucks. Silverstars seem to get decent reviews, but nothing will seriously increase illumination from the halogen system.

GE Nighthawk Sport bulbs. I swapped to these after reading a bunch of reviews about a month after I bought my truck brand new. The stock lights are total garbage compared to these. Bright white, not blue at all. I highly recommend them. I've got 3 years and counting on mine, drive to work and home in the dark most days and they're still going strong if you're worried about longevity.

Here's the Amazon link to them:

I'm going to echo the sentiment about OEM headlights. They are the highest quality and the easiest setup with the conversion harness sold by The Retrofit Source.

If you want to go a little cheaper, you can always get the Spyder projector OEM style headlights for about $370, and slap very nicer internals into them. If you go this route, I would recommend getting the HID ready version, using quality ballasts and bulbs and the TRS harness to connect them.

I got the halogen model and went with a different HID bulb and ballast kit, but it was slightly more complicated. Great output for around $500 total though.



http://spyderauto.com/product.php?mo...-H7-(Included)

If you want to upgrade your halogen bulbs, take a look thru this link...

https://www.hidplanet.com/forums/for...-halogen-bulbs

Putting in better halogens will help some, but will probably leave you disappointed compared to the LED lightbar you already have. My truck came with the HID’s and they are indeed impressive.

But going the quick and easy route, Silverstars is a bulb that often comes up in these threads. Personally, I’d recommend you avoid them. I’ve put Silverstar and Silverstar Ultra’s in a LOT of trucks and cars over the years, and they are better than stock but really only give you a blueish light that looks brighter, but doesn’t really help you see a whole lot more over the stock bulbs. Plus they burn out quickly, sometimes in less than a year.

Like somebody already posted, go for the GE Nighthawks. They’re cheaper, brighter, and will last longer than Silverstars. I put the Nighthawks in my last truck after getting frustrated paying $40 a set every year for Silverstars. The lights were slightly brighter, and I sold the truck 4 years later with that same set of Nighthawks in them.

Will the projector lights be a "significant" upgrade over stock halogen? Those are in my price range.

To answer the other posts I am looking for OEM HID lights. Nothing local so far.

I see DDM Tuning popping up in a lot of threads. Some good, some bad. I checked out their site and its quite confusing.

Its looking more and more that I am going to have to spend some money and upgrade the entire headlight to HID. I don't want to spend a ton of money on this as I am on a budget.