so dads 97 has some crappy headlights, so first I purchased a lens cleaning kit to brighten er up a little bit and it worked. then I thought lets put a little more brightness behind the lens so I went down to napa and purchased 80/100 watt street glows, as opposed to some new 55/65 some bitches. threw them in there. went to online napa and saw a warning related to this much power in a bulb that I could damage the factory wiring harness..oh well too late they're already installed just got back from feeding cows.. initially the damn things were brighter than all get out, got back into the truck noticed they weren't quite so bright, checked it out and sure enough the passenger side bulb is really really dim, driver side still works fine though. have not yet checked fuses, or tried switchin' out to the old bulb.. what do you guys think though, the truck or its harness ain't got the cahootchies to power these bulbs, or I just got a bad one or maybe screwed it up while I was installing what do you guys think? when its all said and done i'm going to prob still install a pair of 100 watt halogens on the bumper, but for now i'd like to try and solve this little dilemma.

 

It's the way that the lights a wired in the trucks.

Instead of being ran by a relay, the actual switch does all the work, this creates poor voltages to the bulbs.
stock lights wired properly are far far brighter.

I'd post a link, but it's to another forum.

 

Its quite easy to do, get two of the heavy duty bulb connectors that Napa sells, add wire length to those to reach the battery (I ran ours to the drivers side and made one connection. Then a double pole relay for the lights and use the drivers side factory connection as a trigger...

Look up Bright Box... They sell a kit just like it.

 

thanks again guys, Joe you seize to amaze me with your knowledge and experience, I walked away from the 80/100 watts as I didn't want to burn anything else up and its illegal to use them on the highway. I bought the Phillips extreme power, being brand new they were def brighter than what was in there also on the drivers side headlight dad and I found two random *** pieces of metal inside the headlight assembly the other side had nothing that resembled these pieces and they were too big to pull out the back side, without crushing them down with needle nose pliers and carefully removing them, still not sure what the hell they were. At any rate that plus new headlights, and purchasing some new headlight clips so the lens is pointing out and not down the lighting is substantially better; i'll keep your suggestion in mind because we love good headlights. just installed some wide angle halogens off the back bumper so we got sweet back-up lights now too.