I remember Pat/Operatic floating the idea of a retrofit program a year ago. The main concept was to get a set of projectors made, ship those out, and then get a good core from the customer back in and refund the core charge. Then repeat with the retrofit and keep going. After a lot of poking and prodding and getting a lot of no-answers in regards to outsourcing the work, we find ourselves just doing it in-house.

So the question stands, if we start this up, is anyone still game? We're going to stick with the PnP projector kits out of simplicity if we go with this, especially when it comes to handling the bi-xenon half of the projectors.

The primary idea behind this is to reduce the downtime of not having a set of headlights and clearly, giving a better HID output in non-HID cars. Because frankly, we understand that a lot of people are scared to crack open their own headlights for fear of breaking them and then being completely out until they can get new ones.

A few pictures in a Chevy Cobalt:


Low Beams:


High Beams:


So, what do ya think? Start up a core program, or have people send their headlights in first?

 

That looks more like a bolt in projector more than a retrofit. I think I've seen them on a Honda Fit forum. If one could get a full replacement headlight (like Umnitza promised so many years ago) that has the quality and look of some of the DIY retrofits found on this site you might have a product. Or are you offering a service to bolt in the projectors for the customer so they don't have to stress about taking apart their headlights?

 

After the retrofit are the lights still adjustable up/down and left/right?
Nice cut off on the example.
Here is one done by a clubxb member how does it compare?
http://www.clubxb.com/forums/f59/lit...ing-31975.html

 

how much would u charge though?

 

i think i'd still prefer my tsx's even with all the labor and frustation included.

 

these have been around on the matrix/corolla forums too..
can u pm me pricing for the 9006 projector kit plz im in houston as well

 

It would figure that Firefox would crash in the middle of an 8lbs post
Starting over...

----
Yes they are the bolt in projectors. Primarily we're looking to see if there's interest in doing the baking and breaking open of the headlights, since frankly, it scares a lot of the natives away. We're sourcing out the G3 projectors as well, just haven't had a set come in yet to test fit.

But the idea is to source the headlights locally, bake, open, install, level, and reseal. When we're done, we ship them out, and they either send back a usable core, or we get a new headlight.

----
The headlight adjustments are handled the same way as the stock headlights. As for a direct comparison against a legit E55 projector, I'll have to see when the next time a Mercedes gets left overnight at the body shop to see if we can get a side-by-side comparison. Although I really want to wait to get the G3 projectors as well to see what the actual output difference is. I'm more of a "seeing is believing" type person. So far, compared to the standard Ebay projector headlights though, the G1's have the better output.

----
Honestly don't know. Most headlights shouldn't take longer than 2-3 hours. Unless it's a Saturn Ion. Apparently they used concrete to seal the headlights. What's the going rate on labor, $25-30/hr?

----
I honestly don't blame ya. '04 The Acura TL we had here before we sold it was a nice car to roll in, simply due to the headlights. That and it was a 6-speed... We've done a couple full bore retrofits on an SC400 and a 2000 Navigator. The SC400 used X5 projectors and the Navi used the Mercedes SL500 projectors. They were good quality lights for retrofits, but the fact that we could never get them really lined up right or the bi-xenon shields working always kind of rubbed me the wrong way. The one other thing that really killed me was we had a Scion TC headlight sent out for a quad bi-xenon setup and while it looked great from the front, the backside was a big... well, look for yourself:
http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/711/img2134h.jpg
http://img202.imageshack.us/img202/895/img2135a.jpg

I forget the actual total on those, but it ran somewhere close to $500 after shipping back and forth and an 8 week wait. (Looking at the pictures again, they look really odd from the front in the pictures O_o)

----

Like I said, we're floating the idea around to see if it's a viable option.

 

So whats going to happen is I pay you for the parts, labor, and a core charge. You send me a complete set of headlights already retrofit, I send you my core headlight, and then your give me back the core charge. right?
So price break down is: (estimates only)
TSX projectors: 200
Labor: 75-90
Shroud: 50
Total: 325-340

What if I provide you with my own projectors? Would I just pay for the labor and shroud?

 

you know what i was also budgeting a projector project for my car too.. but i was thinking of using the ebay projectors but removing that ugly @rse halo (no offense to the owners who has halos) http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/PROJE...Q5fAccessories

 

don't do it. the light output characteristics are terrible. you're better off with your stock headlights.

 

^^ agreed, i thought i was hot stuff with my sonar projectors...until i went back to stock with HID and was like WHOA!!! I CAN SEE THE WORLD!!!

but if you are interested in a set of sonar headlights you know where to find them, click my link in my signature.

 

well HID Retrofit is really just a nice way of saying ghetto rig. when you're taking a square and putting it in a round hole... somethings gotta give.