LED headlight install

Forum for Infiniti M35 and M45, and Nissan Fuga owners.
User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

i decided to go ahead and do my own led headlights since i was bored here are some pics.











FndMspot
Posts: 110
Joined: Thu Dec 18, 2008 4:18 pm
Car: 2007 M35 Sport

Post

Nice look, can you describe your steps to go with your pictures?

User avatar
mburlison
Posts: 11
Joined: Sun Feb 17, 2008 1:35 pm
Car: 2006 M35 - Stock

Post

After seeing the other thread, I was just waiting for someone to do this. I love the look. Could you post what exact LED strip you used and where you got it? And a few more details on the install would be awesome. Thanks for the pics.

User avatar
wolfM35
Posts: 57
Joined: Mon Mar 03, 2008 6:55 am
Car: 2007 M35 Sport

Post

Looks awesome! How do you switch on/off? Would love if they came on whenever car was starting. Daylight Running Light solution...

Please do post the step by step, where to buy etc.

paigoomein
Posts: 179
Joined: Fri Mar 30, 2007 5:23 am

Post

nice! just like everyone else is asking...

1) where/what did you order (lights, parts, tape, etc)2) detailed instructions on the installation

curious, are these the side-emitting LED strips? are they actually pointed downward so that the light is shining into the housing? it looks also like you were able to put the rubber weather stripping back on too.
Modified by paigoomein at 10:54 AM 12/1/2009

User avatar
fiveliterbeater
Posts: 1501
Joined: Tue Jan 20, 2009 10:57 am
Car: 2006 EVO IX, 2000 Maxima SE,2005 Altima 3.5 SE
Contact:

Post

hey Mex, please shoot some pics of your car from a distance and at night please. i was actually planning on putting some LED strips in the same location as you (too lazy to put them under the light

User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

For install it was pretty easy, I did remove one of the weather strips but realized after some light testing that it wasn't necessary for my set up. If your trying to have an audi look this isnt for you and you would have to remove the weather stripping and place the leds there in order to get that look. There's another thread sayn audi leds, and display every bulb, not the look i wanted. So first all you have to do is save up a lot of money, $25 to be exact lol for Alpena FLEXLED-24 inch, comes from either auto zone or advanced auto parts. They have three colors, blue, red and white, i bought the white ones. Then i purchased some 3M clear, plastic adhesive for about 6 bucks in the section where you can buy epoxy products.

Then you have to drive home and park your car, open the hood and clean the area where you would like the led's. I used a liquid i had left over from painting my grille, its called wax and grease remover, dupli color has the same thing. You may not need that but i choose to make sure it would adhere GOOD. Before i glued the led strip i ran the wires along with the wires for the parking lights since i was tapping into them. Then i applied some glue to the beginning portion of the led closist to the grille then applied pressure, once that dried, which was only about 3 minutes i glued the rest of it on. I wouldnt try to glue the whole thing at once because even though they are flexible it doesnt form to the headlights perfectly.

Once that dried i started surgery on the wires with my handy razor blade/box cutter. Make sure you dont cut to deep, if you feel a difference when ur cutting that means you reached your wires. I cut in a V type pattern to make sure i didnt cut into my wires. If you have a good wire stripper you can use that to make a gap of wire to splice into. Tapped in and then used some electrical tape to protect it. Then test it by turning on your parking lights before moving to the next step. another thing i did was I removed the parking light bulb to make it look better. ( in my opinion)

After that i decided to tape off the plastic to make it look clean and made sure no light was visible except for the front of the housing.. If you look at the pic where u can see the red showing on the led, that's how it would look if you left it alone. Also the red portion is the back of the leds, they are facing towards the car which makes the lights appear the way they do. Another thing to make the wires fit back into the grove, tape off the sides first and then place a piece of tape on top, that makes it look like you havent done anything to your wires. And then move to the next side. Shouldnt take more than 2hrs. It depends on how peculiar you are.

Neway hope this is descriptive enough for you guys.

(sometimes it's better to be a smart assssss then a dumb asssss )

User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

fiveliterbeater wrote:hey Mex, please shoot some pics of your car from a distance and at night please. i was actually planning on putting some LED strips in the same location as you (too lazy to put them under the light
here you go.







here's one with the flash on


User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

now they are

paigoomein
Posts: 179
Joined: Fri Mar 30, 2007 5:23 am

Post

I love the look. I think I prefer this over the individual LED's showing.

the weatherstrip that was original there--is it held by an adhesive as well?

User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

If your asking about the one i took off, then all i did was just use the 3m stuff to put it back on and it worked fine. And if your asking about whats under neath it, seems like super duper double sided tape. took me 30 minutes or so to take it off with goo gone rubbing and scrapping.

User avatar
fiveliterbeater
Posts: 1501
Joined: Tue Jan 20, 2009 10:57 am
Car: 2006 EVO IX, 2000 Maxima SE,2005 Altima 3.5 SE
Contact:

Post

wow bud! i think im gonna do that instead of the Audi LEDs. that looks amazing. i know im being a pain in the a** but can you please shoot one more pic of your car at night with the headlights on as well? please

User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

i tried to but cant get the picture to come out good. It has the headlights really bright. Anyone know how to take pics of headlights?

here's the some i took just for example




User avatar
dvan
Posts: 734
Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 3:27 pm

Post

Depending on your camera, you should be able to put the F-stop/aperture lower (probably around 6) and do a shot with a shutter speed about 2-3 seconds. That should some out decent.

medic35x
Posts: 90
Joined: Wed Sep 23, 2009 5:37 am
Car: 2006 M35x

Post

ya i had the audi leds installed but i wasnt really digging it so i ordered new led strips (not the flat side emitting strips) im going for the "neon tube" look and not the single led look... i will be doing the install within next couple of days. ill take some detailed pics of the install.

paigoomein
Posts: 179
Joined: Fri Mar 30, 2007 5:23 am

Post

perhaps it would work if you had the strips mounted so that the light is pointed downwards into the housing?

User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

it does work but gives it a different light effect. What worked for me was the set up i have displayed here. I think when i tried facing them downward, u could see the led bubs at a certain angle. Either way if your planning to do this just fiddle with it to ur liking. The lights come with a switch to turn them on before u install m, it's like a try me button when inside the package.

paigoomein
Posts: 179
Joined: Fri Mar 30, 2007 5:23 am

Post

hmm, so if I took the side-emitting LED strips and simply mounted it in that groove with the lights shining towards the back, then I'm guessing it'll give it the look of the light tube rather than the individual LED's. sweet.

paigoomein
Posts: 179
Joined: Fri Mar 30, 2007 5:23 am

Post

another question. I didn't find any pics of the Alpena FLEXLED's online, so wanted to ask what they look like. which of the following do they more closely resemble?

http://www.senoled.com/5050-LE...p.jpg

or something more like this?

http://www.senoled.com/335-Pir...p.jpg

User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

i would say it resembles the forst link. and im sure u could find an auto store to Look at them in person. they come in 2strips of leds totaling 24 in.s i also couldnt find a pic for the one i bought

paigoomein
Posts: 179
Joined: Fri Mar 30, 2007 5:23 am

Post

thanks for the info--appreciate the help. I didn't see them in the stores which is why I asked, and I didn't see any pictures of the product itself online.

medic35x
Posts: 90
Joined: Wed Sep 23, 2009 5:37 am
Car: 2006 M35x

Post

hey are they side or top emitting leds? so since they are facing the back which way do the leds shine upwards (side emitting) or shine backwards (top emitting)

also, the last pic of installation? it looks like u put electrical tape over the actual leds? i cant see anything but black tape... just curious because im experimenting with how i want to actually mount the leds.

thx
Modified by medic35x at 11:33 AM 12/5/2009

User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

medic35x wrote:hey are they side or top emitting leds? so since they are facing the back which way do the leds shine upwards (side emitting) or shine backwards (top emitting)

also, the last pic of installation? it looks like u put electrical tape over the actual leds? i cant see anything but black tape... just curious because im experimenting with how i want to actually mount the leds.

thx

Modified by medic35x at 11:33 AM 12/5/2009
I dont know if these are side emiting leds or top. Iwould say top though just because of the way they lay out. Picture it like this

I@II@II@II@II@I

etc,etc thats how they're set up. Mine are mounted against the back part of the headlight housing. The red strip you see on the pic above is the 3m adhesive they come with and could be labeled as the bottom of the leds. Hope this helps

User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

here are some pics i took with my phone








medic35x
Posts: 90
Joined: Wed Sep 23, 2009 5:37 am
Car: 2006 M35x

Post

ok so are the lights shining towards the back of the car or up towards the hood? the actual light beam of the led themself, not the strip. thanks

User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

the light is beaming toward the engine or the back of the car, however u want to put it

User avatar
mexillis
Posts: 2418
Joined: Wed May 27, 2009 2:28 am
Car: M45s
Location: SOVA

Post

paigoomein wrote:thanks for the info--appreciate the help. I didn't see them in the stores which is why I asked, and I didn't see any pictures of the product itself online.
here's what my led's look like for all that are wondering. http://www.v-leds.com/Exterior....html

12 "s on each side was needed for my set up fyi

Menace2Society
Posts: 19
Joined: Sun Nov 15, 2009 5:04 pm

Post

mexillis wrote:
here's what my led's look like for all that are wondering. http://www.v-leds.com/Exterior....html

12 "s on each side was needed for my set up fyi
Hey Mex great set up.... i just purchased a 24inch strip of V-leds and have a few questions.Once i cut the single strip into two 12 in strips, how should i connect another set of wires to it? In other words, after u cut it one (12in) section will not have wires to piggy-back onto the parking light wires... What should i do about this? Thanks, Chris

User avatar
yosM45
Posts: 495
Joined: Fri Jul 25, 2008 12:20 pm
Car: 2006 M45 Sport Twighlight Blue

Post

Menace2Society wrote:Hey Mex great set up.... i just purchased a 24inch strip of V-leds and have a few questions.Once i cut the single strip into two 12 in strips, how should i connect another set of wires to it? In other words, after u cut it one (12in) section will not have wires to piggy-back onto the parking light wires... What should i do about this? Thanks, Chris
Pretty sure you'll need two 12 inch strips.

If cutting 12 inches off a 24 inch strip doesn't lave you the pig tail wires to splice in to the parking light, then it won't work.

You can order from autozone online if you don't have one in your area.

Here's the link to the item number.

http://www.autozone.com/autozo...lpena

User avatar
fiveliterbeater
Posts: 1501
Joined: Tue Jan 20, 2009 10:57 am
Car: 2006 EVO IX, 2000 Maxima SE,2005 Altima 3.5 SE
Contact:

Post

hey Mexillis, do the LED strips come in different kelvin colors (8000k as opposed to 6000k) or just one heat range only?

oh and you bought them at Autozone right?


Return to “Infiniti M35 and M45 Forum”