Thread: So---With Visa card in hand I called Gennie Shifter---

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I have the lites shipped to me and I then modify them to fit into the reflectors, along with adding the o-rings and instructions. email me at camp914@comcast.net
Craig

Well add me to the headlight bar problem group...LOL! Wealth of info in this thread.

How in the world did hot rodders make it before the internet??? LOL!

Originally Posted by youther

Well add me to the headlight bar problem group...LOL! Wealth of info in this thread.

How in the world did hot rodders make it before the internet??? LOL!

Should we welcome you or just commiserate??

Well I ordered mine today from a place in NC. They are going to drop ship it from Gennie. Hopefully it will mount up without any problems.

After I looked at pictures of "a30coupe's" car before he got the headlightbar and used single mounts for each light, I might have went that route. It sure would have been cheaper...LOL!

Originally Posted by youther

Well I ordered mine today from a place in NC. They are going to drop ship it from Gennie. Hopefully it will mount up without any problems.

After I looked at pictures of "a30coupe's" car before he got the headlightbar and used single mounts for each light, I might have went that route. It sure would have been cheaper...LOL!

The nice part about headlight bars - they tie early Ford floppy front fenders, especially 'glass versions, together into a nice solid single unit. The fender brace, is then bolted thru the fender to the bar. Some folks don't bolt the outer part of the brace to the fender though.

Still interested in your type side curtains but I took the easy way out and bought the "It's A Snap" headlights that have the yellow LED separately on the bottom of the lens and they do fit in the 7" Dietz bickets I have. There is a lot of misinformation regarding the braided cable from the radiator shell to the headlight bucket. Anyway, I am happy to report that the Speedway Dietz (stainless) buckets do work with the "It's-A-Snap" bulbs which hold an H4 bulb in the top part and have a larger segment along the bottom of the lens that is separate from the clear part. For me it is easier to mess with the bucket installation although the It's-A-Snap unit is expensive. The main point is that I was able to look at and compare in hand four different lamps as well as their tests at the recent NSRA Richmond National Meet and I came home with the It's-A-Snap units. I like your LED in bulb but I would have to cut the reflector and the LED in that case is somewhat within the white light when the headlights are on. The slight advantage of the It's-A-Snap unit is that there is a partition between the LED part and the H4 part. Anyway I am just glad that at this point I have parts that go together, fit and work which is somewhat of a rarity for me! I also ordered a neat unit for LED tail lights from Bratton Model A parts which is just inserted where the stock lens would be and the leads plug into the stock bulb sockets so I will have LED turn signals all the way around.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Boxstr. I am still studying your side curtains and I like the use of the smooth snaps on the front edge of the windshield pillars. Although that is not an original setup it looks smoother than the pegs which leave a hole around the snap. I am attaching a picture of my Dietz stainless buckets now in place which shows the LED lens along the bottom of the "bulb" and it is clear when the LED is off. I am not sure if I can find wire covers long enough to use the bottom of the bolt because the stock cable sleeves are only 12" long and with the dropped bar the headlights are now lower relative to the grommet holes in the side of the stock radiator shell. One way out is to drill a hole in the back of the bucket for the cables similar to the way the stock Model A headlights attached the cable but I am trying to avoid messing up the shells with hand-drilled holes. I have the braided lines from Speedway but they are thin and it would be hard to get another wire in the thin sleeve for the turn signal light. The "It's-A-Snap" bulbs actually have three wires in addition to the usual three for the headlight but there is no way I/you can get six wires in that thin braided sleeve. If I have to drill holes in the back of the bucket I can attach the LED ground wire to the ground wire for the H4 bulb inside the bucket and cut off the wire for the parking light option so that I will only have one wire to the LED and hopefully by giving up the parking light option I can get the fourth wire through the braided cable. But first I want to try the thicker stock flex cable whoich might allow all six wires or certainly five using a common ground wire. Boxstr, I am sorry to not use your neat LED solution but the separation between the H4 area and the LED area is partitioned off here and I wanted to avoid fabrication with my associated foibles. The two circles on the firewall are special aluminum rims around rubber grommets for the heater hoses.

Don Shillady
Retired SCientist/teen rodder

Don I have to agree, I think $169.00 seems a bit on the high side for turn signals
that I would be able to fab myself.
Craig

Originally Posted by boxstr

Don I have to agree, I think $169.00 seems a bit on the high side for turn signals
that I would be able to fab myself.
Craig

I have a feeling that what you are paying for is their little proprietary control box - which is fine if you need it. Most after market wiring blocks already have a flasher setup built in

IC2, I do not plan to buy their box. I just paid $6 each for four stainless steel brackets that fit the bumper bracket bolts between the upper and lower bar. I am hoping that I can just use the flasher unit from Speedway that clicks with less current just as I would have to use with the LEDs from Boxstr. I also purchased the four side marker LED which were about $8 each so I have about 4 x $14 = $56 in the parts so far without the special flasher; this includes rear as well as front turn signals. Considering that quite a few of the parts I have purchased turn out to be just the first try and then are replaced by something better, I am just trying to avoid continuing to buy two or three items until I get it (mostly) right. So far it has been a rather inefficient process. Originally I thought I would just carefully select the right parts but as progress went on I had to get second or even third parts as I learned things. I may yet try Boxtrs in-headlight LEDS but I already had the side marker lights so looking it over I will try to get them to work. I like the bright yellow lights in the bumper but I don't like the wires to show so if I am not satisfied with that I will get back to Boxstr.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

As far as buying 2-3 different parts to achieve a purpose - what makes you any different then anyone else That's what swap meets are for - sell the extras - but, of course, at a loss.

One item you may need to add to the LED lights wiring assemblies is either a 'special electronic' $35 flasher or a $5 resistor in each circuit. The LEDs do not draw enough current to activate a standard flasher. Take a look here http://www.watsons-streetworks.com/h...aillights.html

For possibly using tubing as a conduit, McMaster Carr (http://www.mcmaster.com/) sells lengths of SS and have a fairly good selection of clamps. Type in SS TUBING on their search function in the LH column. I wouldn't spoil a good paint job if I could mechanically clamp an item by drilling and tapping a small hole.

Don---Couldn't you bend some 3/8" thinwall metal tubing (like brakeline or hydraulic tubing) to follow the contour of your front bumper brackets and tack the tubing to the underside of the bumper brackets and run the wires thru it? If you painted it flat black or the colour of the brackets, nobody would ever notice it.---Brian

Brian, yes I thought of that some time ago but in terms of copper tubing that would be easy to bend into a serpentine shape but I did not think of steel brakeline, that is a better idea and would be easier to tack weld but I have a nice black enamel finish on the brackets and need to just tack the tubing in a few places. Still the steel would weld better. I might try the copper tubing idea and use epoxy to glue the tubing on the bottom of the brackets; some small holes can be drilled into the bottom of the brackets to aid attachment of the epoxy. Copper would offer some corrosion resistance down where splash water is commonand would be painted black on the outside as you suggest. Overall the lights in the bumper look more like the restorers solution than a traditional rod appearance but the ones I have in the rear do look pretty good if I can hide the wires. Note that the stock bumpers are angled at the ends so the flashers face to the side somewhat as do most "modern" turn signals and since I have invested heavily in the stainless bumpers, I think it really looks good in a "restorod" sense. Even so just discussing this helps me formulate this approach and I think I will try the epoxy-copper tubing idea if the plastic tubing idea does not work. I have purchased some black plastic "flex tubing" which is already black and easier to glue. I originally purchased this for the wiring over the top of the windshield for the lone electric windshield wiper but upon looking at it I note that it might be perfect to hide the wires under the brackets, Another possibility is to just to glue (epoxy) the wires alone to the bottom of the brackets. Since the brackets are thicker than the wires there is a pretty good chance the wires can be hidden underneath. I am studying the LOGO-Light pictures and the wires are only visible just behind the light.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Originally Posted by Don Shillady

Brian, yes I thought of that some time ago but in terms of copper tubing that would be easy to bend into a serpentine shape but I did not think of steel brakeline, that is a better idea and would be easier to tack weld but I have a nice black enamel finish on the brackets and need to just tack the tubing in a few places. Still the steel would weld better. I might try the copper tubing idea and use epoxy to glue the tubing on the bottom of the brackets; some small holes can be drilled into the bottom of the brackets to aid attachment of the epoxy. Copper would offer some corrosion resistance down where splash water is commonand would be painted black on the outside as you suggest. Overall the lights in the bumper look more like the restorers solution than a traditional rod appearance but the ones I have in the rear do look pretty good if I can hide the wires. Note that the stock bumpers are angled at the ends so the flashers face to the side somewhat as do most "modern" turn signals and since I have invested heavily in the stainless bumpers, I think it really looks good in a "restorod" sense. Even so just discussing this helps me formulate this approach and I think I will try the epoxy-copper tubing idea if the plastic tubing idea does not work. I have purchased some black plastic "flex tubing" which is already black and easier to glue. I originally purchased this for the wiring over the top of the windshield for the lone electric windshield wiper but upon looking at it I note that it might be perfect to hide the wires under the brackets, Another possibility is to just to glue (epoxy) the wires alone to the bottom of the brackets. Since the brackets are thicker than the wires there is a pretty good chance the wires can be hidden underneath. I am studying the LOGO-Light pictures and the wires are only visible just behind the light.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Don--epoxy won't work in that application---rather, it will work, but to have enough to make it effective you will need so much that it will look terrible. That is definately an application for steel tubing welded in place.

Well, the big melt is underway here. Daytime temperatures have crept up to 60 degrees F at mid day, and my lawn is slowly emerging from its white shroud. (Sounds poetic, but Damn! I hate winter.) I have my new "lathe room" all drywalled, taped and plastered and painted, and the base for my new lathe is supposed to arrive here tomorrow. ---This will be good, as the drip pan for the lathe is really part of the base, and without it I can't really do any machining with a lubricant/coolant, or it goes all over the floor. Hopefully, I will soon drag this thread back to what I originally started it as, about installing the new Gennie Shifter" headlight bar and changing out my aftermarket front fender support brackets for a set of originals. I will be using the new lathe to machine a pair of oval, tapered shims from aluminum to fill the gap at the end of their ill fitting headlight bar. They advertise these bars as being universal fits, but they really seem to only fit the fender curvature on the 30/31 series fenders, not the 28/29 series which I have on the roadster pickup. Since I have the headlights apart anyways, I will be replacing the 7" sealed beams with some kind of direct replacement Halogen headlights. Thank you Irelands Child for your info placed earlier in this thread.