what have you guys done about this? I am assuming that your guys headlights suck as bad as mine do as far as light output. Is it because the reflective material on the inside of the housing is gone? What have you guys done about this. With the winter coming up I am going to be taking insurance off my other car and leaving it in the garage, so I will be heavily relying on the second gen and i would like to get better light from my headlights. I have foglights so that is not the answer...I really need more light from the headlights. I have already tried silverstars and they did not really help....just cleaner dim light.

 

Yeah everyones lights look dim compared to sarins. That sig he has really shows the difference huh. Well I got some PIAA headlights and they're better than the silverstars but the price was ridiculous. The polarg driving lights he has are cool too. I don't know what kind of fog lights he has. But aside from a grounding kit there isn't too much we could do. But yeah you can take out the head assy and repaint the reflective part to help the reflection.

 

I have the polarg lights on the way...and i have some ricer euro headlights on the way as well....but what I am trying to figure out is not bulb related....I am guessing if sarin turned off his foglights his lighting would not be that great either. I think I just need to pull them apart but thats what I wanted to avoid.

 

Do you guys have the same fog lights? For some reason I thought sarins were aftermarket and yours were stock.

 

No we have different foglights. Mine are not stock either, I have some after market Pilot, and he has PIAA if I am not mistaken. I understand that the foglights will help, but I ride around with my bright lights on all the time and never once have been flashed (to dim lights), just because my headlights do not put out much light. I really would like to remedy the headlight problem with out addressing foglights.

 

Sorry man, I think your first idea is the right one. Your gonna have to crack open the housing a repaint it. There was a thread here that details the job and it sounds like thats the only thing that will get you what you want.

 

is that thread in the 2nd gen archives or somewhere else?

 

Yeah, it should be threaded somewhere. I will look, and see if I still have the text sent to me for the removal process. I need to do the same thing...Eastwood has some "semi-reflective" paint they sell, for the purpose of restoring reflectors...after researching, I'd say after you got them apart, clean them out VERY well, and take some steel wool to them...then, lay in a couple of thin coats of gloss black paint first, as it's gives the best base for the reflection. Wetsand and polish each coat, then, apply the "chrome" paint, and do the same...wet sand the coats, and keep going until you have a good film build-up, then polish and buff it out...this should produce an vitually OEM reflective surface...then, make sure to buff and polish you lenses before reassembly, and seal the units well with a good quality, clear sealant.

I then plan to upgrade the wiring harnesses, and install some of the Silver Stars, as I will NEVER be able to convince my wife that the cost of PIAA bulbs is acceptable...

 

yeah if you could post it I would appreciate it...I will look as well....I am guessing you just stick them in the oven for a little bit then pry them appart...sounds like a Sunday project to me.

 

Yeah, my lights are pretty much PIAA's. The housing first off isn't the best design. However, I'm one of the lucky few that still have a housings that are in good reflective shape (if you look at my lights and compare to some other people, their look dull and burnt). My fogs are PIAA 2100XT lights with PIAA Super Plasma H3's. I have PIAA Xtreme Whites 9004. They work pretty decent with the foglights off, but it does get difficult to see when it start raining out at night. There are a couple things you can do. Once is to take the headlight apart, refinish the surface, and seal them again, go to a 9007 bulb (which require you to reverse the wires, but using these help as the bulb is bigger), and wire your headlights to a relay that gets power directly off the battery.

For me when it comes to lighting, I don't mind spending the money. I'm partially night-blind, and if I need to dish out the money for better lighting, I will. But not everyone is this way of course. What I'm thinking of doing next is getting a H.I.D. kit for my car. Not doing it for looks, doing it for functionality. The only thing I have to contend with is figuring out how to design a cut-off so I'm not blinding everyone down the road with them.

Last thing....pay attention to the color temperature bulbs your buying. For some reason people think the higher the temperature, the better the light. This is not true at all. The most optimal temperature I believe for lights is between 4000k-4700k or so. My lights are about 4150k for the headlights, but 5000k for the foglights. If you go higher than 5000k, the color starts to filter the light and you start loosing usable light. So keep that in mind.

S

 

mine are fine, the have all thge reflective coating inside them how ever there are cillica gell packets in the bottom of the headlights and after time they just absorb as much moisture as they can and one has started to fog up, not lon untill the reflective finish in side begins to go to hell, and the other light is fine except i hit a dog and it broke the mount on one side so it wobbles in and out and points all different directions

i'm going to replace both in the near future though...

i've hunted arround and this place has the best deal:

http://www.discountcarlights.com/dc7...sanmaxima.html

the dealship wants $224 and thats just the housing with glass front, not mounting bracket or any thing....much better deal at this place

 

Sarin hit the nail on the head. No. 1 biggest factor is reflector condition. I replaced one of my headlights because it was black inside. I did open it, clean it, and use "chrome" paint in it, but it still sucked because "chrome" paint is really just silver and scatters the light around inside the reflector.The relay upgrade made the most difference for me, and I'm pulling power directly from the alternator, 14.5v of juice at the bulbs! This alone will give you about 30% more brightness. The stock setup has a lot of voltage loss because it doesn't have any relays and pulls power from the switch on the stalk. Before I added the relays I had 11.5v. Second biggest difference was 9007 bulbs, they tend to widen up the beam pattern a bit more, so more light gets spread to the sides.

Sarin, I finally got my projectors from a pair of smashed Volvo truck headlights! The R31 Skyline headlight project will start soon! No more crappy headlights for me. They're still only halogen projectors, but man, do they ever give off a ton of light, and they do have mad flicker and a sick cutoff for the bling factor.

 

Werd, I'm hoping to do the HID's. I might attempt at doing a projector, but that might not look good in these housings.

S

 

Ah, not in these housings for sure. The textured lense would still scatter light all over and ruin the output from the projectors. I'm propably going to build from scratch, with a fiberglass bucket and a lexan front lens. Hopefully looking just like this:
http://r31skylines.bssc.edu.au/LGEIM...es/image15.htm

 

You know what else you can try. This sounds stupid....but it can be pulled off with work. You can actually use Chevy Silverado/Suburban/Yukon lights. They have the crystal diamond cut style lamps. The only problem is dimensionally, they are a tad bit smaller, and they also seperate hi and lo beams into the 9005/9006 combo (which I think are great lights, as that is how the Volvo is setup).

 

That would be one way to go, and retro the projectors into those. Swap some dual filaments into the turn signals to have parking lights and it's done. You might want to look into using those with HID, 9006 works a lot better than 9004/7, and you can get glare shields for them that go under the bulb.

http://www.hidforum.com/, is a good place for learning everything hid related.