As I mentioned in another thread, I had a electronically-savvy friend of mine whip up some "custom made" LEDs for the city lights to match the new HIDs. Even with the stock headlights the horrible yellow color to the city lights drove me crazy.
Here are the new blue/white city lights with STOCK headlights, for reference.














Also, I finally got a chance to install my HID kit, and I LOVE it.
The kit was very straight forward (despite the rubbish instructions), and actually kind of fun to install. The hardest part is deciding where to mount the balasts, but I think I did a good job. So without further adue..

The kit itself, 8000k in color/temp, and is *not* as blue as people may think.



I mounted the left ballast in a small open compartment infront on the battery, inside the fender. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.




New grommet/wires coming from the rear of the housing.


I had a tough time finding a place to mount the right side ballast, but found a nice spot away from the direct heat of the engine. The power steering fluid resivoir mounts to a bracket infront of the shock tower. Also on this bracet are a couple ground wires for other engine components. I put a 90* twist the bracket for the ballast, and mounted it to the other bracket using the bolt holding those ground wires down. If you look in your engine bay you'll just what I meant. I zip-tied it to the brake lines, and fitted a small piece of rubber between the two to help isolate and vibration or wear on the lines.





I believe this area is the toughest to get to on the car. You have to have incredibly small hands, and be willing to bleed.


The final product, albeit somewhat bright out. You can clearly see the color difference between the stock fog lights, and wonderful match to the city lights.




I haven't got a better pic of the final product yet as I really need to adjust them. They're pointing way too low.. So watch for another pic here in a day or two!

 

looking damn good man. I have a similar setup in my xtype and like it alot. just wish it was a little brighter. But yea i got the blue LED center lights too.

 

Lookin good 310...........damn man....thats 2 top class posts within as many days....lol
Save a few for later bud

Jim

 

Oh no worries, I have plenty more! I haven't even begun scanning pics of the '86 XJ.
I tried to get a good pic tonight in an empty parking lot, but as luck would have it, the batteries in the camera were dead.

 

You did a magnificent job

 

Lol.....been there mate.
Out front after spending hours doin whatever on the X, cleaning or maitenance and then a short while down at all different angles with the camera ( maybe 10 minutes or so messing around with it cos the rechargeables have gone dead ) looking like a real ****[&:]
I can see the neighbours curtains twitchin and hear them...." there's that guy out at his car AGAIN.....he's taking pictures now, wuick LOOK!!"............rofl

Jim

 

Your funny jim! Thats exactly what they are saying too!

Hey 310 welcome and do you find that the 8k is kind of irritating or could be after say a 8-11 hour drive in the dark??? I want hids and will be getting them in the next 2 weeks but not sure about 6k or 8k...would you stick with 8's or go with 6's I don't care about 6 or 8k because you will always know or people will know either way I have hids...but I don't want to irritate my own eyes because they show up blue and irritate me...anyways thanks...

 

You know, I'm really not sure about that one. They haven't bothered me yet, but I'm not sure about an 8-10 hour drive. I don't think it might be an issue, but they definately do have a blue tint to them.
I'm really going to try to get a good pic of them up this weekend, so maybe that will help you get a better idea of the color.

 

Where did you get the HID kit from and how much did it cost you?

If you dont mind me asking!!!!!

 

I got it from ebay.. here's the actual auction:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...91435&rd=1
They were only $80 shipped, and appear to be very similar (if not identical) to the ones from "mydepot," which is where most people on there got theirs from. The seller was very nice and shipped then the next business day, I had them three days later.

 

Can't beat that....

I'll be getting some very soon like in the next week but I can't figure out whether I want 6 or 8...I want 6 as long as they are still blue at the angles but for the most part I want bright...

 

Alright ordering the 6k right now...woopppeeee

 

I had a chance to take a few new pics tonight (hopefully) giving everyone an idea of how the 8k lights look. They're not the best, but they're a little better than the previous ones. enjoy!

 

I think they look great 310.........must be a huge improvement over stock, surely?

Jim

 

Oh absolutely. It's like driving a different car, and looks unbelievable rolling down the street at night.

 

Lol..........or course it is 310 cos you can actually see where the hell you're goin
Takes away the scary element of night driving, or I can only go out in my car when all the street lights are working and there's a full moon!...lol
Why don't you take some of the car with headlights against a wall fairly close up so we can see the cut off line?

Jim

 

I'll try, but the problem is that part of the internal assembly of my driver's side headlight is broken, so the light points lower than the other. It's part of the adjustment mechanism, so I can't get it back up to match the other light. Apparently it's pretty common to break this piece when changing out the city light bulbs.
I did adjust the other light to cut off about 3 feet from the ground at a distance of ~20 feet. Right now it cuts off at the top edge of the trunk of most cars infront of me, and not a single person has flashed their high beams at me.

 

Thats good! I went to adjust my lights before we left for wisconsin wednesday night...well my passengers side gear to adjust the lights are broken! WTF??? Is there any fixing it?

 

Supposedly you can remove the headlight, heat it in the oven for a bit to soften the seal/adhesive, and pry the clear lens from the housing and glue the broken plastic bit together. If it were me, I'd just watch for a used housing to show up on ebay and go that route. Of course, you run the risk of getting a broken one from there, but then you could alway use it for practice..

 

Yeah my buddy has removed all the headlights he had on both his bonnevilles and had good luck with baking them in the oven...worse comes to worse I'll do that but to remove the headlight I'd have to remove the bumper and I wouldn't want to do that for fear of not being able to put it back on together properly and making it look properly...