Install Audi A6 Bi-Xenon Projectors in R32

[MR666]

How to install Audi A6 Bi-Xenon Projectors into your R32 Head lights.

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This is in a large doc file that I need a host for ?

First get yourself this set of 2002 ¬ 2006 Audi A6 Bi-Xenon projectors made by Hella, from eBay out of the USA. Make sure they have the two wires for the coil sticking out of the black box on the bottom and the black bulb holder ring. If they are not fully complete just stay away from them as the guy selling them is just trying to flog them and you’re screwed. Chances are the circuit board in the black box in the bottom is missing too. Make sure they have this same number on the sticker as these. American DOT rated lights, US 9DR 151 333-04 . I would not recommend buying them individually. Pair price $ 115 to $ 170 USD. Make offers and they will counter offer, good luck. The pairs, seem to come up only a few times a year so be careful on your bidding but don’t wait too long either.

These are DOT rated and you will get no grief, from the Canadian authorities. Make sure you have lots of photos of the conversion with some showing the sticker to prove the projectors are in fact what you are claiming they are and you’re covered as far as I’m concerned.

This is usually how they look on eBay. These were how mine as advertised. Note the black rings and wires.



Get yourself a D2S HiD System with 35 Watt ballasts, bulbs and wiring harness. I got mine from http://www.xenonrider.com for $200.00. Email Joseph@xenonrider.com and tell him what you’re doing and he will tell you how to order it on line as they don’t show the D2S as an option when buying, but he will make your kit just for you. I’m very happy with his knowledge base and he’s originally from Vancouver so he knows, what’s it’s like to be a Canadian. I live near the border and have a US postal address so I cleared customs with the kit myself. Always pay the duties if any are levied, one day you may need to return something and you don’t want to pay duties and taxes twice, Crooks! Watch out for one of the courier services as they charge $60 for an international handling and brokerage fee, also Crooks !
This is my HiD kit.

I picked the 6000K lights and they have a definite light blue colour. When I hit the high beams, the yellow halogen high beams blend with the blue and partially wipe out the blue.

I replaced my Halogen high beam bulbs with 100 Watt Hella H3 bulbs( H83135111 ) $8.00 each. I bought a Hella relay (H41388461) $9.00 and a Hella wiring harness (H84709001) $22.00 to take all that power off the cars wiring system when I hit the lunar landing lights. You will over time damage the car electrical wires as they over heat and slowly melt. My old car took a year to damage the wires so I thought I’d avoid that one, this time. I don’t think you can get any more candle power than this setup, unless you put in a dual HiD system and used dual 55 watt HiD systems, it would be day light at midnight. You would then have a real time getting the second set of projectors into the head light body when there is no room in the high beam pocket, or I would have done it.


And then I found a harness and relay that worked better for me at Princess Auto for $7.00 and returned the other stuff. I put it in here as not everyone has a Princess Auto around. In the end I didn’t use that harness either because all it did was add extra wires and connections. More to give you trouble down the road as corrosion sets in.


I just used push in/on crimps and heat shrink to save some money and extra wires. Use heat shrink absolutely everywhere and solder as many of the connections and crimps as physically possible. I even removed the plastic collar on the crimps to allow for easier soldering and heat shrinking. You’re not going to be taking the wiring apart until the car goes to the crusher so make it permanent and do it right the first time. That way it won’t have to be done over again.

Here is the layout for the adapter rings and what they looked like before.
Making things ahead of time will dramatically reduce your rebuild / down time are the mounting rings / plates. Use 3/16 inch aluminum plate.

After making holes in it and fitting the projectors in.


Note the square holes for the nylon blocks for the aiming adjustment screws, they have been rotated 45 degrees in order to keep them as close to the original geometry as possible. The Audi projectors are slightly bigger and this causes a problem with the aiming screw mounts and pivot point relationship. But if you keep things close, everything works out great. I used #8 stainless steel machine screws 1 ½ inches long and four lock nuts. I used plain nuts and washers to angle the light up and left. This made it so there was more of the aiming screw in the nylon, since the lights were designed for the opposite pointing direction. I sanded with the Dremel the two bottom corners of the circuit board box on the projectors, to give more clearance at the back where they hit after they are aimed for our roads.

The dimensions as follows; I started with a 4 ½ inch by 4 ¼ inch adapter ring but it ended up with it being 4 ¼ inch square. The drawing was only modified later to remove the 1/8 inch on each side to make it 4 ¼ square. So if you want to start with a square piece, then you needs to adjust the horizontal dimensions accordingly or just mark it off like I did and make it smaller when you cut the rings out of the plate. Go back and look at my blue-plate picture.


If you print off this drawing I supplied and make it to the displayed sizes, you will reduce your layout time significantly. Spray your aluminum plate with lay out blue. Before you put the paper over it, scribe the vertical and horizontal center lines as measured on the print, and then pin punch what is going to be the center of the large 3 and ¼ inch hole. Tape the print to the plate after lining it up on the plate/ring, by using something pointed and stick it in the center of the print and then put it into the pin punched center that you just made. You can now center punch on all the marks and use an Olfa knife to cut through the print and score the aluminum around the tab that holds the pivot and score where the bottom two lens legs and solenoid body are. Don’t cut on the lines for the square holes, for the aiming screws, as you have to drill them first and then mark directly on the aluminum plate the lines at the edge of the holes on a 45-degree angle. Drill all the holes first with a 11/64 drill then re-drill the square holes with the drill Q. and use the 3 1/4 inch hole saw for the center hole. After using the 3.25 inch hole saw, use the drum sander to make the hole edges nice. I used a bare hacksaw blade with no holder and then cut the straight lines for the three lens legs. I used a high-speed die grinder but if you don’t have one then a Dremel to remove the excess for the lens legs. Then used a small bit on the Dremel to get into the corners and square them up. Also very lightly chamfer the square aiming screw holes to allow the nylon to expand and lock in when the screw comes through. Keep this hole tight and relatively square, but you don’t need to get right into the inside corners and make them sharp corners. See mine that is plenty. Don’t be too zealous with the Dremel and open the aiming screw holes up. Near the end, hand file the bottom lens legs flat when you to fit the legs. Use a small Dremel the same bur and make the four screw holes fit and the top lens leg is centered on your center line that you scribed into the plate in the beginning. If this isn’t right, when you turn the lights on, your horizontal light beam cutoff won’t be horizontal.


End of part 1 of 3

[MR666]

Install Audi A6 Bi-Xenon Projectors in R32 2of3

You will have to make the lights four mounting screw holes fit to the projector with your Dremel. In some of the pictures of the first ring I did, you will notice the holes are quite oval, shall we say. Even in the finished pair above, you can see the holes have been adjusted. I then made these two rings, which were more accurate and have a slightly different shape, so look carefully at the blue aluminum plate picture as this is the finished product. Note the differences in some of the pictures between the first ring and the final rings, in the shape of the lower half and the cutout at the top.

A couple of first ring pictures. You can see how the square hole is chamfered and the tab for the pivot fits.

This plate was my first one and not used in the final assembly. Notice the shaved square nylon insert.



When building the rings, try and keep the two rings (Left hand light and Right) side by side and oriented left and right all the time, like you would be looking at the car from the front. You mind will be able to keep track of the mirrored parts better and you will not be likely to make mistakes. The key is, keep in mind where the pivot point is on each light so you don’t end up flipping a ring over and modifying or shaping the wrong surface of the ring.
I now disassembled the whole thing and painted the lens holder and this adapter ring high heat black. I put them in a big cardboard box with a trouble light and baked them for a while, then let cool. This makes the paint harder. Do pull the glass lens out before you paint them. Just bend the tabs back and carefully remove the ring without chipping the lens.


Note the screws have different numbers of nuts and washers from one side to the other and top to bottom. This angles the light more left and up for our roads and displaces the reflector rearward slightly at the same time. This does two things, first it facilitate having more threads of the aiming screw in the nylon and to push the projector back by the thickness of a nut. The plug from the ballast wire will hit the outside body and will not mount on the bulb, it’s that close. If you put one too many nuts on, the bulb holder ring will hit the inside diameter of the hole and you can’t get enough angle to aim the light where it needs to be. If you force it, you can break the reflector or the adapter ring just pops off the pivot as your aim the lights. By now I have had the lights in and out of the car at least six times dealing with that issue. The nut and washers just act as shims or blocks to tighten down on without pulling on the reflector. Tighten well and snug but don’t overdo it. Remember this is all plastic that’s bolted to a thick, strong, metal ring.


Adjustments to the projector it’s self.
Make a small hollow in the rim of the reflector for the pivot point nylon, with the sanding drum on the Dremel. It needs to be slightly into the rim and you will have to gauge how deep to make it when you fit your lights.

Where the lower aiming screw comes through, with the sanding drum on the Dremel, sand down any overhanging metal on the lower lens mount. Which is on the same side as the pivot point tab? Also reduce the height slightly of the two plastic alignment pins. You want the plate to sit on the screw heads and not on the pins.


This ring was not used but shows the shaved nylon block for the lower aiming screw. The hole is so close to the projector that there isn’t enough room for the full nylon block. Shave about one third of it way so the plate sits down on the lens mount screws. If need be, shave a little of the projector at that spot too. Kind of share the cut backs when you fit them.

Shave off the locking tabs on the pivot point nylon and slide it on to the plate. It should be a snug fit. Both the internal dimension and the gap in the ring the nylon is sliding down into.

Note that my pivots were not exactly the same; one of them was not fully closed like the other, I don’t know why ?

You will have to make a relief on the underside of the ring on the inside diameter, to allow the movement of the low to high beam gate. Where the solenoid hook inserts into the gate tab, the tab will swing into the mounting plate, don’t just bend the tab down, as this will increase the likely hood of the solenoid hook falling out one day while you’re driving.

Make sure the projectors are completely fitted to the rings and all your fabricating is finished before you take your head lights out. This should take you in the order of 40 - 50 hours to make the rings and fit the projectors to them.

Pulling the head lights out of the car.
Remove the center grill by just popping it out of the lights, CAREFULLY. Bloody plastic breaks.


Then use a screwdriver to get in behind and pop the corner lights off.


Which exposes the top and bottom screws that hold the light in place.


Remove the nuts and bolts from the back of the headlights and your headlights are out.


Pre-heat your oven to 210 Degrees Fahrenheit. Place your head light on a cool cookie sheet and bake the light with the heat still turned on for 30 minutes. This will heat the glue and glass enough that you will be able to pull the Lexan glass off. Maybe have a flat screwdriver handy in case you need to get it started. While wearing work gloves, start pulling at the sharp corner by the high beam reflector. Once the glass starts to pull apart you have to watch out for the strings of glue, don’t get them on the reflectors or your table. They are really hard to get off. Go figure !



Remove the two screws at the top of the molded plastic light surrounds and use a screw driver to carefully pop the two lower holding points out.

Unscrew the light aiming screws all the way and then use a screwdriver from behind to carefully push the pivot point off.


This is the difference between the Audi A6 projectors and the ones you’re taking out. If you put the bulb holder ring on then you will see the difference in diameter at the back end.


Under the Audi light is the black plastic box that surrounds the high beam gate circuit board. This will cause you problems later so the corners need to be sanded down to give a little more clearance as it’s really tight back there when we are done.


Since the pivot point geometry has been changed slightly, the screws now have to angle out and away. The aiming screws need to be loose in their sockets. Use the Dremel and make two notches or relief’s inside next to the locking washer to facilitate the use of the needle nosed vise grip inside to grab the lock washer. Otherwise you can’t get the vise grips to grab the washer. Use another vise grip on the screw itself outside and pull the locking washer off by rotating the screw back and forth while holding the washer still, all the while pulling apart at the same time. This works the washer off.



Use your drill and oval out the holes in the correct directions. The top screw will be angled high and away from center and the bottom screw will be low and away from center. You could use the Dremel on the outside, to change the bearing surface angle where the screw inserts and sits when it is in fully. You want it to sort of match the angled direction the screw will eventually be in. I found that the locking washers for the aiming screws would work themselves off as I rotated the aiming screw because they are on an angle. Then the light would fall apart. This lead to making a groove at a location on the screw that allowed the washer to be loose but still locked on the screw shank. I made this groove by putting the screw into a drill and turning it on. I used a small triangle file and then made my groove near the end of the area where the locking washer locks.
This is what it looks like with one light finished and the other still to do. The Audi light is at relatively the same depth, in the light body compared to the originals position. But it’s just a little too tight getting the new D2S light bulb out. I had to ream the hole out with a drum sander on the Dremel to facilitate putting on and off the bulb holder ring. The Audi lights have a bigger back end and this will cause some challenges and compromises latter when it comes to the pivot point and aiming the lights Since the Hid Lights last 10 times longer than the ordinary Halogen bulbs. It will more than likely be many years before you have to pull the lights off the car to change the bulbs.

[MR666]

Install Audi A6 Bi-Xenon Projectors in R32 3of3

The finished and aimed light will have the back of the projector stuffed into the bottom right corner at the 4:00 O’clock position. I was trying to keep the lip for the rubber boot at the back. I would like to find a boot to seal up the light. I drilled a small hole in the side that faces the high beam, to feed the gate wires out and connect them to the high beam wires. The gate will drop when the high beams come on.


Both pictures are of the right head light.


Because the internals in the right head light were different from the left, the new projector sits back and away from the molded plastic cover. The left light is a horse of a different color. It has a longer pivot point and longer aiming screws, which moves everything forward. The OEM projector was also right into the molded plastic cover.

This is how they looked with the new and the old projectors in place with the molded plastic still inside. Note the OEM left head light projector (Right one in the picture) is right into the molded plastic cover in the light. So much so that it is pushing on it and was bending it. Is yours this way too? Or was it just mine?


Here is a close-up shot at the backside with the projector centered in the hole, but not its final position.

They may even be a touch further back then the old projectors? However, you need that or the big plug from the ballasts will not go on. There is a fair amount of fiddling to get the bulb of the projector to the back far enough but at the same time not so far as to cause clearance problems with the bulb holder ring or the black plastic box for the gate on the bottom rear.

This is a look at the right headlight. Everything looks good and fits nice, for diving on the left side of the road.

But after the headlight is aimed for our side of the road, the projector is way to one side. So much so that the molded plastic actually blocks some of the light beam.


The molded plastic in front was so much trouble I just opted to remove it and paint the lens holder and the adapter ring black. Out came the lights again ! Hard to see black on black but it looks good.

I think it looks rather good and it cured several problems at once. Especially when it comes to the left light.


The Left light from HELL !
The left light internals were different compared to the right light, everything was longer. Which lead to a modification to the pivot and aiming screws? There is a difference of ½ inch in length from left to right pivots.


I decided to use the push in pins from the back of that molded plastic which I am no longer using. These pins were the exact same size as the right head light pivot so I removed both original pivots and put in these two short ones, just to keep everything exactly the same. With the shorter pivot pin in place, the projector is now located far enough back to get the plug on the bulb. Now the aiming screws were too long and the threads did not go down the shank far enough. I thought the pitch of the thread was 6 mm 0.8 ,but that doesn’t exist. I later found out the thread was a double start thread and that can only be done on a lathe. The cost was going to be between $100 and $300 dollars just to thread the two screws further down the shank. Just change the thread to 6 mm 0.75 and rethread the screws over the existing thread and then down another inch more. There was no other way I could fix this dilemma without paying big money to the machine shop. If I had the machine shop continue a thread of a different type past the present thread. Then when the new thread entered the nylon block it would still wipe out the old thread ways in the nylon block. So I opted to wipe it out right from the beginning of the thread and keep the thread the same all the way down.

Now comes the wiring section.
Basically the kit is comprised of a H7 wiring harness, D2S Bulbs and 35 Watt HiD ballasts.


Mount your ballasts where you like, but they will have to be near the lights and mount this little four-tab relay somewhere near the battery. Hook up the ballasts to the harness, connects the red lead to the battery, the ground to the battery wire (Yes Battery). Note all the grounding wires were put on where the battery ground goes down to the body. This keeps things clean and not cluttered. I am also running the high beam grounds back to this point too. These cars have a poor grounding system so don’t use the body as your ground unless you’re forced to, especially for this much power. Also this type of car has the tendency to give all kinds of gremlins if the electrical system taxed with too big of a load on it. You get false computer readings, false ignition timing signals and a host of bad and wonderful things, pick one, any one, the list is long. Plug in your ballasts (watch for the polarity) and plug in the bulb lead and put them on the bulbs. The only two wires left are the ones that go into the cars low beam wiring harness plug for the HiD lights. When you put on your low beams the relay will be energized by these wires and bring power directly from the battery to the HiD system.

I mounted the HiD relay down below the relay box and I mounted the High beam relay on the top screw for the relay box

Use 14 gauge wires for everything except the high beam gate wires for the Bi Xenon projectors. On the high beam relay, hook up tab 30 to the positive on the battery. Tab 87 and 87a are the positive wires for the right and left Halogen high beams. Run separate ground wires back to the battery/body grounding point. That one is located where the battery cable comes off the battery and goes down to the body ground, which is hidden about a foot down the wire from the battery. The HiD coil wires are (black and blue), push them into the low beam plug on the cars wiring harness and secure them. They will energize the relay when you put on the low beams.

The high and low beam plugs on the left side of the car will not be in use. Run another single wire from the left high beam plug (positive), back to the blue or positive for the HiD relay and splice it in. The low beam lights go out when high beam is selected. To keep the Bi Xeon lights’ running when you hit the high beams, the relay needs to get power from the high beam light harness to keep the relay energized. I made use of the unused left plug. I covered all the wires with that plastic cover to keep things neat looking. I used ¼ inch and 3/8 inch. The ¼ inch fits two wires nicely while the 3/8 fits three wires. I ran the two left light wire looms under the rad support at the top of the rad over to the left side of the car.


For the projector gate coil wires (Brown and White), splice a smaller gauge wire to the Brown wire (Ground) and then to the ground wire crimp for the high beam. I put it right into the crimp in the light itself and just made two more holes in the rubber boot to run the extra wires out. The positive for the projector gate coil (White) will come from the high beam positive crimp, also on the light like this.



I am not sure as of yet, what the high beam projector gate coil uses 9 volts or 12 volts to power it. You might have to put a resistor in line on the positive (Brown) wire.



There you have it, a new head light system that will work well and last a long time.

I made some Devil Eyes and boy do they look great, but had to pull them out temporarily. I used hot glue instead of epoxy and did not think about the low amount of heat required to melt the glue. It would not be too good if it all came apart on a really hot day.


I hope this is helpful for anyone contemplating putting in new DOT lights and keeping the stock look. Not to mention that the HiD lights throw so much more light that the two 100 watt high beams barely increase the visual range.

David

[DarkCaporaL]

Couldn't you of just replied to your own thread to keep it all in one? Instead of having 3 completely different threads for one DIY?

Just my thoughts...

[cobrAA]

..Whatever. it's a hell of DIY!! Very nice.. If i had money I would do that. It still an expensive mods ( buying audi projector,good paint, and scraping the HID H3c kit I bought..+ buying a new H7 HID kit..+ times)

Good imagination!!

[MR666]

I'm new to posting threads. When I posted, the limit was 10,000 charactors and I had 29,000. I didn't know you could just reply and post another 10,000. I'll try that next time. Thanks
.
.
Also this mod is far cheaper than what some places are charging to mod your lights or at least you get to keep your original look and not have HONDA lights in it.

[CanadianGTR]

I merged your threads and cleaned things up a bit, let me know if anything is missing.

Killer DIY, I love seeing guys who aren't afraid to take on projects like this.
Keep up the good work.

[MR666]

At one point right in the beginning I thought I was going to have to junk the headlight and buy another one. There was no way I could make the Audi light fit into any part of the hacked up OEM projector. As this is how all the other conversions on the web did them. I had to come up with a projector holder of my own. I actually started to panic over what this screw up was going to cost me and then having to deal with the wife ( Finance Minister ). But I decide to fabricate a ring on the fly and try and keep it as symmetrical and similar to the OEM geometry as possible. As I got further into the project it was all coming together nicely and I was then feeling quite confident about the whole thing.

[MR666]

Right now there is another pair of Audi A6 projectors up on eBay.

http://cgi.ebay.ca/Audi-A6-RS6-Bi-Xenon-HID-OEM-Hella-D2S-3-Projectors_W0QQitemZ380125816833QQcmdZViewItemQQptZMotors_Car_Truck_Parts_Accessories?hash=item588143a801&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=65%3A12%7C66%3A2%7C39%3A1%7C72%3A1215%7C293%3A1%7C294%3A50

Godd Luck

[Shaw]

NIce job you did there but we need a night time picture of them

[MR666]

The pictures really don't turn out but the devil eyes look good