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Dealing with retarded headlight design/replacing bulbs

959 views 2 replies 3 participants last post by  FredB 
#1 · (Edited)
As I stated in the discolored headlight thread...I polished my crappy looking lights with a compound...and they came out quite nicely...The other issue I had to deal with...was trying to change the bulbs in a system that looks like its designed to fail ...if you own a first gen...you owe it to yourself to check this out..cause when a headlight bulb fails...you got problems...note the torx head screws on either side if the headlight caspule..these are what you need to remove to change a bulb...lubricate them generously in hopes they will come out when you need them too...if not..this is how I saved my mess. OK...when I tried to change my bulbs..everything was breaking on me..and I found a way to cheat some.....the inside screws (towards center of car) both go down to a threaded insert..pressed inside a plastic ear..and it dont take much to break the insert loose inside the plastic..then I had to use vicegrips and squeeze the plastic around the tab to get the screws out, by the time it was out...the lower tab was dinked...then..I remove the turn signal lights...this allowed me to swing the headlight capsules out...pivoting on the inside screws..to change the bulbs...then...to re-install the capsule..and deal with the broken tabs..I got a small peice of sheet metal....cut it to form a bridge of sorts...to go from the headlight capsule to the original screw hole on the holder...found a self tapping screw that was a nice fit..then...drill another hole in the existing peice of the plastic tab..drill a small hole throught the metal and into the tab..and find a self tapper that fits...if I save 1 person from a disasterous mess that requires new headlight capsules...it was well worth all the typing :))
 
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#2 ·
man sounds like you just had some bad luck with yours. you just have t remember that when dealing with screws that go into plastic you cannot put any downward presure on them or will will mess the threads in the plastic up. i would probly try it this way if i couldnot afford to buy new headlight housings, but my yellow "fog" is inside mine. so polishing wont work. plus i tryied not to put the screws back in too tight when i had the headlights out trying to clean them
 
#3 ·
The problem with the headlight assemblies is the brass insert in the housing that the torx type bolt threads into. The bolt corrodes to the insert because of the dissimlar metals. Had this happen to one headlight on my 95 LHS. Because it was the outside bolt I removed the parking light housing and managed to stop the insert from turning by drilling into the edge of the insert without hitting the bolt. The drill broke off and as luck would have it held the insert in place so I could remove the bolt. I now use anti-sieze on the bolt threads and don't tighten them too much and have no more problems when changing bulbs. Just my 2 cents.

FredB
 
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