Clear light and Angel Eye Conversion - The Project and Story

hi all, I had made a slight mess up :oops: bumper off, headlights out, cut open the donor lights, keeping everything clean and nice working area, extracted the clear lights and all was going well. Then I cut open the expensive xenon lights with amber of the car, installed the LED Angel eyes along with the new clear indicator. While waiting for the glue to dry and decided to clean up the back of the lights that had oil, dirt, dust and all sort of crap on them appears I lost a door on the wheel arch at some point (now ordered from sopers) I was using some de greaser and somehow the spray has drifted over to the other side of the bench and put some very light specs on the very shiny reflector... these specs turned black I had no idea and thinking they must be dust i tried wiping them off which made it 1000 times worse. :o

I remember reading CJ's comments as well about not touching the reflector part! bloody hell...

:headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang: :headbang:

So now I need a drivers side chome inner pre facelift. I have used this for now but it will eat away at me each time i see it! :-( Does anyone have one they can sell me?

Great guide... just wish id followed it a little better damn it!!

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apart from that its looking good.... :driving:
 
btw my donor lights have 2 black inners if anyone is is going for the all black look. Hopefully someone will have some bits from a donor lights with a drivers side chrome inner! Still kicking myself... :headbang:
 
It might be easier to simply take both your black inners to be chromed. Will hardly cost anything and they will be ultra shiney and match perfectly. Once done you can split ans swap them back in

Failing that you could chrome paint spray them yourself or for a satin finish one of the plastic spray paints. Did my X5 that way and look fantastic and survived years.
 
sorry i cant help you on a spare chrome inner, as i too only have spare ones in black

Where did you get your LED rings from? as they appear a different colour to mine

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i'd be tempted to fit the black ones, or for a even more unique looks... spray them sterling grey (body colour)
 
I did the same on my chrome inners. I'm just going to spray them sterling grey to match the car. Won't take long.
 
Someone a few pages back has sprayed his a kind of dark grey using a heat resistant paint and it looks great.

The fragility of the finish on the chrome inners is a nightmare. By contrast chrome inners from the facelift lights that i cut open were indestructible.
 
Thanks guys, I will look for somewhere that does mirror chrome as I like that finish, will get the 2 black ones done then swap them over when i order the M bumper next month. Is it possible to have them chrome dipped or are we talking chrome paint? Perhaps an alloy wheel specialist will be able to help?

Still kicking myself today... at least they look 1000 times better than stock even in the current state.

Founds lots of broken plastic after taking the bumper off where a year or so back i clipped a high curb, a total of 4 pieces of plastic ordered from sopers! 100 quids worth still it needs to be right. No wonder the temp meter thinks its over in the US it was broken off.

I got the rings believe it or not about 2 years ago haha from a guy on http://www.alibaba.com he sold them in the 100's manage to convince him to send me a couple of sets for 100 USD, after that I bought each light when i saw them available on ebay think I paid about 50 quid for one of them and 120 for the other and its been sat around ever since. I have now moved house and have a driveway as before it was a multi story carpark so am taking the opportunity of doing all these mods that have built it over the years :D

They look blueish in the photos but more white IRL. I would say they are the same colour as they new 5 series/3 series that has the super bright coronas. I have wired them to the sidelights for now as it appears there is no 12v line in the headlights at all from the ignition. My plan will be to find the parking light wire in the harness, splice into in fit a diode from ignition feed then fit another diode in-line on the existing wire this will hopefully mean that when the ignition is on the angel eyes are lit. When the parking lights are on they are also lit however current cannot run back up to either feed. i see no other way of doing DRL. I thought about adding a separate wire into the lights but this would compromise the air tight seal and also stop me removing them as easily in the future.
 
Google plastic chrome plating. Lots if suppliers of it.

I intend to turn my AE's into DRL's and will reconnect the normal sidelights.
Just haven't got around to it but think I'd just add another pin in the connector (assuming there are no spares already). Done this on my doors for puddle lights and it maintains seals, integrity and looks neat.
 
Yeah that was my original plan too, id bought some nice LED sidelights and they look a treat with little chrome bezels that match the surrounds off ebay, there is a spare pin in the headlight connector but would need a donor plug on the car side to put in a pin unless some way of creating a pin i found though that the LED detract from the angel eyes when both on together so i figured the 2 diode way in the end would be best as that way loose no functionality and they will work with the side markers too when using the indicator stalk which I do quite often when parking out front on the main road.

Thanks will do a google and see how i get on.... The robot that sprays those chrome inners must put an exact amount on it just to cover it and no more! :headbang:
 
They are on the car now and look great, have some condensation forming so likely need to sort out the seals on the back perhaps turn them inside out left to right as others have done. Has anyone been successful in polishing the headlight plastic front? Mine are 8 years old and have had various scratches chips and swirl marks it was hard figuring out which marks were made by me on the inside and which were on the outside haha
 
Very nice, would love to see a pic of them on the car. The facelift ones on page 1 picture 5 of this thread appear to be a kind of textured chrome, i wonder if I can get some of that stuff in a can. I guess the upside of less of a mirror finish is a more defined Angel eye :thumbsup:
 
WOULD YOU ALL PLEASE STOP POSTING TWEAKS TO THE CLEAR LIGHT CONVERSION THREAD!!!

From just simply changing the hockey sticks, you've all subliminally persuaded me to Angel Eye and now I'm contemplating respraying the innards Maldives blue...

Frak Frak Frak... with a big smile on my face...
 
Jembo said:
WOULD YOU ALL PLEASE STOP POSTING TWEAKS TO THE CLEAR LIGHT CONVERSION THREAD!!!

From just simply changing the hockey sticks, you've all subliminally persuaded me to Angel Eye and now I'm contemplating respraying the innards Maldives blue...

Frak Frak Frak... with a big smile on my face...
Click to expand...

I was also very happy back in Feb 2008 when I bravely chopped up some cheap eBay lights and created clear with AE. 44 pages later I can see some great improvements, but it would have taken me longer to read the thread than do the job :D
 
Where can i find the led rings from? i have read the lengthy thread but didnt see a link, maybe by the time i got to that post i was nodding off :dizzy:
 
This is what Ranski provided

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BMW-E85-E86-Z ... 3371830ed0

However am still waiting for delivery & apparently they have sent a second set out...

Let's see
 
I think I'm going to give this a go using only my one set of xenon lights. Hope it goes well.

The end result I'm aiming for is black reflectors, tinted amber hockey sticks, just to take the ginger edge off but still keep a colour difference in the light as I think it breaks them up rather than all black, and led AE.

I will post up my results in the coming weeks if all goes well
 
Jembo said:
This is what Ranski provided

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BMW-E85-E86-Z ... 3371830ed0

However am still waiting for delivery & apparently they have sent a second set out...

Let's see
Click to expand...

Link is dead :(
 
BPM-Z4R said:
Jembo said:
This is what Ranski provided

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BMW-E85-E86-Z ... 3371830ed0

However am still waiting for delivery & apparently they have sent a second set out...

Let's see
Click to expand...

Link is dead :(
Click to expand...

Hummm... just checked the sellers other items, seems he doesn't now have any others for sale ;@(

Will keep a close eye, will be well miffed if they don't arrive. Will let u now
 
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