Low Beams

[dcresci]

Hi, I have 1993 SC300, 125,000 miles. My low beams are horrible. Is there an easy fix to this that I can do myself?

[Psicks]

Not trying to be a !Removed! but have you tried new bulbs?

[dcresci]

No problem, any bulb you recommend that would fit and give better light?

[J.Wills]

You may want to either try cleaning the front lenses or replace the whole thing...SC 400 are notorious for getting cloudy/foggy headlights and can affect the lighting coming from your headlights. I recently replaced mine and not only is the lighting better it looks way better too...

You can also try getting some brighter bulbs or halogens...cost a lot more but the ice blue lights look great! you can probably find a nice set up for around $250-350

Cost: $250 per headlight brand new (E-Bay)

see pics...

[dcresci]

Looks great...thx for the info.

[gcrookston]

McGuire's sells a polishing kit that works well with a drill. I used it on my '95 when I bought it earlier this year. Made the lenses clear as new...

[Graham]

I had great experience with the 3m headlight cleaning kit.

The lights question is tricky.

The projectors are set up for regular halogens and you should

not use them with xenon-ballast retrofit. There's a website

that describes changing the projector lenses from a BMW

to fix this.

I stuck with halogens and found the regular sylvannia oems

Are the best overall. Silverstars ultras and PIAAs die after 6 mos.

The yellow light offers better visibility than the carshow ice blues

this is covered on that BMW enthusiast site I mentioned

(on the iPod so can't paste in the bookmark)

[Graham]

Over at club lexus they have an HID conversion from the Acura TSX:

http://clublexus.com/forums/lighting/18590...projectors.html

Here's a writeup of what to think about and what can go wrong...

http://faqlight.carpassion.info/retro-vs-oem.htm

And here's a table of other conversions, gives some insight to what can go wrong as well.

http://faqlight.carpassion.info/car-tested-retro.htm

I can't find the lexus forum link that talked about BMW retrofit lenses... but the Acura TSX retrofit seemed to work above.

Good luck and keep us posted if you retrofit!

[Graham]

One more link... the complete DIY projector cleaning/refinishing (cheapest and quickest way to get back your visibility)...

http://www.clublexus.com/forums/sc-400-300...efinishing.html

Remember, halogen light output will drop 50% long before the light actually "goes out." Winter's coming, it's a good time to replace things.

[Hawkman]

I have to disagree on HIDs not working well with the SC's stock housing/lens. I've got HIDs on mine and I think they're great. Going on almost 2 years now. I lowered the beam so as not to blind oncoming cars. No halogen bulb can compare.

Ebay's got them for like $75 now...maybe less.