What did you do to / for your E53 today??

[e30cabrio]

Looks great!

[Joshdub]

Those look great!

[Jungerishere]

Very nice...

[crystalworks]

Originally Posted by Ricky Bobby

And another huge thanks to Phil @ Detailers Domain for the wrapping of the new lenses in Xpel Ultimate for long term protection

What AE's are those? Look like CCFL rings in the pics... and did you buy new headlights to retrofit or were you able to find new lenses? Didn't think they sold replacement lenses like they do for e46, e39, e83, etc.

Oh, and ring sizes? LOL, you are right it will really cut years off the truck. The dull stock AE's on mine are driving me insane.

[powers1]

Originally Posted by Ricky Bobby

Big reveal is coming next week. I have the ABS module sent out for repair so no sense in putting the headlights back on only to take it out again in a few days.

HUGE THANK YOU to Caesar and Rich at Lightwerkz for putting everything together for me on a day off of work, my lights came out beautiful and now I don't feel like my X is 12 yrs old anymore.

Hi Jay,
Excellent!Looks great!Like the way you dremeled the turn signal transparent cover,looks much neater .Nice work ,mate

[Ricky Bobby]

Originally Posted by crystalworks

What AE's are those? Look like CCFL rings in the pics... and did you buy new headlights to retrofit or were you able to find new lenses? Didn't think they sold replacement lenses like they do for e46, e39, e83, etc.

Oh, and ring sizes? LOL, you are right it will really cut years off the truck. The dull stock AE's on mine are driving me insane.

For your facelift housings you either need to have about a weekend worth of patience to open the permasealed housing without cutting it open, or cut it open and hope you can re-seal it properly. You won't get brighter rings unless opening and replacing with Umnitza, its the optics of the facelift rings that stop you.

These are PRE FACELIFT, aftermarket housings btw, although they look like facelift housings. They are discontinued by Spyder from what I have heard, are made for halogen equipped cars, but come with a projector mount that is made for the stock xenon projector. Fernando, btw that turn signal was untouched, it is how it came from the factory (see link below for another example of these housings).

They are NOT CCFL, although CCFL rings came installed on the housings from the factory. They were removed and I sourced SMD LED ring replacements from Aliexpress, and these are AT LEAST 2-3 times brighter than the CCFL, and I paid under $50 for the set, with included resistors for long life of the LED rings. My retrofitter said they looked like very good construction, no issues with quality. The sizes for a perfect fit on mine were a 146mm semi-circle ring, and 125mm full circle ring for low beam.

I also had EvoXR projectors installed instead of the factory Hella E39 projector, which alone will give me a ton more light on the road.

So basically I accomplished my goal which was to have a better looking housing than the Depo E53 solution, but the same brightness and reliable LED rings, as well as superior lighting from the projectors (the Depo projector from the factory is a downgrade from the stock E53 projector)

EDIT: There is a chrome set of my housings on Ebay now (you would have to just spray the chrome shroud with flat black paint while the housings were open), $242 shipped:

2001 2003 BMW E53 x5 Halo Projector Headlights Lamp Head Lights Set Left Right | eBay


When they are reinstalled I will make a thread with better pics installed so all can see the look on the car, and run down the total project upgrade list.

[e28jay]

Put in a new fuel pump last night and took it her out for a test drive.

[mam4.6]

Originally Posted by Ricky Bobby

Big reveal is coming next week. I have the ABS module sent out for repair so no sense in putting the headlights back on only to take it out again in a few days.

HUGE THANK YOU to Caesar and Rich at Lightwerkz for putting everything together for me on a day off of work, my lights came out beautiful and now I don't feel like my X is 12 yrs old anymore.

WOW, Jay!! Just perfect..! Can't wait to see those babies installed. You'll love the updated look, and won't ever want to be without EVO-XR projectors again!

[crystalworks]

Thanks for the info RB. I was fooled into thinking they were facelift housings... can't see the side of the housings.

Looks great, and that info should help other pre-facelifters decide on what they want to do with their headlights.

I'll be baking my permaseal headlights open, but my lenses suck... so I might have to buy another set just to get new lenses.

[beamertruck]

getting new taillights, exhaust, got spacers to get more ride height and well as offset. Gonna mount 20 inch ATX Artillery rims with wrangler duratracs or i'll stick with nitto terra grapplers. Got the Rigid LED pods wired to a hidden switch, for the exhaust I got the X-Pipe running straight back to flowmaster 44s. The whole engine I going to be rebuilt, new rockers, new valve guides, springs, head gaskets, valve covers, timing chain, and guides. Just pulled trans to rebuild that as well. got skid plates fabbed for the undercarriage. Last thing is going to be to swap the tcase to make it a true 4X4