Tools:
– Dremel
– Cutoff wheel
– Hole saw
– Heat gun
– Screwdriver
– Soldering iron
– Hot glue gun
Materials:
– TSX Projectors
– eBay H4 housings
– JRT Lighting HID Kit with H4 harnesses
– Gloves
– Epoxy
– Washers
Procedure:
First thing you need to do is take one of the h4 housings and take a heat gun and heat up the glass. heat it around the edges and try to heat it evenly. You should be wearing glove because the glass will get very hot.
when you think you’ve heated it up enough, use a flat head and gently separate the glass from the plastic housing.
Now, due to there not being any space to mount the projectors and since the projectors are actually longer than the h4 housings I decided it would be best to mount the projectors as close to the glass as possible. here is where I cut my housing in half:
cut:
Next thing I did was I got a sheet of ABS plastic and cut it so It would fit perfectly on the back side of the housing.
Next what I did was take a soldering iron and melt the plastic together on the back side. If you’re asking yourself is that going to work and hold good?! The answer is yes it will if done properly. We’ve accidentally broken glove boxes in our shop and have soldered the back together.
Now for the inside you’ll need a little sand paper and some epoxy. Sand where the Abs plastic and the housing meet to help the epoxy adhere to both surfaces better.
Follow the directions for the epoxy which is usually a 50/50 mix and apply it to the housing:
Next I used a 2 inch hole saw and drilled a hole in the center of the plastic. After cutting the hole, i cut out a paper template which had the general shape of the projector and outlined it with a marker.
Then I used an air saw to cut it out and a pencil grinder (dremel will work too) to cut out any additional areas to get the projector to fit nice and snug.
My original plan was to mount the projector from behind, but I saw that If I mounted them in the front I could gain some more clearance and they would still clear the glass lens that goes over the housing. How you mount yours is totally up to you.
Fit your projector in there and use those mounting holes that the TSX projectors have and shoot 4 self tapping screws into the plastic to secure it. I’d definitely recommend using self tapping screws so you don’t risk cracking the plastic.
Here is a shot from the top so you can see how far it sticks out.
On the backside of the screws I used speed clips to ensure the screws wouldn’t come loose.
Now with one basically done we can compare it to the stock h4 housing.
Next I cracked open my HID kit and tested it out.
After rolling around with them for a night, I knew that I had to seriously adjust them and aim them way down. I was blinding everybody and lighting up all of the freeway signs lol. Surprisingly not one person high beamed me, I guess they just accept the fact that you have HID’s and your headlights are really bright.
I tried to use the stock adjustments, but it would only go so low and the beam aimed upwards at like a 30 degree angle at like 100 feet away.
The only way to fix it would be to a) try the sleepy eye mod and hope it fixed the problem or b) angle the projector downwards inside of the housing. So I ended up taking the headlights apart the next day and used spacers to angle the projectors downwards. I also did a color mod too. Here’s how I did it.
Get some #8 washers from osh, homedepot or walmart. I got my baggy for $2.
Take your projector apart and it will look like this.
Next put two washers on each of those alignment things that are sticking out. There are 2 so the means you use 4 washers total.
Now to angle the projector downwards I used a heatgun and heated the glue up from behind. Once the glue is hot gently push the top of the projector inwards. and wedge like 5 or 6 washers inbetween the projector and the housing and screw the projector in place.
Now that you know it works and you’re confident that you won’t need to mess with the projector again, set the glass housing cover in place and heat it up again. Once it’s hot, firmly press it in and it should reseal. I ran a bead of hot glue around the edges just to be sure.
Now to seal the back you can either use some more epoxy or use hot glue like I did. I let the HID run for like 10 minutes and the projector housing did NOT get hot enough to melt the glue.
Now with one side done, wire up your HID kit in your car and mount your ballasts. I used a self tapping screw and mounted my ballast on the radiator support.
I had a few issues with getting the new housing to fit right, one of the being these little nubs that space out the housing. It made getting the metal ring around the headlight a little difficult.
a little grinding and problem solved!
The other issue was that this metal bar was hitting the headlight plug it needed to be tweaked.
I used my cutoff wheel to do that but ended up cutting out that little piece I had left also because it hit again when I tried to aim the light down more.
Now with our clearance issues resolved, lets compare our old halogen to our new HID!
Now we’re on the home stretch and you just need to make the other housing exactly like how you made this one. It should take you less time to make since you know how to make it.