Forgive me if this has already been done but I saw how the headlight assemblies get pained chrome and I was wondering if any of you guys have given a go at painting it the same colour as the body instead of leaving it grey? I can't work out if it would look good or weird! It might look ok on a black zed? I was thinking Ferrari style like this: Like I said sorry if it's been done or discussed before
Could look alright if it's done well. Hell of a job to remove both headlights and separate the glass though Have a look in the tech section for Blipman's articles on removing and disassembling headlights. CheerZ Cliff
I've thought about doing this but couldn't justify the effort in my case having a blue car the grey colour doesn't look to bad, but for others, who have a different coloured car it might be a good option. I think it would look really good on a silver Zed and maybe black. However, chrome headlights also look good on a black car.
Hehe yeah... Time to raid mum's hair dryer. I have to take them apart cos the glass is looking pretty dirty and there are small bits of foam (what the?!) in there so I figured maybe I could paint it while I'm there!
im getting mine chromed soon going to put them in the oven instead.... we baked my mates wrx headlights the other week and they came undone pretty easy. I think it was 120 degrees for about 15mins...
the little bits of foam.... contain little moisture tablets to remove moisture from the inside of the headlights... when I opened up my headlights, mine were still intact so I encased them in some new foam, and tucked them away out of site... if you can see bits of foam floating around, chances are, they have disintegrated.. Cheers
nah, dont think so.... i only put mine back in cos they were still intact... otherwise I wouldnt have worried about it.... Just make sure they are sealed properly... Cheers
Hi All, Sorry to dig up an ancient thread, but does anybody have photos of a silver Z with chromed headlight casings? I've looked everywhere...
Omg epic dig 08/2005.... Dont know the car youre after mate. Liking that chrome headlight look though.
Try looking for pics of member Lil' Baz's Z. Below is one from Armidale this year. These are OEM 2000 spec lights though, not painted or chromed stockies.
The biggest issue with chrome plating plastic is to use the right grade of plastic to begin with. OEM chromed headlights use a grade of ABS designed to be plated; our standard headlights do not. So they might look good for a while, but eventually they will probably craze - it ends up being the luck of the draw in this regard.
I got the 2k style inserts for my headlights...made from fibreglass and just painted silver, looks good and seems to be holding up well.
The chrome plating isn't necessarily crazing due to the type of plastic, although it mat be possible as I have never looked to see what the oem headlight buckets are. My educated guess would be incorrect etching process during the plating operation. Plastic like any other material needs to be keyed properly to allow the base layer of copper to take. Many years ago I worked for Headlight and Bumper Service in Brisbane, as the name implies, all we did was repair headlights and bumper bars for panel shops in SEQ. After alot of trial and error, we finally had a prep and plating process that could be relied upon. Basically the short story is course grit glass media blasting, triple copper and triple nickle plating. The reason for excess copper and nickle is to smooth the surface left by the media blast. Having said all that, I think chrome plating the bucket will give a very odd lighting effect, as the light is not directed anywhere as a multi parabola reflector is designed to do. The zed uses multi parabola lenses instead of reflectors. Chroming the bucket, which sits between the lense and bulbs would give a strange lighting effect. That may be good or bad, I don't really know there. But with the lense angle and bulb positioning my thoughts lean toward bad.
