I just bought a Hella light kit for my hatch, which will have a jdmb18c in it shortly. The lights run on 12 volts, but i dont know anyhting else about LOAD . Is there something I can do to my EK hatch that will make sure the 5' tach, Headlights and Hellas all are working OK(as bright as possible) without putting TOO much load on the alternator/battery? Again i dont know anything aobut this electrical accessory stuff, but I DO know this. My '99 EK JDM B18C Hatch : doesnt have a stereo OR radio of ANY type. It has a factory gauge cluster of course, a 5 inch monster autometer tach, and factory tail and headlights. I also DO have Air Conditioning. Any tips or hints will be a great help. The guy at Summit Racing said that I was probably going to be okay.....but if i was going to do something about it.....i might wanna buy a better alternator or something.....i was like "ummmm.....okay"......."lemme check honda tech....thanks for the help in advance guys.....always!

 

That electical stuff is actually pretty easy if you have a cheat sheet to remind you of the formula:

Watts = Volts x Amps

If you rearrange things...

Volts = Watts/Amps (silly really because we are always dealing with 12v in a car)
Amps = Watts/Volts (the useful one for you)

If your Hellas are 100w bulbs and you have two, that's 200w. Put that into the last formula:

Amps = 200w/12v = 16.7 amps

If you have a 60w alternator (I don't know), then your new lights are using 16.7/60ths of its generating power - .28 or 28% or a little more than 1/4.

We ran this...



...with a 95a alternator. That's 4 100w driving lights, two 55w and two 65w headlight bulbs, and the other stuff that makes the car go, without any problem. That 640w of light is .85hp, by the way.



Kirk

 

Kirk.....thanks man.....ummmm can you tell me how you made that ILL light rack? Where'd you get the housing?

 

the manual says my alternator output is 13.5 V at normal operating temperature. I dont think this helps me one bit.

 

Look at the alternator itself. It should have some indication on it about its output amperage...?

The light pod came from Seattle area rally guy Todd Hartmann, who I used to co-drive for. Quanto carbone!



K

 

wow freakin' gorgeous

 

you have to have some serious cash to get involved with that scca rally stuff, huh?

 

It's a hell of a lot cheaper than doing silly stuff on the street.

K

 

Jesus! thats some sick lighting! Where's the high-beams haha

 

Kirk you crack me up you are always the man when it comes to formulas and the quantitative items

 

Hey, what do you expect from an ex-junior high science teacher?

K

EDIT - the GTI headlights are dual-bulb, with the highs on the inside of the fixture and the lows on the outside. In stock form (US rules, I guess) the lows go off when the highs come on. We jumpered the relay block so that the lows - and the driving lights - all come on with the high beam stalk.