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DIY: E36 $10 City Lights

17K views 31 replies 11 participants last post by  cj.surr 
#1 · (Edited)
I finally got around to making the city lights that I've been waiting to do. There's another DIY on bimmerforums, but it's not very complete at all in the procedure, so I was never too motivated to try it myself. Well, I got bored and frustrated with the other projects on my car, so this DIY is the result.

It turned out to be really easy once I figured out the parts I needed.

-2x 194 bulb sockets - I found them at Autozone, they were labeled as "license plate bulb sockets", $4 each


-2x 194 bulbs - I ordered amber ones from Amazon and they were $4 for a pack of ten. Any 194 bulb will work, and they're pretty common


-large drill bits

-RTV

-butt splices

1. Assemble the bulb and socket
Put them together and you get this:


2. Drill the hole for the socket
I started off thinking that I would make a hole in the highbeam that was the size of the widest part of the socket, but I didn't have any drill bits that big, so I used the biggest one that I had. It was perfectly sized, just about the same diameter as the bulb. This was good because the top of the socket would fit hella flush, without too much space to wiggle around.



3. Install and seal the socket
The bit wasn't quite big enough, so I had to bore it out a little by rotating the bit about the hole until it got big enough so that the bulb just barely fits in. Then, I put some RTV around the edge of the hole to seal the socket. I later found that it was easier and less messy to just put the RTV on the part of the socket that will sit on the hole. That way you don't get any RTV on the bulb while inserting.



Push the bulb in, and it should fit pretty snug. I used some tape on the socket to hold it down while the RTV dried.



4. Wire the light
Once you're done with that, you need to decide how you want to wire them up.

If you want them to come on instead of the parking lights - Cut the wire going to the cornerlight that is for the parking light (not sure which one it is, may require trial and error. It's not the brown one though, obviously). Connect that wire to one of the wires on the city light socket, and ground the other wire from the city light socket.

If you want both parking lights and city lights - You might be able to do a three way splice on the parking light wire, but I'm not sure. You would need to do the same as above, but with a three-way splice instead of just re-routing the wire.

If you don't have foglights, then you can use the foglight wiring. This is what I did, since I don't plan on installing fogs. This is a little easier and you can control the city lights with the fog light button, which is pretty cool.

That's all there is to it. I have some pictures, but my car is stuck in the garage so they aren't that good (Damn ECS :mad:). I love the way they look in person. I might buy some different color bulbs and see how they look for you guys. I'll probably try white and yellow.





Updated pictures:







 
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#5 ·
Exactly how I did mine....


However, I can't remember if I mounted my bulbs in the top or bottom of the headlight. Whichever I did, it matched the true euro ones....
 
#8 · (Edited)
Nice job, although I believe even the French have largely abandoned yellow headlights. :)

What light pattern do you get out of the added 194 bulbs?

Would higher wattage bulbs be the ticket to turn your high-beam position lights into agreeable DRLs? You could dim them down with pulse width modulation when they should serve as position lights.
 
#9 ·
i dig.

however, changing the bubs to a different color or when they burn out will require more rtv and cleaning of the old stuff...:dunno:

i think i would be looking for donor lights from a junkyard just to cut out the bulb fitting and see about attatching it (either by epoxy or melting the plastics together with a soldering iron).

still, :thumbup:

i still like angel eyes though...unfortunately i am not able to do what i thought i would as i do not have the euro style lights. :( (unless anyone knows of a way to cleanly seperate the lens without destroying it)

cj, have you tried using leds for the lights??



df
 
#10 ·
i dig.

however, changing the bubs to a different color or when they burn out will require more rtv and cleaning of the old stuff...:dunno:

i think i would be looking for donor lights from a junkyard just to cut out the bulb fitting and see about attatching it (either by epoxy or melting the plastics together with a soldering iron).

still, :thumbup:

i still like angel eyes though...unfortunately i am not able to do what i thought i would as i do not have the euro style lights. :( (unless anyone knows of a way to cleanly seperate the lens without destroying it)

cj, have you tried using leds for the lights??

df
Put the headlights in your oven at 200* for ten minutes, then separate the lens from the body
 
#11 ·
Nice work. If I find myself bored (unlikely) I might run my angel eyes to an independent switch like I used to have in my E46, and wire these up to the parking lights.
 
#12 ·
I actually wouldn't have to remove the the socket to replace the bulb, because I have these weird plastic headlights that actually have a removable lense :dunno:

But even if I did, I don't really see a problem, since RTV is pretty easy to break, and the sockets are only $4 if something goes wrong.
 
#15 ·
I could just plug the 194 bulbs into the socket where the angel eyes would have connected, but I don't want to heat and remove my lenses and then heat and replace them after the bulbs are in.

And just like Amber's DDM lights, I can't drive with them until I get my new adjusters. The PO had removed the lower ones altogether, and the new lights are "**** hunting" REAL bad without them tilting the housing down. With the adjusters as low as they will go I'm still shooting way too high.
 
#16 ·
:rofl: @ ken...thought you needed a pooch to do that...:rofl:


you mean the plastic lenses don;t warp?? i read about the heating in the oven trick, but then discovered (according to teh interwebz) that this trick will work on the euro lenses but not so much on the domestic.

if so, then i'm in!! i have acrylic rod (3 different diameters) and want to 'play' with some angel eye designs, i have some leds that are beggin to be hooked up.

the only thing is i thought that i'd hafta buy euro lights to separate them, but now i'm just a little concerned about warpage....hmmm...maybe some ebay aftermarket units...:eeps:


df
 
#17 · (Edited)
:rofl: @ ken...thought you needed a pooch to do that...:rofl:

you mean the plastic lenses don;t warp?? i read about the heating in the oven trick, but then discovered (according to teh interwebz) that this trick will work on the euro lenses but not so much on the domestic.

if so, then i'm in!! i have acrylic rod (3 different diameters) and want to 'play' with some angel eye designs, i have some leds that are beggin to be hooked up.

the only thing is i thought that i'd hafta buy euro lights to separate them, but now i'm just a little concerned about warpage....hmmm...maybe some ebay aftermarket units...:eeps:

df
My Miniature Pinscher goes crazy when I drive around the place at night. He thinks he's supposed to follow the lights. When they're pointed into the trees he gets pretty weirded- out :rofl:

I hadn't thought about the heat warping the lenses (or back!) Scratch that!
 
#21 ·
I can't get mine to photograph well either..... :(

Needz bumper mesh dude :p
 
#23 ·
RTV may work, but I used a soldering iron to melt the piece to the bumper. I also tried JB weld for a while before I melted them together...
 
#24 ·
Yeah, I'll be using a soldering iron to weld it.

I just read something on bfc about people wiring angel eyes up to the windshield washer pump harness... Seems weird to me. Apparently that is a way to make them run all the time. I think I'm gonna try that sometime soon for the city lights.
 
#25 ·
Search for Chad's DIY for angel eyes on this forum, there is a hot wire in the fusebox that will run AE's or city lights anytime the key is on. That is how I wired my old angel eyes in the 325i
 
#28 ·
Or just buy a switch from germany, and wire the rear fog button to turn the city lights on and off...:angel:

I like being able to turn mine off, since i have blue lights, orange corners, and yellow fogs, its a bit of a color rainbow with the city lights on :p

looks good CJ, now when you get DEPO's you'll already have 194 bulbs lol
 
#27 ·
You can just put electrical tape on the contacts on the back of the bulb to test it out. Or you could leave them like that (what I did)
 
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