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This might be a silly question, but here goes. If one were building a ‘68, drive to work during the week, rally through the hills at the weekend type of car, would it have ever been equipped with clear headlight lenses and yellow TTG fogs/driving lights? Or would the headlights and fogs have matched in color? Thanks for the advice...
I did install the mud flaps the other day...
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I'm by no means an expert, but I own a 1954 Austin Healey 100 with a fairly extensive race history and it has both. No idea if this was common, only a Healey thing, or specific to this car. But I love the look.
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I kind of remember that era. If you want a real expert on historic sports car lighting, contact Aardvark International.
Headlights
Yellow headlights were France only and there only from WWII up to 1993. It might not have been legal to register a car with yellow headlights outside France but lighting regulations aren't always enforced.
If you ran yellow headlights back in 1968 you'd be considered to be a poseur.
Driving Lights
I assume you mean long range lights intended to be used with high beams. I've never heard of these in yellow although yellow bulbs are available. I'd run white to be historically correct.
Fog Lights
Fog lights could be either white or yellow: your choice.
I suspect a rally car with a rack of driving lights would also run white fog lights. I was at the Petersen yesterday; the Ferrari GTO on display had white fog lights.
On the other hand, yellow fog lights could work a little better in thick fog. The big advantage back in '68 when virtually nobody in the USA had fog lights is that yellow fog lights wouldn't be mistaken for high beams. If you ran white fog lights people would blink their high beams to get you to dim yours (even though you weren't using them).
Thank you both for the information. I appreciate the period details you’ve provided, Jim, and you have a very nice Austin Healy, LiveFromNY! At both car events I attended this weekend (EASY C&C, and a drive this morning) I saw a few vintage cars with clear headlights and yellow fogs, and I like the look, so I’ve gone ahead and bought the Marchal yellow TTG fog lamps from a seller on the site here. Can’t wait to get them mounted. Thanks again for the input...
I agree with what has been said above
Lighting rules are very much jurisdiction specific and France was the only place with normal yellow lights.
Here in Australia there has always been a choice between yellow and white fog lights but yellow was only allowed on fog lights (and maybe not even in all states)
I have always preferred yellow fog lights over clear ones as I use them especially in heavy rain at night. In those conditions I find that they provide much better vision than white fogs (although white fogs are better than standard low beam due to the beam spread)
I try not to drive my 911 in those conditions theses days but I have it set up that way as shown on the picture if you what an idea of what it looks like
I have yellow for both headlights and fogs.. and some Marchal driving lights (in Yellow as well..), what can I say..
Jeffrey, maybe this should be a new thread BUT could you please post pics of how you installed your mud flaps / brackets etc.? I have those same flaps. Thanks!
nvr2many, it was loosely based on this photo that I found on another thread here:
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A bit rough looking, but it was not expensive and it works fine. I painted mine flat black to hide it a bit better. I’ll take and post some photos of my specific setup...
Hugh, beautiful car! Yes, I definitely like the look with the yellow fog lights.
My 'french' look
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Slightly later than the OP question year but yellow (Amber) fog lights were a Porsche option around 72 and 73 in the UK Porsche price list. See exerpt from Porsche cars GB pricelist below. Lights as local option and optional fitting charge. While yellow is most usually associated with France (for obvious historical reasons) yellow was preferred by some as the auxiliary lighting for use in fog here in the UK. Probably for reasons Hugh says the colour seems to work in fog.Quote:
Originally Posted by Darth Frivolous
I recall the use of a yellow fog and a long range white used in combo like shown in earlier Healey post above from my parent's and grandparent's cars. Not just a Healey thing in UK in that era.
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I have a feeling the practice was dropped (or certainly seemed less commonplace) when regulations auxiliary lighting to be matched pairs changed rather than allowing a fog and or a driving light pairing to be used and switched as conditions required along with the normal lights. Some switched yellow and white separately. Headlamps main beam and a single driving pencil beam when pressing on in country lanes. Dipped headlamp and a low yellow spread beam pattern if in fog. Iirc correctly headlights plus a single lamp became frowned upon by road safety folks here for some reason -- vague recollection it might be about safety wih busier roads beyond halcyon days of 50s because such a three combo on an unlit country lane might somehow get confused with car and bike close together?
Tbh not at all certain about that as that combining yellow and white "fashion" was slightly before my time.
Steve
Très jolie, Mathieu!
Here are some photos of my cheap hardware store mud flap mounts. I will say that this setup affords a lot of adjustability to get the positioning right.
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And here’s a nice shot from earlier this evening:
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Thank you for the additional information from the UK, Steve.
Hi Jeffrey,
This is a very grainy picture of one of the pair of TTG lamps that was on what is now my RS taken decades' ago; kindly given to me by a PO.
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Given your question I thought an old (albeit grainy black and white) picture might be of interest to you showing what a rally driver active in that era had on his personal fast road-car -- a 911.
The owner at the time was a rally driver and he had "class success" in the 1973 RAC rally. The Carrera RS was his road-car never used for competition by him -- he competed in Ford Escorts. The RS at the time was owned in Wales which has some wonderful driving roads and often features prominently in local and national rallying events -- challenging Welsh public roads often featured today in UK magazine road tests. As an experienced rally driver I suppose he had skills to use it well in the Welsh lanes even as a road-car. That PO and his family still active in motorsports with small family owned business prepping historic rally cars. I caught up with them at the Goodwood Festival of speed where they were running a car in the rally showcase event at top of hill -- separate from the main hillclimb. His son (now a grown man) working in the family business told me after I got in touch with his dad about car he was ribbed mercilessly in the workshop banter for regularly being car-sick all over his his dad's "pride and joy" as a toddler! Something I can relate to when my kids were small and son christened all sorts of things including once the brand new Range Rover of my boss I'd borrowed which he never quite forgave me for :(
While the lamp shown below on my 73 are a little later than in your question it can be made out that the car had Raydyots. It has on a December 72 car the correct silver TTG grille as used on the earliest of that model year for TTG fittment before the stocks of these ran out and cut black plastic grilles were supplied instead to mount lamps there. These shallow depth lamps suited the location, were Quartz halogen and with anti theft washer won a British Design Centre award at the time -- so quite popular. Don't want to risk a tenner's worth of lamps being knicked on your £7000 motor!
Detail of lamp is quite hard to make out. Raydyots of that time do have a distinctive black plastic covers with a white 'R' branded disc in their centre.
The choice of owners back in the day of even expensive cars was sometimes good quality accessories of brands/local manufacture. Britax or Kangol seatbelts, Radiomobile brand radios as used in R-R AM etc were popular as were Raydyots here in the UK. Accessories from Warley Worcestershire, Chertsey Surrey and Cricklewood N London found their way onto 911s :)
I have got Raydyots but personally prefer the simpler front end look of car without lamps -- so they are boxed up in deep storage. Got various Hellas stored too but that's not a particularly distinctive choice and weren't on this car's original order/ CoA.
The Raydyots in pencil long range driving and Amber fog and or passing beam pattern are shown in a contemporary accessories, components book I have dated April 1972. Yellow aka Amber (other when we used to paint our headlights with temporary yellow varnish for our road trips to France) to me in UK imply for fog use. Hopefully this second image is a bit more clear:
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Our old classic cars were bought new by owners in a range of country markets and as Hugh says were subject to local regulations before common standards became established. Unless the option was on Kardex etc I suspect there was much more interesting variety of accessories got used than conventional wisdom and default choice brands in restoration today would lead us to think.
To be original and authentic to back in the day can be interesting and different if a car's history exists on paper or in pictures from helpful POs we can choose to recreate the variety (or not).
Enjoy your new lamps, mudguards etc
Cheers
Steve
What a wealth of interesting details, Steve, thank you for sharing. My son is 11 now, but he certainly did his share of “christening” himself when he was younger. I have the switch already installed in the dash for the fog lights, now I need to sort out the brackets and wiring.
It always makes me smile when you see the old adverts as in Steve's above in regards to the early prices of things.
500 Raydyots for just over a "Lady Godiva"
Thats a $ Fiver for those that dont speak English proper.
Mark
These are from a 1971 MG Mitten catalog I found at a swap meet,
It looks like they even had Hella 128s a couple years after Porsche changed foglights.
H4 bulbs were first introduced in 1971 so it's not a surprise they weren't being sold in the USA through this catalog.
If it about improving your car's "sex appeal" like is says in the heading of ad posted by Jim then forget Porsche 911 or yellow lamps and go for an old British family saloon but make sure it has Bri Nylon seats. Advert in motor 1973 ... Copy says it all :)
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