tiguy99

Here ya go. By popular demand, I wanted to seperate the threads. Thanks guys for all the complements I've been getting and the PMs and emails. Its all taken to heart. It was hard work and I need to reseal my lamps with more silicone a tiny bit (I'm a perfectionist). Excuse my crappy 50.00 digicam. In no way is it accurate in capturing the images of my setup in action but its better than nothing. Enjoy!

I'm posting them here before I go on Hidforum.com

from about 12 feet
15 feet
from 25-30 feet

left headlamp lit
right headlamp lit

car itself

tiguy99

I'll have day time shots when I go out in the afternoon so you guys can see my lamps better

tiguy99

As promised...daytime shots. The gold lining on the lense is the Epoxy once its 100% cured. Its a small blemish but a tiny price to pay for 2000% increase in lighting performace.







Who knows...I may fix it later but for now its all good.
Mike

Toysrme

ry grabbing the lenses off a '93. Mine are not smoked.

They look great man! I'd love to see them in person to see the true color.
Awsome cutoff btw.

tiguy99

Next meet....! In between time, you can come up to Chicago and I'll be happy to give a demonstation

siniquezu

Is that line yellow or is it a property of the camera?

tiguy99

Its faint...its from the epoxy once it cures 100%. The camera intensifies it. In person, you can't tell whether the lights are on or off. And the output isn't effected so its cool

Jmai22

nice but whats the circle in fron to fthe projector.

tiguy99

The circle consists of the more advanced 110% clear lense of the 2003 X5 BMW over the older plastic design of my 1995 lexus. It was transplanted from the truck's wrecked headlights and used as a solution to the glare problems the original lense created due to its small dithered lines at the bottom. Also, the original ES300 lenses look clean and clear for halogen lighting but after placing an HID projector behind it, the imperfections come out the closet. The beam is dimmer vs. stock HID BMW, the clarity is reduced and the lines create more glare than intended. One solution is to sand them (which is what I did to the right one). It works but only brings the new beam pattern to 75% the quality of OEM HID. BUT with the lense transplanted from the real thing, the beam equates that of the real thing 100%. Thats the best way I can explain it. Check this thread for verification and education of the whole lense transplant importance for some retrofits.

http://hidforum.com/forum/showthread...&threadid=4300

Final answer...not all lenses are created equal even if they appear to be.

Jmai22

oh i understand, but it doesn't look very "clean" with the transplant, but function over form is good. you should have done a bigger area maybe a square from top top bottom or something. but i can clearly see the oem hid lens much more clear then your stock ones.

tiguy99

I wish I could but I ran out of plastic! The x5 lamps were severly cracked and only a small portion was salvage able the funny part was that the parts I used followed the curvature of my ES300 lamps! So I didn't have to take them to a plastic molder or anything like that. Which saved me big $$$. They were going to charge me around $200 to do what I did. Only they would have molded the plastic together. I might do that in the future but for now, I like what I got. In fact, I was driving last night behind and then on the side of a CL55 AMG on the 290 headed east into the city. Our lights shined exactly the same yet he's got the bixenons. He kinda did a double take at my ES like WTF when he saw my beam pattern and cuttoff flicker colors. This unfortunately wasn't my experience before I did the lense transplant. For some reason, my lexus plastic ate away at some output. like 25% of clarity, sharpness, and even color of cuttoff was lost just by putting my projectors behind them. It sucked because for a year and a half I used that setup with my E46 single xenon units. Now the odds are more in my favor. Newer cars have the same clear plastic lenses. I wish Lexus came out with this back in 1995 but the need wasn't there.

Jmai22

i know exactly what you mean by the stock lens taking out a lot of the light and color. when i did my retro and held my lens up in the air and looked through it, it wasn't clear at all. i couldn't read a stop sign that was 100-150 feet away. here's a pic of after my deline. but i may have to do what you did.

Jmai22

thats a lot better than my before pic though. check it out.

Jmai22

the beam pattern isn't that bad. but my cutoff line isn't as shaprp and my cutoff line doesn't shine as far as i'd like. when i see a s2k or audi come up behind another car there cutoff line is sharp from a long distance.

tiguy99

Man your stuff looks good and alot better than my old E46 setup did. My beam intensity was 75% of yours. It wasn't as bright as I wanted and my cuttoff would disappear after 40-50 feet. Like I could see the outline of the beam, but when compared to Audi or BMW driving beside me with the same equipment, man my stuff would be eclipsed in terms of their lighting performance. Maybe there is a simpler way for us to solve this for you. Cutting the lense was a cool solution for me because I had the X5 wrecked headlamps in my possession and it turned out that the salvagable plastic was the curved pieces that fit my ES perfectly. If asthetically there is a simpler method for you to fix your situation, by all means go for it. My solution is one of them. Apparently member of this board don't agree but I can attest that my lighting is 100% better than the critics that have given thier 0.02. What they don't understand is that with HID the lense is the last and final barrier that either makes or breaks your setup. MR-10 plastic can be used for our headlamps and a decent amount can be had for cheap. You would have to get it molded to the contours of your lamps for best fit. If you want, it can be professionally molded to your GS headlamp for best appearance but plan on spending upwards of $200.00 or more for good results. If you do a square (which would work better for you because of the lack of curves my ES300 lamp has in the beam area) you can cover a larger area and maybe get it to look better than I did. All in all, the final result from behind the wheel is worth the upgrade over what you've got now. ITs the final thing that gets your lamps to be equal to OEM. The lense is it. Find out who does aftermarket. You may find one with Mr-10 clear lense and avoid the cutting afterall.
Mike