So I've started a retrofit

I figured I'd post some pics up as there hasn't been much project content lately over the winter months....

This retrofit is my first, and it will be going into my 1986 Corolla GTS.

First off I ordered a set of ebay glass lens h4 housings for the car. It just uses 5x7 housings as it has pop up headlamps. Here's a shot with the lens on (notice I gutted all the halogen projector bits out of it)



Heating up the housings in the oven allowed the glass lenses to be pried off. A fellow DSMer Anthony Hiscock helped with this part as I wasn't sure on how hot or how long to leave the lights in the oven. I used a flat top screw driver to remove the remaining OEM sealant that held the assembly together.



Here's a shot of the back of the housing I had to work with. There isn't much depth between the front lens and the OEM bulb location, so I would have to cut the back out of the housing to get the projector to sit far back enough to allow the re installation of the lens.



Here's a couple of shots of the projector I'll be using. Its the bi-xenon mini d2s kit. I bought a full kit from retrofitsource.





What I ended up doing was using a hole saw to cut out the original mounting flange for the halogen bulb. I then needed to ream out the bottom of the basket to have the projector sit deep enough into the housing. Finally I cut two triangles to allow the projector to sit perfectly straight in the housing without any tilt.



Here it is test fit into the housing...



Front clears!



That's as far as I made out last night with this project. Today I picked up two PVC caps for the back of the housing. I hope to use the caps to centre the projector before bench adjusting the cut off and aim of the light with respect to the housing. I also picked up a tube of urathane which I will use to seal up the back of the housing to ensure its water tight.

Thats a pretty cool mod....I like it.

I started off the day knowing I needed some form of cap to cover in the back of the housing. I was hoping for something to not only keep the weather out, but also provide a structural point to attach the rear of the projector to. I measured up the outside diameter to see what I could use...



Looks like I need something with about a 2.5 inch ID...

I found this at Canadian Tire, it was the closest match in size, but was still quite a bit smaller than what I needed. This pic shows the OD measurement of the light housing compared with the ID of the cap.



After a bit of die grinder fun, I was able to work about half of the cap sidewall thickness out. Finally it fit.



Things really couldn't have worked out better with this. After modifying the second cap as I did above, I used a hole saw to cut out a smaller hole for the threaded portion of the back of the projector to fit through.

Using the provided hardware, I sandwiched everything together making for a VERY secure mounting of the projector. This is before even using any urathane or other adhesives.






Finally I powered it up on the bench with the lens electrical taped back on to see how the pattern looked.



There it is!

Damn Mike, you're working fast!
Looks great so far, can't wait to see it finished!

Thanks Anthony. Its coming along. Next I've got to mount a light with the harness connected to see if it will fit into the car's flip up housing without modification. Then I'll be doing some fine tuning on the aiming and urathaning it up.

I think as long as the cutoff is level (rotation of the projector), I shouldn't have to have the up/down TOTALLY bang on as I can adjust this later once they're on the car with the OEM headlight adjustment screws. We'll see... I'll get it as close as I can to perfect.

Well this is a relief...the housing fits the car without having to so much as trim the flip up housings. It's ridiculously close clearance wise.

That's awesome! I bought the exact same kit a few months back for my 1ga. The lenses are 4X6 and take a LOT more hacking to make everything fit, also the car's frame needs to be cut up for to make everything fit when popping up.

I haven't finished my install and I'm giving up for now as I bought a new DD and will be doing the retrofit on that instead.

Can I ask at what temp and how long did you put them in the oven?

So I started working on the shrouds today after work. I have one done there now, and after posting this I'll be going to do the 2nd.

Here's a shot of the modified shroud. It fits really nice and I'm HOPING that none of the visable edges will be roughed up from the grinding. I used 3m tape to cover it all before handling it.



Note that the depth of the flat portion on the bottom view has quite a bit of meat taken off of it. I pretty much just cut the top of the shroud, ground some of the outside diameter off, and took some depth out of the flat part as I mentioned above...



Test fitted. Looks sweet I think. The real challenge will be making the second one look identical to this one

Quick post before bed. Its almost 2 am here now and I have to get up for work at 7... I wanted to get the two coats of primer and two coats of paint done today though, so here's some more pics.

All scuffed down with a scotchbrite pad


The shrouds came out perfect after the trimming. No marring around the edges.


After two coats of primer


And two coats of paint! (paint is still drying here, you can see how on the edges its a more satin black as its cured up in some areas and still wet in others)



I also mounted the ballasts and ran all the wiring today. I used 3m double sided tape to tuck the ballasts way out of the way of the flip up lights right up inside the rad support. You can't see them really from the engine bay now. I used a large ziptie on each side to hold ensure it stays put against the 3m tape.

Looking good Hiscott, you're almost there!

Bad ass man, I love this car!

Sealed up the headlights tonight minus the lenses



Boom

Damn you work fast Mike.
Looks awesome!

I wanted to seal up the back of the mounting flange, but didn't want to have it permanent like the urethane is. I used some silicone instead to make things reversible should I ever need to pull a projector.

I sealed up and installed the lights this evening.




Powered up! High and low beams look great. I'll get some cutoff pictures once the car is off the jackstands. I have the front hubs off the car to install 1/2" 20 tpi wheelstuds to match the ones on my rear axle...



This happened after about 30 seconds of the lights being on. Its all fogged up around the beam, but they obviously haven't been exposed to any moisture as of yet, and I'm entirely sure the housings are quite well sealed....

Could it be that I had the lights in the oven not long before heading outside, and its not too far above freezing now? Would having put the bulb in inside the house where its warm make it fog up outside where its cooler and gets exposed to the warmth of the projector? Any ideas?

Nice work

Re. the fog - is something you used to seal them maybe still drying up?

Looks great Mike, nice to see a retro that looks like it should have come stock. Nothing worse then someone bolting a projector assembly inside his stock light & calling it a retro

Someday I'd like to do a proper HID retro to the 2gb Eclipse heads but I'd need to figure how to make it loook stock. I don't like the looks of just modifying the Ebay projector headlights, as they don't look as good as OEM to me.

I'm guessing the fog is just temporary. You said you had them inside & in the oven & then brought them out to near freezing temps? When hot air meets cold, it condenses.

Yea we'll see... I might go out now that its probably all at the same temp and turn them on. See if they fog up again... Perhaps I'll need to pull the bulbs and let any condensation that may have formed from the initial temperature shock out of the housing...

Oh thanks for the compliments guys! This is my first one, and so long as the fogging is figured out I'll be very happy with how it all turned out. Didn't think it'd look this nice when I started.

I could certainly see going from the oven to outside maybe causing some fogging (it was pretty cold last night).
I say pull the bulbs and let them sit inside (or outside) for a bit and see what happens.

Retro looks awesome!

Nice work Mike, looks great!