Everything you'll need you'll find at HIDplanet.com. It's a real good website with lots of info. You'll learn alot. That's what I used as a guide while doing the retrofit on my car.
you could use an integra projector but those are designed for halogen bulbs. I would recommend using ECE Valeo projectors (from audi's). I just did a retrofit with them on my prelude as well. I'll post some pictures as soon as i get back to austin.
My neighbor has an Integra Type-R and he put a Philips 6000k kit on there. The cutoff on his car is no where near even close to being as sharp as my car.
The Valeo projectors were also meant for halogen. I don't know all the specifics but they are much more strict in Europe when it comes to lighting than here in the US. That's why the Valeo H7 projectors are so much better than the best USDM Spec HID projectors and usually have a much sharper cutoff. Just look around the HIDplanet website and check their forum. Like I said....there's alot to learn there.
I thought about using Integra projectors (it's in a thread here on PO from about a year ago) but after doing research and stuff I realized that it wouldn't even be worth it to use Integra projectors. If you do use Integra projectors......you'll be kicking yourself in the head later on for doing all that work and only having a halfass projector setup.
im planning on doing a retrofit myself. i have a set of ece valeos but im thinkin to get a real set of HID projectors. you should def NOT use a integra projector since its not designed for xenon and wont give you what your looking for when using it with HID. and if your gonna go through all the trouble, you should use the right stuff. the valeo ece (from audi a4) was also designed for halogen but happens to work very well with hid. i think ide like to buy a projector made for HID but they are getting pretty expensive. the S2k projectors are supposed to be really good. nice wide beams and distance lighting. and the ls430, or sc430, forget which one, have a really wide beam and provide great light, but they are pretty big.
bixenons are projectors that have a solenoid so it can provide you with high and low beam.
the reason why europe (ece) projectors have much sharper cut offs is because the signs are lit up over there by themselves. the projectors here dont have as sharp cut off because it has to provide a little scattered light to light up signs. but since more light is focused on the road and its not scattered around, the ece provides better light, and like everything else, everything is better from a different country, hehe.
do you guys have pic of installs and stuff? and how satisfied are you with the projectors you put in? i wanna install but i just got a few questions like as to how you aligned the projector to be straight and what shrouds you used, did you ever compare it to oem hid like a s2k, etc.
No write-up here or anything but I have a few pics of while I was doing it.
This is what I used for a shroud. I got it at home depot...it was a perfect fit...just needed some cutting and trimming.
Just before I put the projector with reflector assembly back in the housing.
All the dust and stuff on the car is from using the Dremel to cut the housing to fit the projector. Wear a mask or get a fan and open a window cuz it will get really dusty in there and make it kinda hard to breathe.
Test fit...
Just a comparison pic between reflector and projector.
nice retro PRelude787!
as far as adjusting its simple. the projectors are mounted where the stock reflectors are so adjusting/aiming
would be the same as adjusting the screws behind the headlight ( look like bottle caps )
heres mine
This is a great thread, can somebody post a picture of what the HID's look like against a wall at night? I'm curious to see how the cutoff line is with JDM headlights.
Also, it looks like you guys took a huge chunk of the reflector out of the headlight housing for the low beam, is there any type of recent write up or guide to help others do this?
Can somebody give a quick list of the steps and things needed to do ?
-have a pair of projectors, bulbs, and ballasts that work
-you might wanna have another car to use while your headlights are being worked on, or have an extra pair of headlights you can put in.
-remove your bumper, then your headlights.
-prepare headlights by removing bulbs and all removable pieces of rubber and the 5 metal clips around the headlight.
-put 1 headlight in an oven between 250-300 F for about 6 minutes to soften/melt the glue.
-pry the clear plastic lens from the black housing. The glue in my headlights was very tacky and stretched quite a bit before it separated.
-back the low beam reflector out by turning the aiming screws the small bolt as well. Takes a long time.
-you can either mount your projector in your reflector or create a metal plate that you can mount the projector to and reuse the brackets that hold the original reflector so that the aiming screws can still be used. I used the latter method.
-make sure everything fits inside of the headlight before putting it back into the oven to remelt the glue.
that is a very basic list of things you need to do. if you need more information just post a message in this thread.
rprelude787 did you keep your reflector? Its hard to tell. Im guessing that would be the easiest way as well as still keeping the aiming controls functional.
Yeah....I kept the reflector. It's really hard to tell it's there....even when looking at it close up....because I painted it with a few coats of Rustoleum flat black spray paint.
It's the best way to do it IMO because you do keep the full functionality of the aiming brackets. Only thing is that you have to be really careful when using the reflector. It's fairly strong but if you apply just a little too much pressure....it will crack. That happened with one of the reflectors.....it was easily cured though with some JB weld.
you do have some adjustability with the reflectors, but how did you intially mount it so that its within the adjustment boundrys. i guess you just used common sense and tried to mount it the best you can, then just adjusted it to what you want?
i tried getting it as level as possible. I actually used a level and measured the dimensions of the projectors and exactly how far apart the holes were from each other.
I just took all of these measurements and tried to center as best I could. The level was so I wouldn't have a cockeyed beam pattern. I wish I could better explain it. In the third pic the black surrounding the projector is the reflector after being painted.
I made this steel plate instead of reusing the reflector because i was worried about its durability. It wasn't very difficult to make and worked pretty. It was about .15 cm thick and easy enough to cut out. Here's what it ended up looking like. You can see the brackets that when on the reflector originally.
heres a pic of the reflector itself ready to attach the projector on it. as
for leveling what i did was make the projector parallel to the reflector itself.
once this is done then your cutoff should be a straight horizontal line.
im trying to figure out a way to allow for rotational adjustment (as in turning the projector clockwise). i guess the stock up/down left/right levelers will suffice for directional stuff.
I opted not to make a shroud because i got lazy and my creativity was absent, So the finished product looks not so impressive....
