Driving Lights

[Phantom]

My first new car was a 1970 340 'Cuda.  Yes, I cry every time I remember selling it.  Anyway - it came with a pair of round "fog" lights suspended under the front bumper. They were controlled by a toggle switch to the left of the steering wheel.  I tried them one night in a local park and couldn't even see the road in front of me with the headlights off.  I started calling them my "glow in the dark" lights as they were worthless for anything else.

One day I got a wild hair and went to a local aircraft supply house with one of the bulbs in hand and asked if they had any landing lights that size in 12 volts.  Yup - that was what was used on a Cessna 150 and they put out about 1,000,000 candlepower.  Bought two and installed then.  Also changed the toggle switch out for a three position toggle switch so that the new "driving lights" would work with my headlight dimmer switch. Noticed two things right off - my battery was getting drained if the engine was under 1500 RPM and it did a great job of turning the interiors of cars in front of me white when I turned them on behind them. Usually got an interesting reaction from the driver, too.

I found out later I could pick out a bridge clearance sign (black letters on white background) at just over a mile away and that they literally would burn through rain so I could still see where I was going in the dark in heavy rain.

Starting to think about putting a pair on my Z for driving the roads around here with all the deer that come out in the evenings.  Need to figure out a way to dim them quickly though.