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Orange removal from headlights. Options?

C

chris

Senior member
Southampton
I want to de-tango the front, but what options other than new headlights are there? Ive seen headlights which look as if the orange lens have been take out, or so it looks like. Not sure about tinting the outside, although maybe an option.

How easy are the headlights to take apart as well?

Cheers Chris :)
 
Lots of info on here with the options you have listed. But to remove the orange you need two sets of lights as you will need the front from one pair and the rears from the other as you have to cut them apart. They will not un glue using the oven trick :(
 
cj10jeeper said:
Start by reading this, which shoudl give you a lot of basic info.
http://www.z4-forum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2953&hilit=xenon+the+story

From there ask away
Click to expand...

Must admit i read your write up a while ago, and very good it is :thumbsup:

Only thing i did not want to do is the donor headlights, well i could but i might as well just get some clears. What i was meaning is if you can just simply take the amber unit out, or the face of it off. But looking at the photo's again i doubt you can. So its tinting or new lights really then :lol:

Although i could take them apart (done it on a few cars) and tint the orange bits. Depends if i can find a set on ebay before the orange really annoys me :P
 
Well if you don't want donor lights then I thing you have a few options:

Replace with later clear lights, but rare and expensive of post facelift woudl need wiring and LCM work
Apply a tint to the outside of the clears
Crudely chop the front off and do something to the amber (It cannot be removed and left out as on some BMW's) then reseal it back
Sent it to a company in the US that does converions
 
Is it different wiring on the facelift versions then? As i have halogen not xenon if that makes a difference.

I want to see a close up of the fronts with tint film, may drop christurbo a PM and see, as he has just done his.
 
chris said:
Is it different wiring on the facelift versions then? As i have halogen not xenon if that makes a difference.

I want to see a close up of the fronts with tint film, may drop christurbo a PM and see, as he has just done his.
Click to expand...

I believe halogens are a direct swap, from what others have said, but cannot categorically state that. xenon's erquire wiring and LCM coding/change
 
Halogens do seem to come up a lot more than xenons on eBay, the black lined ones certainly do, assuming you can live with having the lights from a smaller engined car. A lot of people don't like the idea of putting the black 2.5 lights on a 3.0 (which has silver lined), personally if I like it it wouldn't bother me, also a lot of people on the forum don't know the difference so who else is going to care? Ironically, there was a discussion some time back with a few M drivers wanting to swap their lights for black.

I think on your car with those wheels, get some black grills and it would all tie in nicely with black lights.

I've done the upgrade on mine (although I already had the black inners) - see the link in my signature. I hadn't tried either the sanding lights or plastic welding before, but thanks to the guys on here I did both with pretty good results.
 
Here's a slightly off-topic, though related, idea that someone (Phil? :)) may be able to help me with:

Would caliper paint be heat-resistant enough to cope with the headlight backing on a set of xenons?

See I'm planning on the light conversion (full AE and de-ambering) at some point, but want to do something a little different; not black or chrome but body-colour lining. I found somewhere that mixes up caliper paint to paint numbers (er... they're in america, can't find the link now though :(), but I'd imagine the heat generated by xenons is far more than calipers have to deal with, no?
 
Interesting proposition. My thought - be interested to see if it's right, or even close... while the lamps themselves would, I expect, be very hot to the tough, I'd be surprised if they radiated enough heat to damage a painted housing - I was using thermoplastic (thank CJ for the knowledge there) to repair my headlights. I heated a very similar material to 175 degrees in the oven to repair my bumper, so assume this is the sort of temperature range when the plastic become malleable over a short time. Even if you doubled that to 350dgrees you should be okay; the calliper paints I have seen tend to work up to the 600 degree + mark. I think you should be fine. Assuming any of that was even remotely correct.

PS, nice to hear someone trying something new :thumbsup:
 
Well, that does sound promising, Matt... cheers :D
Though, will have to wait until I am considerably richer methinks
 
Hi Guy's just joined as i have been busy working on a customers car doing the following,

z4%20lights.jpg


z4%20lights2.jpg


I will post the final pics when finished but i am going to do a xenon conversion with led sides and led indicators.
 
Tweed - the heat from xenons is actually a lot less than halogens (around 35w vs around 55w current draw) so less heat in them to start with. In terms of the housing (black or chrome) then you can spray that in any suitable plastic paint or panel spray (with primer).

I sprayed the black inners on my X5 matt silver using Plastic spray paint. Been unmarked after about 4 years of daily use.

Don't mess with caliper paint and similar as it has a very strange composition and will likely give a fairly rough texture.

Ultimate shine - welcome. Would be interested in a more full description of what you're doing.
 
Welcome Ultimate Shine, I too am interested to hear more about what you're doing to that headlight too. have you started with a clear-indicator light unit? Are you reusing the same lens and backing or do you have a sacrificial unit? How did you seperate the unit?
 
Ultimate Shine said:
Hi Guy's just joined as i have been busy working on a customers car doing the following,

z4%20lights.jpg


[imghttp://www.theultimateshine.com/pics/z4%20lights2.jpg][/img]

I will post the final pics when finished but i am going to do a xenon conversion with led sides and led indicators.
Click to expand...


Ok - so from that image, you've separated the glass from the unit.... You realise you're now considered the Z4 messiah (sorry CJ, you've been dethroned ;))

Welcome and please, for the sake of the children, share how you achieved this! :thumbsup:
 
sk93 said:
(sorry CJ, you've been dethroned ;))
Click to expand...
:rofl: that's a bit hasty sk93, at least until we know the full details and THEN we dethrone Phil :wink:

It's still not possible to buy the clear inserts seperately, to replace the amber ones though, is it?
 
Hi Guy's,

Yes the car is a 2003 Z4 and had the orange lenses in place. I then had to get a set of LHD lights with the clear lenses and remove the lenses off the orange lights and then remove the rear off the LHD lights so i would have a perfect rear and a perfect lens and then replace the orange with clear. This job is mega mega involved but TBH i would do the job again in a min as i now know what to do. As for the bulbs for the indicators this was the hardest bit to find as my customer had asked if he could get silvertech bulbs but as you will all know they don't do them.

The choice for painting them black was to make them bespoke looking and not to keep with the silver (something different and subtle always makes me turn my head)

I will have a big write up that i will do for you when i have finished.

PS the lights took me approx 16hrs but if i was to do it again then it would take me 3 or 4 hours.
 
Ah well, it's the same procedure as what CJ and others on here have done to theirs - a sacrificial clear set is still required. Damn, I thought you'd stumbled on the Holy Grail for Z4's there!
 
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