Headlight difference's?

Quoting DR1665:

4. The H1 high beams require a special adapter that goes between the bulb (which has only 1-blade) and the wire harness (which has 2 blades). One of mine was broken. It took me almost a year to find someone in Australia who could hook me up with a replacement.
]




Funny part is that i've got like 5 of them just laying around..... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crazy.gif

 

[DR1665]

Quoting evo8ya:
My JDM's shine fine at night. Maybe they were adjusted before I bought them but I can see fine at night and have never been flashed by oncoming cars. With the JDM's in my evo, I get flashed all the time if I don't have them at their lowest electronic level setting.


Well crap. Maybe we should compare light patterns then. Maybe I'm doing something wrong? I'll try to snag a picture tonight and post it tomorrow morning. I'd love to be able to aim my headlights a bit higher up.

And sorry, GTI. I totally spaced on that one!

 

[evo8ya]

I'll try to remember to get a pic tonight aswell.

 

Dr1665,
Thanks for the pic's bro. Very helpful.

Curtis,
I'll get back to you as soon as I touch back in town(home),then we'll chat. Those lights are ridiculous.......as in f***ing sick! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/jawdrop.gif

 

where I work I help build the machinery that is used to sputter the aluminum reflector inside headlamps.
how hard would it be to disassemble one of these so that I could re-plate the insides?

 

[turbowop]

Dude, if you do this for a living, you could have a very nice side business helping out some of the guys on this board with '93 reflectors that are peeling. A lot of these lights get passed over due to this issue.

Disassembly is easy. Several minutes in an oven at 170degrees and they come apart with little drama.

 

[steve]

Agreed! Many of the '93s are considered junk because of reflector peeling.

 

yeah the reason for the pealing is that the headlamp isn't sealed. the aluminum coating oxidizes from heated moisture, eventually pealing and loosing efficiency. Most of the new headlights these days have better monomer topcoats to help protect the aluminum against nature. the company I work for, Mustang Vacuum Systems, sends these machines all over the world, mostly for headlamp manufacturing. some other customers use em for other things like chroming wheels and making casket parts too, though.

the most important requirement for sputtering aluminum and making mirrored surfaces, is that the surface has to be as smooth as possible, sputtered materials are super thin (around 1 micron, not like traditional chroming thickness) and any light scratches or even finger prints will be seen. the best way around this issue is to powder coat or paint the surface ultra smooth prior to it becoming metalized. the amount of prep required might not be worth the cost.

added: what I mentioned above is if it needed to be perfect. I could easily plate over what you already have, but I can't guarantee the outcome will, at the least, be to your liking. I morally/personally wouldn't offer any of you guys anything other than perfect.

 

[turbowop]

Considering that the housings have already had this done once, I would assume they are pretty smooth? Perhaps you know an easy way to remove the remaining "sputtering" leaving a nice factory smooth surface ready for the new coating?

 

I guess it all depends on what you have. because like I said, finger prints will still be seen, they'll just be metalized instead.
if the reflector were metal you could polish it smooth. but seeing that ours are plastic - wet sanding and painting. when the wheel guys repair wheels, they powder coat to gain a smooth substrate before plating.


if someone could post a picture of a headlamp reflector that's peeling, I could better tell you how. I don't know what one of our headlamps looks like peeled.

 

[turbowop]

I don't have a pic on me at the moment but I'm sure somebody else can come up with one...

I don't think the housings are a normal plastic. I think they're some type of glass-filled nylon or something. They're pretty tough. They almost feel like ceramic when you tap on them.

 

[curtis]

The housing / backplate is a thermoset resin with fiber reinforcement. I've tried to repair the coating, one trick during restoration is to tape off the center leaving only the top and bottoms open and paint them black. I did this once with success but 2 other times the pinstripe I used for the edge pulled off the chrome. Its a real pain in the butt to get right. Mine and the others I built I use a 92 backplate and scuff until nothings shinning with a red scotchbrite pad the paint with the detail / trim duplicolor black paint. I painted a set of 93 backplates once and the facets didn't look right with projectors so I trashed them. I noticed that eastwood is selling a chrome powdercoat now. If I ever get my oven done I'll do a thread on how it works and how it shines. Now problem is if the surface is already peeled no way to electroplate. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/bawling.gif Plus there may not be enough metal in the plating to carry a charge. Don't even think about the spray paint chrome from Auto Zone or advance its just silver shinny and doesn't put out the same kind of light. Tried that as well.

As for putting projectors in them its super time consuming finding the correct lights to use inside and getting the focal points set perfect as well as getting the angle's correct so you can adjust them. From start to finish for the weekend warriors out there figure 2 weekends after you have all the parts and supplies. One day restoring hardware painting the frames, baking lights cleaning out the goo that seals them then a day of scratching your head measuring thinking and screwing with them and figuring out how to mount everything. Then the next weekend will be build then paint and cure time then a few hours a few days later of reassembly and sealing. Then a full day of washing and cleaning up the car and installing the lights then a full day of frapping as you stare at them. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif


eastwood chrome powders the first one is the one I'm talking about

Eastwood almost chrome paint, never tired it but as with anything eastwood sells I trust there ad.

 

[DR1665]

Took some pictures last night with the Blackberry after school. No flash from the BB, still crappy pictures. Might try to do this over the weekend with my wife's Nikon for a more realistic image. These look a bit dimmer than actual.

25MPH sign is about "one house down." You can also see how the RHD beam pattern is biased up and to the left. I plan on pulling these out, re-wiring for double-bright high beams, and doing a better job of adjusting them. I think I'm also going to pick up some Osram Silverstar+50s sometime this summer.

Low beams, fogs off.


Low beams, fogs on.


High beams, fogs off. (Only right side high beam working since I haven't installed that adapter from Australia yet.)


As you can see, the JDM lights on my car are pretty crappy in terms of output. A better camera will give a better idea of how they truly light up the road, but it's clear that installing these lights is something of a compromise.

 

Quote:
The housing / backplate is a thermoset resin with fiber reinforcement. I've tried to repair the coating, one trick during restoration is to tape off the center leaving only the top and bottoms open and paint them black. I did this once with success but 2 other times the pinstripe I used for the edge pulled off the chrome. Its a real pain in the butt to get right. Mine and the others I built I use a 92 backplate and scuff until nothings shinning with a red scotchbrite pad the paint with the detail / trim duplicolor black paint. I painted a set of 93 backplates once and the facets didn't look right with projectors so I trashed them. I noticed that eastwood is selling a chrome powdercoat now. If I ever get my oven done I'll do a thread on how it works and how it shines. Now problem is if the surface is already peeled no way to electroplate. Plus there may not be enough metal in the plating to carry a charge. Don't even think about the spray paint chrome from Auto Zone or advance its just silver shinny and doesn't put out the same kind of light. Tried that as well.




yeah everything thing we plate is done in a vacuum chamber. we use plasma energy to tack-up the surface so that the plating sticks better. the problem with using chrome, although it's a harder material than aluminum and doesn't oxidize it's aspect and reflective properties are not as good as aluminum though. thats why they plate headlamps with aluminum.

 

You installed the JDM ones because you wanted the city lights, correct? Why don't you use EDM ones? Exactly thesame as the JDM ones, only made for LHD and not RHD..... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

My EDM ones light op the road like it's faking daylight. The inner ones light up (h1) and the outer ones (h4) with high beams on. So 2 high beams on each side(4 total). I've rarely see such a good high beam on a car. Wish my 8th gen Galant had thesame construction as the 6th gen, especially the high beams.....

 

[Hertz]

Quoting DR1665:

I only *wish* my JDM headlights lit the road like that. Wow.



You're running JDM headlights on your car AT NIGHT on PUBLIC ROADS? That's illegal and dangerous. They're not DOT approved, you could blind someone and cause them to slide into a ditch.

Consider this REAL lighting 101.

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/devil.gif

 

[JSchleim18]

ISWYDT /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/hsugh.gif

 

[solidviper89]

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/worthy.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/rofl.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/jawdrop.gif

 

Quoting Hertz:
Quoting DR1665:

I only *wish* my JDM headlights lit the road like that. Wow.



You're running JDM headlights on your car AT NIGHT on PUBLIC ROADS? That's illegal and dangerous. They're not DOT approved, you could blind someone and cause them to slide into a ditch.

Consider this REAL lighting 101.

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/devil.gif

LOL should I be concerned as well? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/rofl.gif

 

[turbowop]

Pwnt. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/rofl.gif