1969 Dodge Super Lite

[sauterd]

 

[commando1]

I see zero difference between Lo beam + Super-Lite and Lo beam alone.

 

[300rag]

The light pattern is a little higher up the wall farther away, and total distance is greater than low beam only.

 

[commando1]

The light pattern is a little higher up the wall farther away, and total distance is greater than low beam only.

You're still not going to avoid nailing that deer.

 

[ceebuddy]

Here is a larger version of the Super Lite folder.

And here is a print ad by Sylvania for the Super Lite that also has two "with and without" pics in it.

 

[Wonderwagon]

A standard round seal beamed headlight has linticulars that help spread the light into a even predictable field. The Super lite uses a reflector, an aperture to trim the unwanted refraction. The lens a double convex to focus the dispersed light from the reflector into a tight beam. Providing a brighter, tighter field of light. The distance projected is dependent on the wattage of the lamp, reflector quality and the focal length of the lens. A cool idea

 

[65sporty]

Good idea for the time but how does it compare to halogen?

 

[Wonderwagon]

it could be comparable to a "quartz" lamp
it would depend on the soup in the bulb. A tungsten filament was standard fare. Once the lamp envelope is evacuated an inert gas is exchanged for air, this helps the glass stay "clean" by delaying particles of tungsten burning off and depositing on the globe. Quartz is used in all high quality lamp globes, the compactness of the filament, quality of the reflector and associated optics drives the efficiency and lumens produced. Now comparing the Super lit to a HID head light the super lite generates visible lite by heating the filament until it glows. An HID utilizes a plasma arc contained in vacuum, to produce light. think of it as a tig/ mig welding

 

[polara71]

Not impressive by today's standards, in fact probably poor light quality but a great conversation piece

 

[Wonderwagon]

Found a book called Visual Factors in Transportation Systems Proceedings of Spring Meeting. It does give some beam spread photometrics, the photograph of the beam spread is the equivalent of an aircraft landing light, in other words fairly parallel in beam spread. In my experience this could be bright. Color temperature would be closer to an incandescent head lamp more yellow than white like an HID one

 

[ceebuddy]

The Super Lite is more or less the same system that BMW pioneered here in Europe in the early nineties as their projector-beam (lens) headlights (with a halogen bulb, no HID's back then).

Although the shape of the reflector is more complex now (three ellipsoid curves) I think it is fair to say Dodge was way ahead of it's time concering auto headlights with the Super Lite.

 

[Fratzog]

The light is of marginal benefit as mentioned above. One reason it never caught on is some states banned it and others tried to.

 

[ceebuddy]

You are right. But I guess if it would have been legally possible to replace the two selaed beam low beams with two Super Lites, that would have made a difference.

 

[Fury440]

When I bought my Fury I was out at the Kingston airport with a buddy who owned a plane and he was changing one of his landing light bulbs. It was bulb made by Lucas and was the same sized as my high beams. The glass alignment bumps were in the wrong orientation, easily fixed with a little hacksaw work on my headlamp frames. The power socket was also wrong, so I sawed my plug down the middle. They worked perfectly and at around a million candle power each made awesome high beams lightening the road like daylight.

 

[commando1]

I'm surprised the alternater could keep up.

 

[Fury440]

I'm surprised the alternater could keep up.

Knowing what I know now, I'm amazed the head light dimmer switch didn't fry. I did have the biggest battery that would fit the tray so what the alternator couldn't supply maybe the battery did. Plus they weren't used that much because we don't have many "dark" places left without oncoming traffic.

 

[Wonderwagon]

did the same as Fury440, with a PAR 36 acl's for driving lights on a big box truck back in the 80's, the state troopers didn't like it much

 

[cm23uoc]

The European H1 Halogen bright lights were already on the market at least a year Prior to the Superlite and they were very effective, still pleased with them on two of my cars, due to the Sealed Beam System in the US never used there though.

 

[300rag]

The European H1 Halogen bright lights were already on the market at least a year Prior to the Superlite and they were very effective, still pleased with them on two of my cars, due to the Sealed Beam System in the US never used there though.

I used Marshall H1 bulbs back in '74 for both low and high lamps, along with an H1 pencil beam. Best light I have driven with, bar none.

 

[Dobalovr]

This thread has been very illuminating....