3rd Gen BHLM and light mods

Desolder old LED and solder new LED.

Sourced my LED chips from a different place than what mesojdm recommended. Bought a hot air gun because two soldering guns were impossible (it worked on smaller 1206/0603 LEDs).

 

Really want to do this myself.... really don’t want to burn my house down...

 

Lol, there was a guy who nearly did!

 

That’s why you have home insurance

 

Good point... thanks for the write up though man, I think I’m going to attempt it this weekend if I can get all the parts by Friday. Do you recommend a full parts list or having certain extra pieces on hand that I can get delivered on Amazon?

Haha I know... don’t use a dry towel in a hot oven!

 

If you’re just doing a BHLM, just make sure you have the retrorubber and some cans of black(your choice of sheen) handy. Also go to Home Depot and pick up a dozen of the spring clamps.
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Thanks dude, I’ll do that. Last question but is this your grille? I want that grille but different wording on the front and compataibke with TSS

 

Thanks OP and everybody else for posting up this BHLM info. I know that I'm no expert and have limited experience (5 headlights opened so far) but this is what I could offer to anybody thinking about attempting this:
1. I used a large cutting board to lay the headlights on that I soaked in water beforehand and in between headlights.
2. Two sets of headlights I did were relatively new (2018) with under 10k miles. They were MUCH harder to get apart compared to the single 2016 one that I opened up that had some miles on it. Not sure if it is just that the adhesive was newer or different.
3. I found that 15 minutes at 300 was the sweet spot. That allowed me to get some good movement on the large side of the light and along the top. Then I would throw it in for another 2-3 minutes upside down which would allow more heat to get to the "bottom" edge. At that point it just peeled apart easily. I couldn't get them to budge with only 10 minutes in there. Perhaps it was the large cutting board, or my oven, or my puny arms.
4. The tool that @mesojdm recommended definitely helped. I didn't have them for my first set but it made things easier for the second.

I did the BHLM and taped off the chrome ring around the projector to make it "pro" like. I also added in Meso's stage 2 side markers. I'm really happy with how they turned out overall but it was my first attempt so there are some things that I know that I could do better.

 

Nice job and great side marker lights.

 

Did the BHLM today. First light was a complete PITA. Wrecked the housing pretty bad. 2nd light was wayyyy easier. Trick is to fold the black plastic away from the lense. Then just peel the lense off. 4 hands makes it easy. 275f for 10 minutes. Only had to reheat once for the 2nd light.

DO NOT RECOMMEND Morimoto permasealer Permatrator. Absolute garbage. It severely weakened the plastic lense. Spider cracks everywhere you touched it with a screwdriver. Quickly figured that out luckily.

4hrs start to finish. Not the easiest job.

 

I split my housings yesterday, and I didn’t seem to have any of the problems a lot of people have. For me, the lenses came straight off with one bake. I baked them for 10 minutes at 300 deg then used the clip removal pliers (only tool I ended up using) to separate the lens from the housing. Took me about 15-20 minutes per light (including bake time) to separate them.

I picked up an extra set of lights so I could take my time on this, but I’ll post some pics when I make some more progress. I’m planning on leaving a little more chrome in the light than others do. Then have to install the rx350’s, diode switchbacks and Meso’s corner lights.

 

What paint did you use for the gloss black? Going for that look

 

Right on! Hope you like the LED side markers. Don’t forget to add the headlight filler plates in for the final touch

 

Can’t wait, I went with the ambers. Made some more progress disassembling tonight. Just need to figure out how I want to paint the housings.



Playing with some paint ideas using some black tape. Thinking about leaving the chrome strip around the outside:



Not sure that it’s been done before. Would love to see some pics if anyone’s tried it.

 

Vht nighshade was the black cuz its all i had, but the luster comes from the clearcoat. Most use matte but i believe this was semi gloss. I ended up with matte because you can see all the imperfections with semi gloss. Hope that helps

 

Can you post a picture of smoked? I am trying to get my headlights to have no amber unless the turn signals are going


Other question for everyone here. I want to do a set of halos on my build but I hate how they look so weird with the matteblack paint. Has anyone sprayed their halos with some of the Nightshades spray and still gotten good lighting out of them or should I just say screw it to the halos?

 

Are tail lights harder than headlights to do?

I’ve tried my tail lights twice now and have been unsuccessful. First time I left the first light in to long by about 2-3 minutes and ended up melting the lens. Second light I payed better attention it had the thing so hot I couldn’t touch it coming out of the oven and it still wouldn’t split, tried using a flat head and it started chipping the lens.

Ended up buying a replacement set of pro’s instead of doing the mod to my limiteds / I melted one so didn’t have a choice.

Anyways I still have a spare tail light and tried the heat gun in a card board box method last week and still no luck, got the damn thing so hot I was molding the plastic with fingers but the perma seal wouldn’t let go.

Could it be that my truck is a 2016 and has 83,000km or 51,500 miles so has had lots of time to be extra baked in the sun?

Open to suggestions. I still have a tail light to expiriment with.

 

Tail lights are welded together. You have to cut them apart in the back.

 

Hahaha no way. Do you cut at the seam or cut the back of the bucket?

 

I guess I didn’t search diligently enough before I made my attempt.