Opening up the headlights for HALOS part 2, with Pic goodness

riperoo · 03-01-2008, 06:14 PM

Ok, here we go, first time opening headlights up, and if this helps anyone or you if you like the write up, please feel free to add to my rep, I can always use more beans, although my wife will disagree. Speaking of my wife, this post is dedicated to here, hopefully that will offset the great deal of pain I will have to endure if she ever finds out I had car parts in her oven!!

First Pic, a perfectly beautiful, functional headlight, courtesy of Greenking!

Back side of the same headlight, make sure you remove as much as you can, nuts, bulbs and wiring and such.

In the oven, I love you Doreen!!

In the over for 30 minutes at 250

Out of the oven and starting to GENTLY pry with a small screw driver, sucker is hot and even the mechanic gloves were starting to get warm, be real careful at this point, work the driver in, the trick is to penetrate the seal and work it through.

Work it in, the lower inside corner on both lights as they sit installed on the car, seemed to have the most prominant gap to start with, I worked it back and forth about and inch or two from the corner,

Just enough to get my fingers in

Work smoothly and consitently, you can see that silver tab, when that lets loose, it pops, you are going to Sh** you pants and think you broke something. Put full steam ahead, even if you did break something, too late now, the epoxy will fix it later

You get near halfway and it just starts to go

Bam, it is apart

Continued next post

**HemiLover** · 03-01-2008, 06:31 PM

Lookin good man! If I may offer some advice, make sure you get ALL the old sealant out of the housing and off of the lens before resealing. You'll probably need to use a heat gun. Then use alcohol to clean it up real good before sealing it all back up with black RTV silicone sealant. I did mine over 6 months ago and have zero leaks or condensation. Also make sure the lens is fully seated into the housing when sealing it up or your headlights may not line up with the body lines on the car correctly.

Oh and be real careful with the chrome reflectors as that stuff peels off real easy

riperoo · 03-01-2008, 06:39 PM

Here they are apart, the reflector kinda just falls out, held in with a couple of tabs and held in place by the clear cover against the inner housing.

Now this was a nice suprise, I intended on taping off the reflectors and painting the outside of them, I had no clue that the reflectors were a seperate piece, no worries about peeling the chrome off.

This is the sealant left on the outer rim after removal,

Well that is it for stage 1, now to paint, halos and LED strips, it this helped anyone I would appreciate you hitting my rep, I will return the favor.

riperoo · 03-01-2008, 06:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HemiLover

Lookin good man! If I may offer some advice, make sure you get ALL the old sealant out of the housing and off of the lens before resealing. You'll probably need to use a heat gun. Then use alcohol to clean it up real good before sealing it all back up with black RTV silicone sealant. I did mine over 6 months ago and have zero leaks or condensation. Also make sure the lens is fully seated into the housing when sealing it up or your headlights may not line up with the body lines on the car correctly.

Oh and be real careful with the chrome reflectors as that stuff peels off real easy

Thank HL, will do, I will take your advise, I ain't rushing this, had the extra set of of lights i got off of Greenking, just so I could take my time, little bit at a time. Like the heat gun idea, wasn't even thinking of that, was thinking more along the line of peeling and scraping, heat guns seems like the way to go. I owe you some rep, wouldn't let me leave it for you, says i have to pread it around before i give it to you again, must have hit your recently.

krewkut125 · 03-01-2008, 06:52 PM

Very nice write up so far! What color are you going to paint everything? Again man very nice work!

riperoo · 03-01-2008, 07:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by krewkut125

Very nice write up so far! What color are you going to paint everything? Again man very nice work!

Thanks for the kudos KrewKut, as far as paint, I have been debating between gloss black and color matching, I am going for the overall sleeper look on my ride, but since I am Dark Blue anyway, either would work, I am leaning towards the color match, think that would look sweet, but then again so would the black, damn I am so cofused!!!

**Magmania** · 03-01-2008, 08:36 PM

Great work Riperoo.
You have probably passed the biggest hurdle.
Beans for you!

riperoo · 03-01-2008, 08:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Magmania

Great work Riperoo.
You have probably passed the biggest hurdle.
Beans for you!

Thanks Man, I hope that is the hardest part, right back at you wid da beans.....

riperoo · 03-01-2008, 08:44 PM

hey, who ever left me some Rep, saying It was making them too nervous to do theirs, drop me a PM man, I can walk you through it, it ain't near as hard as you think. Yeah, it is scary, but all it is is heat and screwdriver, anyone can do it.

StPaulGuRu · 03-01-2008, 09:20 PM

So what are you going to do with the old lights?