Has anyone bought the projectors off of EBay?! They're for the price of $265 the black housing. I was just wondering if anyone used them like this website did cause I wanna convert from halogen crap to those projectors.

 

Hey guys, I completely ditched this thread lol. A member on here just recently was PMing me about these lights.

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My experience with this setup has been a lengthy ordeal. They have been on for about 6,000 miles. When I first bought the the headlight assemblies I was psyched because they look so good. If you see the pics, they look really good. The angel eyes are a really nice touch and look great when hooked up to your city lights. Separately I bought a H11 HID Kit with built-in resistors, weren't exactly cheap but good quality from experience with same vendor.

1. The built-in resistors did not work on my car, kind of upset I spent a good amount extra for it.
2. The light output was not as bright as an OEM Xenon setup. I compared with my other MINI which is equipped with OEM Xenons.
3. The projector does not have a razor sharp cutoff line like modern OEM projectors but its relatively sharp, can't complain considering the price point for these assemblies.
4. The lights need to be aimed properly or else they will be all cross eyed. You can aim them left & right and up & down. To aim them up & down while they are installed you need a special ratchet.
5. I had the bulb error. I ended up having a NCS coder take off the warning after months of having the stupid warning.
6. The high beams will only work when you hold it down. There is a warning from Spec-D that it only works that way. My installer tried to hook it up like normal so I can click the high beam forward without holding it... but the high beam would fire up randomly one side or not at all. We hooked it up back up like Spec-D recommended and I just dealt with the inconvenience of holding it when needed. It actually wasn't that big of a deal there are only a handful of times that I use the high beams and its usually for a short amount of time anyway. If I lived in the woods or country I'm sure it would be a pain in the ***.

A few weeks ago my passenger side low beam would randomly go on and off. I tried a bunch of different ways with my installer to get them to fire up properly but he said the ballast was faulty. He recommended that I simply get a set of OEM ballasts with bulbs. He said they are WAY more reliable and will be very bright too. We tried out a D1S bulb to see how it would fit in the Spec-D assembly and noticed we would need to make some custom clips to hold the bulb in the lock insert properly. We then tried out a D2S bulb and noticed it dropped right into the fitting but didn't secure. The outer lip of the bulb had some small gaps and we placed small screws to secure them onto the assembly. It worked perfect. He had a set of OEM Audi TT (2000) ballasts and bulbs and he installed them that same day. The light output was DRASTICALLY BETTER than the aftermarket HID kit I had purchased. I couldn't believe how bright they were. I clicked the high beams just to make sure they work properly and SO MUCH brighter too. The high beam was literally 10x better. Then I clicked the forward position high beam and IT WORKED. We were both confused and couldn't believe it. As you can imagine I am a HAPPY CAMPER. I have another MINI with OEM equipped Xenons so when I went home I parked them next to each other and honestly you could not tell the difference in light output. They were both so bright. The cutoff from the projector has sharpened up now, I'm assuming because the light output is much brighter than the aftermarket Xenons I had installed originally. I could have had the OEM D1S MINI ballasts installed but we would have needed to make the custom clips and I just couldn't wait a day or two since I needed the car that weekend. Since everything is working really well right now I do not want to make any changes.

I hope this somewhat helps. I'm not an electrician so unfortunately I can't give you all the details but I can only tell you that the Spec-D headlight assemblies with the D2S xenons has been amazing so far. Very happy.

 

Ok, so I'm not the only one with regret of getting these headlights "love the construction of them, sorta" I think it's because they are blk but the components, super fail!!! What's worse, the "power supply unit" or little square blk box seems to be "cooking" I'm sure that's another major fail!!! I'd like to gut them and have better components installed but it sucks because I could've saved up for the real deal ones lol :-/ oh well add that to the many lessons learned when customizing. At least it's no where near as many marks compared to my yukon "I would say truck but then some would say SUV and so on" but that project has and still is a major head ache :-/

The whole term of "you gotta pay to play" agree but then again the ones that say that really don't have a budge but then I see it as, you pay for what you get. 300 gets you a nice/ok structure but Payless components lmao logic and reality

 

I can't personally speak of the fitment but the projector quality alone produces a horrible beam that I would venture to say is no better if not worse than the factory halogen units when it comes to usable light.

If you buy them then take the extra step to replace the projector units with an oem variant (www.theretrofitsource.com).

 

So basically, remove the projectors from the housing on the eBay ones and plug those in? Sorry I'm not very advanced at electronic things like this.

 

I would agree 125% with all those who regret purchasing these. I bought mine about 10 months ago...
2 new ballasts later...
2 new actual headlights later...
I'm unfortunately still not satisfied.
First, the light would flicker, so protuninglab sent me a new set of ballasts. Then, the infamous high beam issue would happen--where I'd have to hold back to the flash2pass for them to work. Otherwise, it's pitch black... eek! Somehow, I managed with that. But then, the real problem began when I would flick the high beam and the lights would get stuck at the high beam position. As in, when I let go of the flash2pass, it would not go back to low-beam, the lights would stay at high beam. The only solution was to knock the headlights a little bit until the switch moved back into regular or low-beam. Kinda ridiculous. Either way, I STILL managed with all those issues.
But, then... the lights would intermittently turn on and off. It was kind of a luck of the draw, sometimes I'd turn my car on and have both headlights working & sometimes I'd have one working. Then, it became the passenger light that wasn't working. I tried switching ballasts, and still the same issues.
IMHO, not worth the headache.. I hate to reiterate what I've been hearing all along, but you really do have to pay to play. I guess I didn't mind the crap quality, I just at least wanted something that would work :/
Anyway, I've been trying to get a hold of protuninglab for months now and no response. Kinda sketch if u ask me. I'll let y'all know if they respond. But til then, think twice (or even thrice) before u go this route!

 

I think yours were the first ones I saw. What did they run you? And what does CCFL stand for?

And this is what I love about NAM - knife's post affirms that the Spec-D's (unless modified by someone with skills) are iffy at best. Junk at worst and to hear that protuninglab doesn't respond to issues seals it for me.

 

They ran me about $1100.

cold cathode fluorescent lamp (CCFL)

 

Sadly, I agree
Sidenote... but to further prove my point, before you buy them (from protuninglab at least)... call them & have them answer any questions you may have. Protuninglab's number is (per their website) (909)248-3211. If you get an actual human being to answer their phone during regular business hours then I'd be impressed

 

The truth is if I wanted this "type of headlight" the best way to get this look/proper result is by modifying an OEM halogen housing. You can add the angel eye on your own and more importantly you can retrofit a high quality projector.

The only problem with going custom is that is a long process and its fairly expensive, unless you can DIY which is not an option for most people. For the money the Spec-D Headlight Assemblies are not a bad idea because the convenience of not having to do anything but get them installed.

I would love a higher quality projector but the truth is that since I had the D2S setup installed on these assemblies the output is so strong that its not a problem.

 

I'm going to step in here and say that's where you're wrong. Just because they are cheap (making them the 'easiest route') does not automatically make them better then what they're replacing.

The beam emitted from the Spec-D lights is absolutely awful, a factory halogen setup with good bulbs is undoubtedly better in so many ways.

Also, besides the fact that I feel angel-eyes makes the car look like it's owned by a teenager I don't see a single benefit from buying the Spec-D lights unless you simply want an inexpensive base to start a retro-fit from.

Sometimes it takes a few mistakes for someone to understand what a bad decision is before they make it, hopefully I've provided some insight to those that may have not yet caught on.

 

I plan on buying the specD projectors and having this genius electrician put them on since he's done a lot of them and car starters. One I get it to work and everything I'll post on here the pictures.

 

Would love to see the pics can't wait til you get it done.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...v=J3ouIFmpdCY#!

I found this on K2motor's site. Maybe this will help those who try to adjust the SpecD's light output and adjust it to low or high. Good luck. I know this will be helpful when I order these this week.

 

Don't forget that Spec-D headlights are known to yellow extremely fast.

 

Are you talking about the lens of the projector or the halo? Cause if it was the housing plastic part I can just restore it with the restoration kit couldn't I?

 

The housing lens.

Potentially, but why waste your time and money, you're still ending up with sub-par headlights and lenses that will potentially yellow in a matter of months.

When you look at it in the long run, either retro-fitting your factory headlights or buying oem projector headlights would be easier and possibly cheaper.

 

Okay Dark, lets say if I go OEM, I want the black housing and where would I go to buy those assemblies since I don't want to be ripped off. And say if I went with the retrofit, could I use plastidip in the housing to make it black, kind of like a Joey mod. Those are my potential questions.

 

I'm sure there are a few mini sites that can get oem parts for less, sadly I can't point you to any as I haven't had the need to order anything yet. Not sure how much less but they'll still be a hair pricey considering you're getting quality headlights.

Yes, you can use plasti-dip or any high temp paint inside the headlight to black out the chrome.

 

Okay thanks for the information I would have ordered the specD lights tomorrow!

 

To those who did install this, how did you remove the headlight washers?
The OP has the headlight washers but it was not mentioned about through the tread. I did read a few times to see if i missed it, and I do apologize if i did.

 

Looks great! I did a similar retrofit but instead of making new brackets I jb welded a new bracket to the original spec d brackets.

 

Any updates from others who have done this install?

 

I just completed this install and while I get the issues people are having, I didn't have those. I bought an HUD kit that includes wiring to prevent the flickering issue. This wiring can also be modified so that you can keep using the error eliminator AND my high beams work normally. I bought a 35w kit from DDM Tuning. I'll post pictures later once I'm back home. Adjustments are a biatch but otherwise I can't complain. I don't have the cash to buy OEM and they're drastically better than the halogen lights I had before.

 

Just to add, the star plastic bolt comes out of the housing by twisting and pull. (you will see the bulb move up/down by push/pull the star bolt). I was able to adjust up/down by pulling the star nut out and then hold the tiny 4mm bolt end w ViseGrips then tighten the star bolt by hand or with plyers.