Seperate Headlights, Paint insides, install halos...

[ian ashton]

Part 1:

I fought with getting these bastards apart for quite sometime. It was only when I stumbled across this (bottom of page) and this video that I got the motivation/direction I needed.

First and foremost, 230 degrees for 20 minutes IS THE MAGIC COMBINATION FOR 300 HEADLIGHTS!!!

I tried several other techniques, including:

• Pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees, shut-off oven and put assembly in for 3-5 minutes.
• 200 degrees for 10-15 minutes
• Hairdryer/space heater

None of these worked.



Anyway, here is what I did;

Obviously first things first, get your tools togather, and make sure the headlight fits in the oven without any issues.

Here are the tools that I used to seperate mine:

• Electric oven
• Baking sheet
• Tiny screw driver (I used one that I got at a trade show, about a 1/8" blade)
• Pot holders
• Gloves
• Red Bull
• 1 wet towel, 1 dry towel

Put a wet towel on to a baking sheet, and pre-heat the oven to 230 degrees.


The wet towel is just an additional precaution to avoid plastic to metal contact.

While your waiting for the oven to heat up take off any/all ruber, wiring, screws etc that are visable. On the 'Touring' headlights all I had to remove were these 2 rubber grommets;



Once your oven is warmed up place the headlight on the baking sheet face up, and put it in your oven for 20 minutes;


Slam a Red Bull while you wait the 20 minutes.

(I don't have any pics of the next few steps as I was focusing on the process, and didn't want to screw anything up/waste any time.)

Take the headlights out of the oven, and and place the headlight only onto the dry towel on your working surface, face up.

Use your small blade screw driver to dig/pry under the upper corner of the lense, being careful not to distort the housing or the les. Take not that the plastic is VERY SOFT right now. I placed a pot holder directly on the headlight lens to avoid burning half.

Once your work up one corner of the lens you should be able to remove it from the housing in 1 shot, just be careful not to scratch it, and watch for any soft glue that make a mess of things.

Tada!



Again, the write-ups listed above are much more complete, and I am very grateful to have found them!!!

The whole process took me about 30 minutes per light, including bake time.

Part 2 will be painting, and I'm hoping to get that taken care of tonight...

[Simans82]

Looks good!

[bund]

nice write up! dont forget to do the same with your wiring

[ian ashton]

10k halos ordered from AAC, I can't wait to get them! Pics tonight of painted bezels I have an idea for the lenses as well, I'm going to play with some other possible tricks

[bund]

Originally Posted by ian ashton

10k halos ordered from AAC, I can't wait to get them! Pics tonight of painted bezels I have an idea for the lenses as well, I'm going to play with some other possible tricks

Are you gonna etch the lens? Ive seen pics of this one 300 where the guy had 3 or 4 horizontal lines which i think looked nice

[NOVO]

That is so brave.

Although I do allot of work on the car by myself, but never had the courage to attempt what you just accomplished due to the fact that the C HID headlight is very expensive to replace in case I screw up.

[ian ashton]

Originally Posted by bund

Are you gonna etch the lens? Ive seen pics of this one 300 where the guy had 3 or 4 horizontal lines which i think looked nice

I'm thinking about tinting the inside bottom of the lens, kind of giving it the look of the "C" headlights. Once I get the bezels painted I'm going to mess around with the lenses a little bit.

[ian ashton]

Originally Posted by NOVO

That is so brave.

Although I do allot of work on the car by myself, but never had the courage to attempt what you just accomplished due to the fact that the C HID headlight is very expensive to replace in case I screw up.

I bought these for $75 from a member of this forum. I'd never do this on a set that I couldn't afford to loose,

[Inferno07]

Ian,

I did this mod on my last car (01 Stratus) do make my own clear corners since no one made them. I was petrified to put them in for that long at 230 degrees so I would up heating and reheating each lens 10 times or more.. Took me an hour per capsule to seperate them and my fingers were burnt, cut, tore up!

What a friggen nightmare that was...

AAC Halo's are on my list, I MUST have them... But I am so afraid to do this to my 300c lights.. I am going to have to find a pair of mint used lights (cheap.... which probably is not going to happen).

[bund]

Originally Posted by Inferno07

Ian,

I did this mod on my last car (01 Stratus) do make my own clear corners since no one made them. I was petrified to put them in for that long at 230 degrees so I would up heating and reheating each lens 10 times or more.. Took me an hour per capsule to seperate them and my fingers were burnt, cut, tore up!

What a friggen nightmare that was...

AAC Halo's are on my list, I MUST have them... But I am so afraid to do this to my 300c lights.. I am going to have to find a pair of mint used lights (cheap.... which probably is not going to happen).

I plan on doing this on the upcoming weekend. Im having a buddy help me who has done stuff like this before. I'll let ya know how it goes.