DIY - Smoked Ellipsoids

[nando]

it's a work in progress, but I've pretty much finished the low beams. here's what they looked like when I got them and what they look like now:






Yes I know I have the wrong lense on there, I don't have a new set of low beam lenses yet.

after removing the lenses, I found out that the silver coating on the reflectors would boil off in water, so I boiled them to make painting easy. I used SEM trim paint (cause it's about the right shade, and I had it lying around). I also took apart the ellipsoid assembly, taking out the lense and painting the holder, and then I painted the front half of the bucket black. They are completely dark if you look straight into them, because the front of the cutoff is black so nothing reflects back out of the ellipsoid lense.

now I just need to find some plastic to finish the high beams, and get lenses for the low beams..

[M42Technik]

Well done!!! Looks great. Get us more pictures when you can man.

[Avus_325is]

So you painted over the reflectors? Hope you don't have to drive down too many dark roads. :roll:

[LikeCDoos]

i think you might have lighting issues because you "smoked" them with black trim paint

[nando]

uh, go look at a set of real smoked ellipsoids.. 99% of the light comes from behind the ellipsoid, not the reflector that's behind the lense. there's actually two reflectors, the outer and the inner.. I painted the outer one, since that's the difference between smoked and clear ellipsoids. ;)

the lenses aren't smoked, the ellipsoid itself is not smoked, it's just the plastic parts that you can see from the outside that are black. I'll get a pic of the inner assemblies to show you what I mean..

[LikeCDoos]

uh, go look at a set of real smoked ellipsoids.. 99% of the light comes from behind the ellipsoid, not the reflector that's behind the lense. there's actually two reflectors, the outer and the inner.. I painted the outer one, since that's the difference between smoked and clear ellipsoids. ;)

the lenses aren't smoked, the ellipsoid itself is not smoked, it's just the plastic parts that you can see from the outside that are black. I'll get a pic of the inner assemblies to show you what I mean..

I forgot about that, let me know how the lighting turns out compaired to before they were smoked

[nando]

here's the inner assemblies, the one on the left I painted the ellipsoid lense holder black, the right side is from my other clear set:

[qimis]

is this the part that you painted ? (arrow)

[nando]

yeah, the outside of the holder.. because it showed up really badly when it was silver with a black outer reflector.

[qimis]

i'm not sure if i can do that w/ my headlights, are they ellipsoids though ? doesn't looks like the smiley euro ellipsoids

[qimis]

how would you do the high beam ? :roll:
would you be kindly enough to write a DIY once it's done :idea: :)

[nando]

i'm not sure if i can do that w/ my headlights, are they ellipsoids though ? doesn't looks like the smiley euro ellipsoids

yeah they are almost exactly the same, except for the cutoff and the lack of the "smiley" and city light.

the high beams have two pieces of plastic in them that form an X, I just have to make a template that matches the curve of the reflector and make them out of plastic.

btw, you have to remove the lenses to do this, which isn't neccesarily easy. two of mine were broken anyway so it wasn't a big deal.

[randomtask37]

ive never seen the inside of one of those before.... those look tight!

[Ryan Stewart]

Mine are just bare metal colored, not black at all....

[nando]

the inner part? I thought it looked ghetto that way, but I can't see it in the pictures of your lights. :)

I still haven't quite figured out the high beams yet. I need a better way to match the curve of the reflector.