So about a week and a half ago my wife got into a minor accident in our 2001 GS430, rear ended a nissan murano. She pretty much hit his rear bumper with her passenger side headlight, obviously broke the healight, bent radiator support, hood and ripped the bumper off the clips.

Evething was replaced, and I picked the car from the body shop this morning. The body shop supplied all the parts besides the headlight, I found the headlight on ebay myself. It was used, but its an original Lexus part, with HID. I am not sure what year GS it came from, but its slightly different from the other side, and I'm trying to figure out what year GS it came from.

1) It has a lot more scratches than my other light, which makes me believe it was taken off from an older GS.

2) It shines much brighter than my other light (all - the HID, high beam and day running light) which makes me believe it was taken off from a newer GS and the bulbs are brighter because they are newer.

3) The turn signal in the original light hase orange lens, this one is white.

4) I cant really tell whether it has the green tint or if it doesnt, but then I cant tell about the other side either. If anything, they look the same, so its either they both have the tint or they both dont have the tint.

So can anyone tell me whether the light came from an older or a newer GS? Also, is there a way to get rid of the scratches, and install the orange lens? I really dont like the white turn signal, IMO the orange looks much better.

 

Pix would definitely help here..I never knew an OEM light had cleared turn signals..Again post some good pix and Im sure it will be figured out..

 

can you post pics? That would be a big help.

3) the previous owner cleared the turnsignal out. So either he opened up the housing and took it out that way or he broke it up with a screwdriver and took it out that way.

2) Is the output of the new bulb more bluish than your original headlight that is on the car now? I would check the bulb and see if it says 4300k or 6000k. If it is 6000k it wont match your oem HID. If the bulbs are different then I would just go to ebay and get 4300k or 6000k brand new bulbs and replace them, that way you are starting with fresh bulbs in both lights.

The other bulbs may be aftermarket as well, especially the wedge bulb. I am guessing he either has a Polarg m4 or m6 or an LED in there, based on the fact that he took the time to clear out the turn signal, he was going for a custom look. So you may want to either switch back to oem by using the bulbs out of the original damaged headlight, if they are still ok, or buy new bulbs of the same aftermarket brand so that both sides match.

 

I see... I will post picture later, I need to get the camera from my office. Also, there are toyota part numbers on both headlight, and the part number seems to be the same. I assume if it wass from a 2000 or earlier GS the part number would have been different.

 

You should be able to get the scratches out without any problem. I used Meguiars PlastX on mine, and they came out looking great. Here are some before and after pictures:

https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sho...=friend+plastx

 

Wow...yah...i believe 2001+ GS comes with a greenish tint (with the exception of the Sport Design edition). 98-00 comes with regular chrome (with the exception of the Platinum edition for 2000 with comes with black chrome emblems and also what looks like a dark chome for the headlights.).

You best bet is to clear the other side....and buy amber bulbs for both turn signals.

Good Luck.

Pete

 

Ok, more problems. Now that I inspected them closer, here's whats happening.

The new headlight inst actually brighter, it seems brighter because the beam is higher than the beam in the other light. I was standing about 10 feet away from a wall, and the beam was about 6" higher. This is the HID beam. To make matters worse, the high beam is even worse - it is about a 12"-15" higher than the other light, same distance from the wall. I will defenately come back to the body shop on monday to see if they installed it correctly.

But what concerns me now, is since the light was most likely opened to have the orange lens removed, maybe its integrity is altered and it can no longer be aligned correctly. That surely would suck

 

Putting the turn signal issue aside, I believe you can easily adjust the height of the beam with the turn of a screwdriver. I've never done it, but if you do a search, I'm pretty sure you'll find a lot of information on it.

 

This is GS430...so OEM HIDs are standard.....check if the shop forgot to install the auto-leveling .

 

Well, the HID beam isnt badly out of level, but the high beam is terrible.

 

you should still be able to align them. maybe when the guy put them back together, he didnt line it up and didnt care. also, to remove the stock HID unit you need to move the reflector for clearance. the orange, you will need to open up your headlight and put it back in. for the scratches, if the meguiars doesnt do you happy, you may need to wetsand the headlight and then buff it out using some compound and follow it up with the meguiars. i used some 3m rubbing compound wiht a buffer and it worked for me after i sanded my headlights. btw: im selling some q45 retro fit parts if youre interested. pm me for details. thanks

 

Since this thread (https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=221283) has gotten more response, let's keep the comments centralized there.