Lights improved on 62? (1 Viewer)

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Frankfort, Kentucky
In the search for a 60 series cruiser for quite a while. I prefer the looks of the 60 over the 62. However, a nice 1989 62 has emerged about an hour from home. The issue with the 60's having dim headlights. Is the wiring/headlights improved on the FJ62's?
 
I have a 62 and am not familiar with the 60 but can say they aren't very good. Do a search here and you'll find info about upgrading to get better light. Personally I find the headlights are alright but wouldn't want to be flying down the freeway at 70 relying on them. Of course flying down the freeway isn't what a cruiser's about either :D
 
the lights on my 62 sucked bad so i ordered sylvania silverstars (needed 4, 2 for hi beams 2 for low beams) direct from the company and it came out to $60 with next day shipping.. put those suckers in and i noticed a nice improvement, especially for the low beams. the install was kind of a bitch cuz all those little screws holding the headlamp fixture in place were stripped so i had to get some needle nose locking pliers and twist them free from behind one by one. a 20 min headlight install took about 2 hours, but night driving just got a whole lot better.:cool:
 
My headlights on my 62 pissed me off more than anything else. Sometimes I had to make sure I had them turned on while driving through low lit city streets because they are so weak. I replaced my high beams with IPF housings and IPF bulbs, and the low beams are now Hella housings with IPF Fatboy bulbs. Also upgraded the harness so I could use all the new hardware. HUGE improvement. Probably the best thing I have done to my Cruiser in the past 10 years.
 
I replaced mine with something like the soverstars. I feel like my headlights (lowbeam) are better than the wifes 97 4runner! Very good upgrade for about $20!
I will eventually get the highs as well, but they didint have one burnt out at the time. I also feel you about the screws. Mine were just rusted to crap. Got half off and bent the mettal down so I could pull the light out. Wasnt 2 hrs though! good grief. Maybe 30-45 min?
 
The real problem with 62 headlights is that the wiring harness is a weird design and undersized wiring to boot. Check the voltage at the back of the alternator when above idle and you will see a reading of aprrox. 14.2 volts or so. Then check the voltage at the headlight connections and you will see a reading of about 12.5 volts - a drop of somewhere around 1.5 volts! Even stock headlights would be much brighter if they were getting another volt or so of juice. Next problem is there is no aftermarket wiring harness, that I'm aware of for the 62, so you have to make up your own. A basic design can be see at rallylights.com along with lots of good products at some of the best prices.
 
I replaaced my factory sealed beams with Bosh H4 system 100/90 bulbs, and bakelite conectors nice improvement .. but when I install my warns SDB - 210 I realized with is really light power ..
 
The wiring on these things is pretty lousy all the way around, don't think it is only the head lights. The wire and harness making that Toyota empolyed in these things is NOT up to the standard of the rest of the vehicle. I've rebuilt lots of harness sections in my 62 and it has always resulted in more system voltage.
 
The stock headlights and wiring on the FJ62 suck. I've rewired the lights in my 62 (.03 drop now between battery voltage and headlight sockets) and I'm running Hella H4/H1 lights with Hella standard wattage 100% Xenon bulbs. HUGE improvement.

The headlights on the 62 are not straightforward to rewire however there is a good schematic in the FAQ. I did mine before I saw this and it took me some time to reverse engineer what was going on (shop manual very useful here). While my design differs from the one in the FAQ they are functionally the same.

Also note that another problem that you'll run into is the alt doesn't turn fast enough at idle to product much output so the voltage at your lights at idle is closer to battery voltage (assuming you've rewired). I'm running an aftermarket alt with an undersized pulley to get better output at idle but even this isn't enough on its own. I'm currently tapping into the A/C idle up circuit in the ECU to increase the idle rpms when the headlights or my soon to be install electric fan are on.
 

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