Mine were, I was looking at some alternative lighting but decided to hold off, then the headlights cut off and came back on one night. I knew the switches have a circuit breaker in them so I replaced the switch. Wow, BIG difference. It never occurred to me that there are contacts in these old switches and they were dirty. Working on new computer controlled stuff everyday I tend to forget how the old stuff worked.

I took the old switch apart and the contacts were very dark. Just thought I'd pass that on to you all.

Shoot, that's pretty good timing! I've been noticing mine getting dimmer and figured maybe the alternator wasn't doing it's job.

I've never taken a switch apart. Can you just clean it up with steel wool or compressed air or what?

Thanks.

It's riveted together into blind holes so you probably can't put it back together but the switches are cheap, probably $20 or so. I paid $12 for mine but my GF works for CarQuest and gets parts for cost.

edit: Just looked up my switch on line, lists for $20.36 part# 55222.

I have found the rivits holding the blade/spade on the switch loose and cuased it to heat up burning the plastic plug on them before.

low idle and alt output does not help anything either.

I now idle my trucks up at night with lights on till it has the no dim headlights at idle.

only a couple hundred rpm over what I like but no more discharging at a redlight at night.

I think I will go have a look at the switch in my 85 truck now... it is 29 yrs old

Yeah mine was 22 years old. I'd post a pic but I can't at work.

you think they're bright now, add a set of relays at the headlights.

New switch was cheap, amazin Amazon is sending me one out, I am hoping it will help with the dim dash lights, so far no headlight problems.

Back in my misspent youth I had a 64 Sport Fury, and got some "High power headlights" thru JC Whitney, turns out they were aircraft landing lights.

I ground off the alignment lugs and put them in the high beam holes (same size) and was amazed! It would light up from one end of my little town to the other!

On my first long distance trip, across Canada, I had occasion to leave the high beams on for an extended time ... that is when I learned about the circuit breaker built in ...after 1/2 hour the lights would flicker off/on once, then 15 min later again, then about 7-8 min again ...

Finally figured out all I had to do was dim the lights for a couple minutes once in a while and I was good to go, problem solved!

Any other time high beam use was short enough that it wasn't a problem.

My dash lights got brighter but I cleaned my cluster and replaced all the dash bulbs when I replaced the switch so I don't know if the new switch helped that or not.