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Xenon Conversion
These pictures where taken on April 7, 2003
This modification was something I never planned on performing to my car. When these type of lights first came out they looked cool on the cars that were made for them, like the BMW, Volvo, and Mercedes but they were not Xenon lights. They were H.I.D.s that were only found, by factory, in the luxury cars. A conversion can be bought to upgrade the lights to H.I.D. but it would cost too much.
Xenon lights were the spin off of H.I.D.s. They were regular light bulbs that allowed your lights to look similar to H.I.D.s and were a fraction of the price. The only problem when they first came out was that they would light up and look blue. I didn't like the blue lights so that is why I never even considered adding Xenon bulbs to my car.
As times changed so did the Xenon bulbs. Now they just have a slight bluish tint to them and look cleaner then before. I decided to get some. As I was looking on www.XenonMods.com I began to realize that my quad style lights were one piece. I couldn't just buy the bulb and screw the old ones out and the new ones it. The entire bulb and bulb housing is one piece. So I began to look up ways to do the conversion. I eventually found out that I had to take the old bulbs out and silicon the new bulbs in. I went and purchased silicon and began working.
I purchased high beam and low beam bulbs in addition to xenon fog lights. The bulb numbers were 9006 for low beams, 9005 for high beams, and H3 for the fog lights. Keep in mind that my body style is a BYP so people with a B4U ground package cannot use H3s for their fog lights.
I started by working on the low beams. I pulled the entire bulb out and brought it inside.
When I pulled the bulb out I noticed that my low beams were Wagner and my high beams were Uniden. They are actually constructed differently so I will provide information on both.
Start by taking the light out of the metal casing.
After you have taken the light fixture out pull the bulb out without breaking the fixture. With the Wagner bulbs you will start by twisting the black circular plastic piece until it moves freely. After you have done that then pull the bulb out carefully. Then pull the black plastic piece off.
After you have pulled the bulb out, clean the existing glue off of the fixture to ensure a tight fight with the new xenon bulbs. I used a razorblade.
Here is a comparison of the two bulbs and what the actual difference is.
I then squeezed silicon evenly around the xenon bulb and allowed it to dry for about 10 minutes before I placed it into the fixture. This will help it stay concentrated in the spot you want it to, rather then spread everywhere making a mess. After the 10 minutes was up I carefully placed the bulb into the fixture, making sure the actual bulb does not touch anything. Keep in mind, that the lights will not last long if you touch them with your fingers. The grease on the fingers will eventually cause the bulb to crack. After pushing the bulb into the fixture I straightened it out as best as I could and placed it in front of a fan for rapid cooling. The lights need to dry for about 5-10 hours before they can be used.
Looking at the light fixtures from the front you can notice that the blue of the bulb can be seen. I think it looks cool. The stock light is on the right and the xenon converted light is on the left.
As the low beams began to dry I pulled the high beams out.
The high beams where Uniden and did not have the same looks as the Walden low beams did. When I tried to screw the bulb out I could not, so I pried them out with a large flathead screwdriver. The gray glue was taken off before the new xenon bulbs where installed.
After I was finished with the conversion I placed all of the lights in front of a fan to dry the silicone faster.
When they are dried all you do is install them back into the car the way they were taken out. Make sure you connect the low beams to the low beam wire and highs to the high beam wire. If they are mixed up then the electrical system could have problems. After they were installed I converted the fog lights over to xenon. That didn't take much time at all. Those were just plug in play versus the headlights which took silicone to work.
I like the way the lights look in my car. I even like how you can see the blue in the light fixture when they are off. Was there an improvement in seeing capability? Yes there was. The xenon lights cause things to reflect better and added a little more distance to my low beams.
