BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
#101
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
there isnt a way around cutting. I tried my very very best to not cut so much. but i had to in order to get the lights to fit they do now. I could of cut much more but felt like this was good enough. Cutting is something you have to do with these headlights.
A write up would be a novel to do. You just got to jump right into it. I will be more than happy to help out. But its a very very risky mod. You could spend thousand if you mess up. LOL
A write up would be a novel to do. You just got to jump right into it. I will be more than happy to help out. But its a very very risky mod. You could spend thousand if you mess up. LOL
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
there isnt a way around cutting. I tried my very very best to not cut so much. but i had to in order to get the lights to fit they do now. I could of cut much more but felt like this was good enough. Cutting is something you have to do with these headlights.
A write up would be a novel to do. You just got to jump right into it. I will be more than happy to help out. But its a very very risky mod. You could spend thousand if you mess up. LOL
A write up would be a novel to do. You just got to jump right into it. I will be more than happy to help out. But its a very very risky mod. You could spend thousand if you mess up. LOL
Thanks
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
Yeah I'm gonna have to side with that, this will become a necessary mod...however to include some sort of stiffening of the front end after I complete it.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
Are those headlights expensive to buy?
Thanks. Tony.
Thanks. Tony.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
I like the light install, good touch for Camaro. Heres a E39 pic (BMW), too bad it wont work with in a T/A
Last edited by transam85dudeman; 01-21-2010 at 09:58 PM.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
I wouldnt mind flying to Massachusetts. I want to see my boy Mr. Brown! LOL
Jim, I do have picturs of the front covers. I just got to download them from my phone.
The headlights are about $250 off ebay. Plus you have to get the angel eyes from another company. They have great stuff. Plus make your own wire harness in order to make the lights work with our setup
Jim, I do have picturs of the front covers. I just got to download them from my phone.
The headlights are about $250 off ebay. Plus you have to get the angel eyes from another company. They have great stuff. Plus make your own wire harness in order to make the lights work with our setup
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
That is because most of the time they are true HID's.
Speaking of which Ramair, did yours come with the ballast's? or do they use standard bulbs? I looked at one of them listed in ebay and noticed they were using 9006 and 9007 connectors.
Speaking of which Ramair, did yours come with the ballast's? or do they use standard bulbs? I looked at one of them listed in ebay and noticed they were using 9006 and 9007 connectors.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
I'm having a hell of a time deciding just what I want to go with here.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
What do you mean that I would need the angel headlight from another company? I thought the halo's came stock with the headlights. Now im confused.
Tony.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
That has to be by far the best healight swap i have ever seen on the 3rd Gen Camaro's and I have to say the final install very professional looking great attention to detail and great job....look killer
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
I've been talking with a guy that sells these lights, and who is very familiar with them. I sent him pics from this thread. He thinks there's enough dead space at the back of the headlight housings that I could cut that space away, and get these to fit without touching the core support.
Stay tuned.
Update. This is a pic of the back of the light with the cover off. According to the guy I'm talking with, they retro-fit these into Maximas and cut a LOT of the housing away. He feels that much less of the housing would need to be cut for this install.
Here's a better pic that shows the back of one of these housings with the cover off:
Here's a heavily modified e36 setup to fit into a maxima. From what I can tell, this has the e36 innards behind the maxima lense and with some different backing pieces. If anything, it makes me more sure that I can modify the housing to fit.
Stay tuned.
Update. This is a pic of the back of the light with the cover off. According to the guy I'm talking with, they retro-fit these into Maximas and cut a LOT of the housing away. He feels that much less of the housing would need to be cut for this install.
Here's a better pic that shows the back of one of these housings with the cover off:
Here's a heavily modified e36 setup to fit into a maxima. From what I can tell, this has the e36 innards behind the maxima lense and with some different backing pieces. If anything, it makes me more sure that I can modify the housing to fit.
Last edited by Jim85IROC; 01-20-2010 at 03:13 PM.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
i never thought about cutting the extra plastic off. That makes a lot more sense to do it that way. If that is the case you wont need to cut the support as much as i did. great looking out Jim
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
I've been talking with a guy that sells these lights, and who is very familiar with them. I sent him pics from this thread. He thinks there's enough dead space at the back of the headlight housings that I could cut that space away, and get these to fit without touching the core support.
Stay tuned.
Update. This is a pic of the back of the light with the cover off. According to the guy I'm talking with, they retro-fit these into Maximas and cut a LOT of the housing away. He feels that much less of the housing would need to be cut for this install.
Here's a better pic that shows the back of one of these housings with the cover off:
Here's a heavily modified e36 setup to fit into a maxima. From what I can tell, this has the e36 innards behind the maxima lense and with some different backing pieces. If anything, it makes me more sure that I can modify the housing to fit.
Stay tuned.
Update. This is a pic of the back of the light with the cover off. According to the guy I'm talking with, they retro-fit these into Maximas and cut a LOT of the housing away. He feels that much less of the housing would need to be cut for this install.
Here's a better pic that shows the back of one of these housings with the cover off:
Here's a heavily modified e36 setup to fit into a maxima. From what I can tell, this has the e36 innards behind the maxima lense and with some different backing pieces. If anything, it makes me more sure that I can modify the housing to fit.
RamAir, I'm sure that you've taken your car out at night already so how much do you think the light output has increased just by changing to these headlight housings?
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
i read theres a simple mod one can do to upgrade to H.D without buying the upgrade kit, bmw owners do it all the time. http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum....php?p=8222169
Last edited by transam85dudeman; 01-31-2010 at 12:09 PM.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
Theres shop out here in the LA County are I believe that sells the germany made headlights you know with the glass instead of plastic like US ones. Anyways and they come equiped with the halo's as well and you could also get them in different colors too. I called yesterday and they also told me that they come with bulb's and the HID's as well for $350 sound kinda high though not sure.
http://www.myspace.com/europeanvision
Tony.
http://www.myspace.com/europeanvision
Tony.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
i read theres a simple mod one can do to upgrade to H.I.D without buying the upgrade kit, bmw owners do it all the time. http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum....php?p=8222169
Some guys are actually taking the HID projector from other headlamp assemblies and retro-fitting them into these assemblies with minimal modification.
I may try doing this in stages. My guess is that even with the H1s that come with these lights, the output should be superior to our sealed beams. I can then upgrade to the HID bulbs, and if I still feel I need to do more, I can retrofit a set of HID projectors in place of the ones that come on these lights.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
Great job. That is the best Camaro mod I've seen. We definitely need a cool firebird one now.
~Matt
~Matt
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
Deff. toss up a post of your own so I can follow your work. Im wanting to do this to my vert.
P.S. I picked up a pre-90 gauge bezel and am gonna work up some trim rings.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
yes it is. I wasnt able to get my lights to adjust the way i wanted them. But i able to see at night. thats all that matters. Good luck with the build Jim
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
Any suggestions on how to make it adjust better? Or is it just where you have the mounts that is fooling with your headlights aiming?
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
I hope that you do a thread of your own and with a tons of good pics. I really want to do this, but I would like to see how and where everyone is cutting and such before I get to it.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
adjustments for bimmer lights, http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum...d.php?t=893721 btw on these cars, the head light always stay level with a servo/solenoid. theres two adjustment mounts each side. two are static adjusters and a third moving mount is a servo that tilts the light up and down.. For example if you go up a hill, the lights stays on the road instead on the air, going down the hill the lights point forward ahead instead of the road.
Last edited by transam85dudeman; 01-21-2010 at 07:53 PM.
#127
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
This is getting REALLY interesting now that we could potentially just cut the light housing.
I'm watching this!
I'm watching this!
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
No HID just H1 bulbs. HID are in the near future. I just love the angle eyes LOL
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
they way i mounted the headlight is causing this issue. I dont think there is a way around this cause the head light itself is not straight. Its more of a curved to it. So dont expect awesome results. But it works
No HID just H1 bulbs. HID are in the near future. I just love the angle eyes LOL
No HID just H1 bulbs. HID are in the near future. I just love the angle eyes LOL
Tell me about the halo's are one of the coolest ideas that bmw has done for their head lights. In the link I have posted above that company also installs halo's and they have them in different colors as well. I though about it if I would go with this converstion I would go with the red halo's like that black out ss 5th gen maro.
Tony.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
I'd kill for a set of those head lights with red halos on my camaro
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
Ive seen a Red BMW with red halos. It wasnt my taste at all. to much red lol. They do sell halos that change colors but are expensive really expensive
#134
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
need some pics with the hood up so we all can see the detail there and copy off of your genious idea. thanks for thinking outside the box. makes the 3rd gen look million times better and looks a lot newer of a car than what it rly is.
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
they way i mounted the headlight is causing this issue. I dont think there is a way around this cause the head light itself is not straight. Its more of a curved to it. So dont expect awesome results. But it works
No HID just H1 bulbs. HID are in the near future. I just love the angle eyes LOL
No HID just H1 bulbs. HID are in the near future. I just love the angle eyes LOL
do you have any driving videos
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
No driving vids yet. But the project cost around 300-400. Something like that LOL and a new pair of ***** LOL
#137
Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
yea, those are depo E36 lights (entirely different from the ones you posted above it) with a stock 89-94 (also 3rd gen, heh) Maxima corner lamp bondo'd onto it, and a wade cover bondo'd over the whole thing. It's a H7 halogen projector and i forget what the highbeam bulb is (H1? 9005 maybe? i dunno). sadly the projector bowls were all bubbled up so output was HORRIBLE. I never actually put them on my car because of that.
however the projector modules just pop out (heat up the glue with a heat gun, 4 screws holding it on) so you could put in a HID-spec projector in its place with relative ease.
#139
Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
thanks. I don't drive the car those were intended for anymore... but I do have an 85 300zx (looks kindasorta like an F-body from the side 100ft away haha) but it's getting an LS1/T56 next year so i guess i'm not a total outsider.
for it i'm using a 7x6 ebay sealed-beam-replacement housing with a Hella E55 bixenon projector and 5000k d2s HID bulbs. what size are the stock sealed beam units on your cars?
for it i'm using a 7x6 ebay sealed-beam-replacement housing with a Hella E55 bixenon projector and 5000k d2s HID bulbs. what size are the stock sealed beam units on your cars?
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
Ramair21, you have one of the best looking 3rdgens I've ever seen! Great job with the BMW lights! I have always wondered how I would go about putting angel eyes on my Camaro. I gotta do this mod! Thanks for doing the leg work!
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
Thanks RsFreak!! You dont have a bad ride yourself man!
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
im about 2 shakes from buying these. i want the black set in link 1
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/92-93...item518f6cc084
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...=STRK:MEWAX:IT
both show to use halogens, i'm thinking 9005/9006. however i don't see headlight sockets??? how does bmw power the bulbs? i see a connector for the corner light, and one to go to the harness, and wiring to work the halos. is the bulb harness separate in a bmw?
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/92-93...item518f6cc084
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...=STRK:MEWAX:IT
both show to use halogens, i'm thinking 9005/9006. however i don't see headlight sockets??? how does bmw power the bulbs? i see a connector for the corner light, and one to go to the harness, and wiring to work the halos. is the bulb harness separate in a bmw?
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
im about 2 shakes from buying these. i want the black set in link 1
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/92-93...item518f6cc084
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...=STRK:MEWAX:IT
both show to use halogens, i'm thinking 9005/9006. however i don't see headlight sockets??? how does bmw power the bulbs? i see a connector for the corner light, and one to go to the harness, and wiring to work the halos. is the bulb harness separate in a bmw?
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/92-93...item518f6cc084
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...=STRK:MEWAX:IT
both show to use halogens, i'm thinking 9005/9006. however i don't see headlight sockets??? how does bmw power the bulbs? i see a connector for the corner light, and one to go to the harness, and wiring to work the halos. is the bulb harness separate in a bmw?
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Re: BMW E36 Headlight Conversion
i actually prefer the halogen look over projectors, projectors look like bug eyes to me. plus light output isn't a big deal because i live in the city and actually it is an upgrade from stock. so tomorrow i think i'm going to get the black ones and i'll have a little install session with pics for yall.