SC400Zulu

Very true. Well, I will use them just to upgrade asap, but will change them within the next couple of months. Seems like I'd 've happy with 5000k. Thanks for the input.

oldManTan

i used to have 8000k and they strain your eyes after a long drive, your eyes aren't meant to look at a constant blue especially at night. having realistic (natural) lights like 4300k is the best for your eyes and will seem brighter than any other color because your brain simply just prefers it.

Studiogeek

iTrader: (6)

AND, they put out more lumens!

Jermmzz914

iTrader: (1)

Welcome good to see another SC owner joining the club. You should check out iJDMtoy http://store.ijdmtoy.com/default.asp they have a good selection of hid kits and bulbs. i personally installed the 6500k kit on my mothers 2000 rx300 and the fitment and quality is great, priced good as well

SC400Zulu

Thanks. I will check them out! How do you like the 6500?

miraluna

iTrader: (2)

I would not go with HID unless you are willing to go w true retrofit (projector)... cheap alternative is HIR... google HIR... and thank me later...

SC400Zulu

I will Bing it now.

But my housings have rounded projectors?

eknine9

iTrader: (8)

There's a difference between projectors designed for halogen bulbs and those designed for HID bulbs. On newer cars they're mostly the same, but on older cars the cutoff is much less crisp on halogen projectors, and you'll get hot-spotting on the ground and an uneven light pattern with less usable light compared to a xenon projector.

However the Halogen projectors that come on this car aren't so bad and can handle an HID much better than a reflector housing, but just know that it can still be better if you ever do decide to tackle a Proper Projector Retrofit.

SC400Zulu

Hmm. Interesting. I'm assuming there's a thread in here to search for exact how to's?

eknine9

iTrader: (8)

Not that I'm aware of here.
I was gathering information from HID planet and just kind of sitting around waiting for a set of clear headlight lenses to pop up on the classifieds here, and they did, with a TSX retrofit attached to them so I just bought the entire thing from him since I was also looking for TSX projectors. Thanks again iheartmysc.




But, if you do intend on retrofitting in this car there are a few hurdles to jump. First our Halogen projector is 3 inches in diameter, so most any HID projector will fit with space around the outside, for instance the TSX projector is 2.5 inches so there is quite a bit of room to fill once they are mounted.

Second, the headlight lens itself is fluted and has numerous vertical lines on the glass, rather than just having a clear lens. So any HID installed will have it's beam pattern broken up and disrupted by this fluting, making it worse, and disrupting the cut-off. So it's really not worth putting an HID projector in unless you can replace the front lens. There are two ways to do that, either wait for someone to sell a set of Supermade Clear lenses on the classifieds, they're typically $300 for a pair. Which sounds like a lot for lenses considering the headlights run for less than that used, but they were made for a limited time and are exceedingly rare. Or you can buy a set of ebay headlights, toss them in the oven and remove the lenses from them. It's slightly cheaper but those lights do have a clear lens. The last option is delining them yourself which involves sand paper and a lot of elbow grease. I don't think they come out looking terribly nice IMO due to the shape of the headlights not allowing a proper polisher on the inside, but there is a thread about delining the headlights on CL.

Once you have a clear set of headlight lenses you'll need to bake the headlights you have in the oven to remove the lenses from them. I've found that the best way is to heat the oven to 200 Fahrenheit, then turn the oven off once you get that temp, lay your headlights in there on a couple sheets of cardboard so the metal oven rack doesnt cook through the plastic. Leave each set in there for roughly 10 minutes, pull them out and start prying a little bit around the lens edge, then put them back in for another five minutes and pry for a bit. Keep alternating between 5 minutes in the oven and prying around the edge until the lens seperates from the headlight housing. The glue that holds them together breaks down with heat, however you want to avoid doing any damage to the housing itself which is why you try and pry at it every 5 minutes after the initial heating.

Once you've got them open the chrome bit will actually slide away revealing a blackish housing underneath, and you can use a ratchet wrench and screwdriver to disconnect the halogen projector from the housing. You can then have to either make custom mounts for projectors, or do a frankenstein-esqu surgery where you chop the old projectors in half and mount the new projectors to the old projectors so you can use the OEM mounts.

Then assembly is just the reverse, it's a good idea to purchase fresh butyl sealant to use to seal the lens back to the headlight housing then trying to re-use the old factory sealant as the factory sealant probably will be incapable of making another water-tight bond.

There is a lot of information out there regarding which projectors to buy, but other than making sure they fit (which most do in the gargantuan 3 inch hole), the other difference is light output, and also les type. A lot of projectors have fresnel lenses which diffuse the light and blur the cut-off a bit to better lessen the glare for oncoming drivers. Some have clear lenses which provide a sharper cut-off and can be modded to provide a more vibrant color shift at the cut-off. Ultimately which you decide is up to you, but the choice is there.

I'm still barely scratching the surface though. If you want to learn more, check out HIDplanet.com, there's a wealth of information there regarding pretty much everything HID, and it's a great place to learn. There's even a few SC's there as well.

Studiogeek

iTrader: (6)

^ Damnnnnnnn those look GREAT! ^

chason

Was about to post up something like what eknine9 said.... The color in real HIDs comes from the ballast bending light, not from the bulb. When you just have the colored bulb vs. the real thing, you can tell. I can tell, everyone can tell. It looks cheap and ****ty. I'm only a few years older than you, but I've never been a fan of fake rice ****.

Also, like everyone else has mentioned, the blue light strains your eyes. There's a reason the military uses red (the opposite end of the spectrum) for low light situations. This isn't opinion, this is science.

Look here for much more info and clear pictures of why you want a retrofit, or normal HID lights and not the **** lights... it will change your mind: (archive from the old intellexual.net, all about Lexus HID) https://web.archive.org/web/20090312...l.net/hid.html

If you have it, spend the cash and do a real HID retrofit. You'll get the colored light, the performance, and the classy look.

Anyway, that's a seriously nice SC. You did well. If it were mine, the second thing on my list would be tint... I have 7%. The first thing would be subs

SC400Zulu

Trust me... I feel naked without tint. But being in the city, 7% would definitely get me pulled over. I was thinking 15% for the rear and side glass & 25-30% driver/passenger, 35% windshield.

And thanks. I need to replace the speakers first before subs. By the summer, she will be damn near show room. I'm thinking about getting the touch screen climate control.

chason

Dude, she's damn near showroom right now!

You know, I thought the 7% would get me pulled over, but in Houston they just don't care. Whether or not it's worth the risk is up to you haha

There's some threads around here about speaker sizes.... both the fronts and the backs, the bezel can be modified to fit bigger speakers. The ones in that came with it are a painfully small at 4", but you can easily fit larger as there's lots of plastic that surrounds the speaker. You can move to 6.5" all the way around pretty easily iirc.

Rear:
https://www.clublexus.com/forums/lex...necessary.html

Front:
I went the opposite direction and got the subs first, but one of these days I'm going to drop a set of Focals in.

The touch screen climate control is sick too... my climate control just broke so I may take the plunge. Pricey, but that thing is slick.

Mastana

Nice car ! That car is real sweet i hope you enjoy it !