Title pretty much says it all, has anyone ever tried putting the clear headlight lense cover from cheap Chinese halo headlights on an OEM housing? And if so, do they fit properly? They look like they do in the photos but I can't tell for sure. I'm doing a proper HID retrofit (unlike the hack job I did a few months ago) and the OEM headlight lenses have those lines through them on the low beam side and the ridges and bumps on the high beam side.

Thanks!

 

theres a thread a guy made about retoring his headlights using this type of resin or thinner mixed with this product and he painted it on or spomething but it looked brand new and i wanted to do it to mine but slowly forgot and never did it if i find the link ill post it, but dont try that just restore yours or find used ones in good condition.

 

Headlight Restoration-new UV sealant idea - Auto Geek Online Auto Detailing Forum

 

They dont fit perfectly. You can make them fit by trimming the housing and using a nice amount of sealant to keep moisture out. I'd prefer OEM plastic lens on my headlights for durability and quality though. It's not hard to clean them up.

I dont think the 2 lines on the clear housing will affect your light output or cutoff. You can sand down the low beam lines and polish out the plastic. I'd leave the high beam section alone.

 

Here's a comparison of the output with no lense (on the left) and with a polished OEM lense (on the right). As you can see, the OEM lense trashes the otherwise very sharp cutoff, so I think I'm going to buy a set of cheap Ebay lights with clear lenses, coat them with a nice 2k clear coat to protect them, and try them instead.

 

Any lense you use is going to have an adverse effect on the sharpness of the cutoff. To be honest that is probably about how much the ebay lenses will effect them too. I'd just run what you have. If it really bothers you you could tune the projectors for a bit more color but you'd be sacrificing sharpness.

 

A couple of things to mention:

-How clean/clear is the OEM lense piece you're using? I doubt the cutoff quality is a result of the 2 horizontal lines in the OEM piece. Once you're done with the clear lens swap, you should post your results in comparison to the original OEM piece.

-A headlight w/o a clear lens cover and one with an ebay clear piece are not equivalent. The actual shape/curvature of the lense cover is the reason for the distortion.

 

Yeah it's definitely not the horizontal lines causing the problem, I just don't like the way the lines look and I don't like the OEM high beam lens either. The lens in that picture was a relatively good condition OEM unit that someone else had tried to polish before selling to me, but last night I went ahead and did it myself so we'll see if that offers any improvement after the clear coat cures.

 

I have heard a lot of people say that those HID lights look cool, but in actual driving the "cutoff" of those lights is so drastic, you can't see past the light. Old style lights, fade therefore giving you a little bit of a "glow" off to the side on the shoulder and in ditches. I'm using the OEM glass on my car, and have little to no interest in replacing them because lets face it, glass never needs to be conditioned, buffed or replaced unless its actually broken!