Headlights from the speed3 on my 3
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Headlights from the speed3 on my 3
When I bought my 09 3, while waiting for the paperwork and such to go through, I toyed around with a speed3 with the salesman, and he told me I could get the headlights from the speed3 on mine (the blue tinted ones)
How much do you think this would cost me to buy them and have them installed
How much do you think this would cost me to buy them and have them installed
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RE: Headlights from the speed3 on my 3
By "the blue tinted ones" are you talking about HIDs? If you are then it is possible, and there are several ways to get them with varying results, and varying amounts of money put in.
The easiest and cheapest way to get HIDs is by adding an aftermarket HID kit with H7 rebased lamps. Just remove the stock lamps, put the HID ones in, mount the ballasts and wire them up (should come with a harness in the kit) and viola you're done. The down side is HIDs in halogen housings are not going to perform as well even though they're both projectors. True HID projectors will have a cleaner cutoff, a broader beam, and will spread the light more evenly throughout the entire beam (fewer "hot spots")
Next would be replacing the entire headlight housing with the HID housing.... assuming the picture in your avatar is your car then I assume you have a 3i sedan, so the housing from the speed3 wouldn't fit your car. You would have to get HID housings from a 3s sedan as the sedan and 5-door housings are shaped differently. Then you would need to get lamps, ballasts, and a wiring harness (easy obtained through an aftermarket kit. New from the dealer the HID housings cost about $800 each.
Next would be the fabrication heavy method of replacing the halogen projector in your current headlight housings with an actual HID projector. You could either get just the internals of a sedan HID projector and replace the halogens.. this would be the easiest swap as it's pretty much just plug and play.... or you could buy any old HID projector (there are lots to choose from) and figure out a way to mount it in the headlight. This is where some fabrication comes in. Check out www.hidplanet.com for info. on different projectors.
With either the second or third options you can space the shield out from the lamp to allow light to leak out and give more color across the cutoff, also increasing the "flicker" other drivers see.
The easiest and cheapest way to get HIDs is by adding an aftermarket HID kit with H7 rebased lamps. Just remove the stock lamps, put the HID ones in, mount the ballasts and wire them up (should come with a harness in the kit) and viola you're done. The down side is HIDs in halogen housings are not going to perform as well even though they're both projectors. True HID projectors will have a cleaner cutoff, a broader beam, and will spread the light more evenly throughout the entire beam (fewer "hot spots")
Next would be replacing the entire headlight housing with the HID housing.... assuming the picture in your avatar is your car then I assume you have a 3i sedan, so the housing from the speed3 wouldn't fit your car. You would have to get HID housings from a 3s sedan as the sedan and 5-door housings are shaped differently. Then you would need to get lamps, ballasts, and a wiring harness (easy obtained through an aftermarket kit. New from the dealer the HID housings cost about $800 each.
Next would be the fabrication heavy method of replacing the halogen projector in your current headlight housings with an actual HID projector. You could either get just the internals of a sedan HID projector and replace the halogens.. this would be the easiest swap as it's pretty much just plug and play.... or you could buy any old HID projector (there are lots to choose from) and figure out a way to mount it in the headlight. This is where some fabrication comes in. Check out www.hidplanet.com for info. on different projectors.
With either the second or third options you can space the shield out from the lamp to allow light to leak out and give more color across the cutoff, also increasing the "flicker" other drivers see.
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Sep 17, 2009 09:35 PM
