Hey, thanks for looking at the thread. I have been creeping on here for a while and wanted to put together this DIY to help some people do this pretty easy mod that looks incredible and night driving is beyond what I expected.

Tools:
Heat gun (highly recommended, but it could be done without it)
Philips Screw Driver
Wide standard screw driver (recommended)
Oven, if heat gun not available
10mm Socket/wrench
Razor/utility knife
Towel
Mechanics gloves
Ruler with metal edge/metal straightedge

Materials:
JB Weld
Black spray on bed liner (recommend rustoleum brand)
High Temp Grill paint (recommended, I chose black, you could get get whatever color you want your projectors to be)
Small washers (1/4" ID, recommeded for proper aim.
Coke Can or slightly thicker Aluminum
STI-R clear Lenses (available from http://www.theretrofitsource.com/com...l#.UwPkqvldXX4
Painters tape/masking tape

Estimated Time: 5 hours

First begin by opening the hood and removing the front bumper. The front bumper is held in place by 10 mm screws in the wheel wells and under the lip of the front bumper. There are also some plastic push pins under the hood. Carefully place the bumper off to the side so it doesn't get scratched.

Next, you can remove the headlights. There are three 10mm screws on each headlight. One is on the outside where the bumper was removed, and two from the top of the light. Carefully remove all the bulbs. and pull the headlight out of the car, take care not to scratch the front of the headlight.



Next you can take the headlight to your work area where you have your towel laid out. Remove the Phillips screws from the back of the headlamp assembly.


Now you can either bake it in the oven or use your heat gun to heat up the seal around the edge. This is where you will want your gloves on.

If you use the oven, I started mine at 260 for about 10 minutes and rotate the headlight around and bake for another 5 minutes. I would recommend putting a piece of cardboard on the rack under the assembly. Don’t leave in too long as you can haze the clear lens if exposed to heat too long and make sure none of the headlight is touching the edges of the oven.

If you use the heat gun, start heating around the edges where the seam is at. Make sure to sweep back in forth in slow motions and do about 4-5 inches at a time for about 20 seconds. When you are done go around the seal to heat it all back up again.

Once the seal is hot, stick the wide standard screw driver in the corner by the highbeam and gently start to pry the clear away from the black backing. The Black rubber sealant will be very stringy. Once you get it enough apart to get a grip, start pulling the lens apart slowly but forcefully. It should pull all the way apart to the bottom. You can set the clear half to the side for now.



There are four screws that hold the projector in the housing. Unscrew all four and pull the projector out. Set the black half to the side. Now you have your projector, ready to work on. I marked a T on the top of the lens and reflector housing to make it easier to reassemble.



There are four screws on the back of the projector holding the lens to the housing and the cutoff sandwiched in the middle. Remove them and the lens will fall free.



We will replace the lens with a clear lens now, which makes a huge difference believe it or not. I am only aware of one place to get them, The Retrofit Source. STI-R clear lenses, they have a perfect quality and one with minor cosmetic blemishes for a few bucks less. I opted for perfect.

There are five tabs holding the lens in behind it, carefully bend these out and the lens and spacer will fall free.



Now you can put the new lens in and new spacer. Bend the tabs in to hold it in place, I opted for a star pattern like putting a wheel on a car. Make sure the metal spacer is all the way on the glass and the gap is between tabs. This will yield the best results. Note: on mine I painted the lens frame while it was apart, otherwise it will be silver and visible from the front of the car.

 

Did you modify the shield? I made my own shields to get rid of the ugly uneven cutoff.

 

Next, we want to remove the factory sloped cutoff shield. I was able to pull mine off with a pair of pliers on one side and wiggling back and forth until the little weld broke and then move the whole shield back and forth until the other welds break. I do not have a picture of this as I took mine off in a previous project. It will be pretty obvious what the shield is.



Next we will make a new cut off shield. I like the DOT style cutoffs where the Left field is lower than the right side. I made my first set out of a coke can I had laying around.



Carefully cut a section out of the can about 2inches long and about 1 inch tall. On one of the long sides just under the existing edge, use the ruler to make a straight cut with the razor, this will be the top of the shield.



Use the ruler and cut another line parallel to the first on from one side to the middle of the shield. The cut should be approximately 0.5-0.7mm below the first one. Too much will have a drastic cutoff and will be difficult to see the left side of the road without blinding everyone to your right and in front of you. For this, less is more. Get creative with your designs if you want, remember they will be flipped upside down and backward through the lens.


Ended up cutting this one down even more.



Now you can line up the new shield over the existing cutout. Try to line the step in the middle to start out with. I placed my cutoff on the front of the factory shield and taped it in place, with HIDs, this gave me the closest to sharp cutoff. If you are still using Halogen bulbs, try the back first. For this I am referring to front as front of the vehicle/output side. The factory cutoff was on the back. When the cutoff is on the shield, cut any corners off that stick up above the factory curve on the shield.



Tape the cutoff in place and set the projector back up and just thread the screws in a few threads, this will allow you to move the lens around to get an idea of how to sharpen the focus.

Put your bulb back in and power it up. Make sure you have the top up or it can harm your HID bulb. Start by aiming the lamp at a wall and don’t look into the housing (sounds obvious). Hold the base of the housing and the lens holder legs, not the back of the bulb. The reflector will get hot. Try by pulling the bottom of the lens away from the reflector and the top tight against the reflector, and watch the cut off until it is sharp at around 20 feet. If you are very close the cutoff won’t appear properly and it will be hard to aim. Play with the angle of the lens until you get it sharp. Keep in mind how it needs to be.

Before:

After:


Without a clear lens, this is about the best you can do:

Now you can start placing washers under the lens holder legs to get the desired sharpness. This takes some time, but is worth it in the end.

 

When you get it the way you want it, disassemble the housing and remove the tape from the shield and prepare your JB Weld. Place a small amount on the back of the cutoff and line in back up on the shield where you had it, ensuring the step is still going the same way you had it. Also, when you put the shield up, make sure it lines up along the top edge and doesn’t go above the edge of the factory curve. Wait a little while for it to dry. JB KwikWeld cured faster than I needed it to, so that would be a good one to go with.
Wipe the inside of the clear lens with a lint-free cloth or alcohol wipe to ensure there are no fingerprints or dust on it.



While the epoxy is curing you can paint the chrome and black housing in the headlight to get a much more aggressive look. There are two screws that hold the clear half of the headlight to the shroud. There is a small yellow reflector and clear cover over the running light that snaps into place. Remove those. Carefully mask off the chrome area where the running light was and cut it along where the clear part was. Now you can paint the housing with the bed liner. I chose this because it has a self-etching primer in it, so no priming is necessary. Give it a few easy coats and let it dry. You can reassemble it after about 45 minutes.

End result of the black housing and lens holder:



After the epoxy has cured for about an hour you can reassemble the projector and the washers you had out earlier to align the cutoff. Recheck the alignment before you put it all back in the car. You can paint the front of the shield with the high temp paint if you want.




Put the projector back in the headlight,



there is a black rubber gasket on the back that has to be pushed down on the back of the projector housing to keep moisture out.



Replace the four screws that hold the projector in the headlight. If you had to use more than 2 washers on the lens, use the same number on the opposite screw when placing the projector back in the housing, to keep the highbeam in alignment with your low beam (I forgot to do this until I went to aim the lights that night so now one of my highbeams is useless).

Heat up the rubber sealant with the oven or the heat gun so its nice and hot. Put the headlight back together in the opposite way you took it apart, with the outside by the turn signal together first. Then while its still hot, start putting the screws in. Now its all ready to go back in the car.

To aim the headlights, the adjustment screw is on the back of the assemblies. Counterclockwise brings it down and clockwise goes up.
Thanks for reading, ask if you have any questions ask.

 

End results

Beam in broad day light:










Above the cutoff


In the cutoff


Below the cutoff






There is basically no glare at night. If you are not in the light all you can see is a faint glow of the lens. It looks incredible and the light output is definitely brighter.

 

I just looked your thread up, looks nice. I am going to do the Halos for sure now, I was on the fence before, but that looks sick!

 

Came out good. I have to say this is a great upgrade for our halogen projectors.

 

That looks awesome. May have to do this to mine soon.

 

I recommend these

http://store.ijdmtoy.com/Retrofit-He...-p/sku-121.htm

 

Is the cutoff steps necessary is it more a personal preference? Will the stock cutoff work with these lenses?

 

I tried a complete flat shield using aluminum flashing but i kept ending up with a blurry yellow cutoff at the center and some blue on the sides. I also noticed a more intense blue band by adding the step to the shield.
Something else i noticed was the height of the shield, it has to be centered correctly or else you will still have a blurry cutoff line.
I recommend a spare battery and HID ballast when doing aiming tests.
I had to do mine out in a parking lot with the engine running and wasting gas.

 

Sweeeeet!

Killer, how have your LED halos from jdmtoy been holding up? Both of my Morimoto halos from TRS have several LEDs that have gone out. They promptly sent free replacements, but my faith has been shaken. I'm already ____ed that I need to rip my headlights back open and who's to say they won't fail again?

/rant

 

I have these and not a single issue. I also like the diffuser which breaks the light nice and even.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Xenon-White-...item3a84efc209I did not biy the TRS nor the IJDMTOY. I wanted a pure white halo to match my 5, 000k bulbs. The morimoto halos have too mich blueish for me and I also had a bad feeling about them.

 

It's really personal preference. I like the look of the DOT steps, it really lights up the sides of the road while the oncoming lane is not illuminated very far out. This means no flashing from other motorists except when I am cresting a hill and the light lingers on someone for a few seconds. I also have 55w 5000K HIDs so they are pretty ridiculously bright. overall I like the steps and honestly didn't experiment much with different shaped shields. I did file down a small amount of what ends up being the right field to make the step level and not sloped. You can do a quick search for custom cutoffs to see what you like.

 

Thread revival! Lol
Couple of questions, read the thread and was wondering if you have any output shots? comparing the stock lens vs the clear sti-R lens? Also what bulbs n ballasts did u use on this set up.