FWIW I don't care about using gen-yu-wine BMW parts - if something's better, go for it. Hell I'm the guy who built a frame of 4x4s to change out motor mounts on a 928. Just seems hack(saw)ish to cut up a headlight lens when there are many options for truly better lighting, that don't cost a ton.I can't speak for anyone else's reasoning, but in my case I put the TSX retrofit in my headlights and didn't want to counteract the benefit from that by leaving that big, thick, fluted lens in the headlight.
There were inner lenses out there at the time that were smooth, but they weren't available for purchase separate from the light. Making my own lens wasn't a feasible option. Removing it was the 3rd, and cutting a hole it in was the 4th. I explored the options I had to me. At the time, I had extra outer lenses lying around that were damaged from taking rocks or had broken clips, so robbing the inner lenses from them to experiment with wasn't a big deal. I got a glass hole saw bit on eBay for $5 and it took me about 20 minutes to drill the lenses.
Any deviation from stock is a deviation aesthetically, so I did my best to put something in the car I was happy with from a visual standpoint without ruining the functionality of a xenon retrofit. The retrofit is a lot of work. Even just the aiming alone takes a good amount of time. The projector has to be in the correct horizontal, vertical, and rotational position. It has to be secure. It has to be accessible. It has to fit in the housing with enough room for proper adjustment. Fabricating a mounting system that achieves all these things with simple hand tools and hardware store stuff isn't something that can be done in a few minutes. Then, on top of that, you have to make it look pretty.
I personally didn't care for the hole in the lens look, as the edges weren't perfectly clean. I opted for just removing the lenses. But i've seen other guys that pull it off and it can look just fine. Unless you're looking for it, it's doubtful that most people would notice it. And that's half the point of doing it.
People trim the edges of their strut reinforcements so their camber plates have full adjustment range. People trim their bump stops when putting H&R lowering springs on. There's some pretty red neck stuff that's perfectly acceptable within the enthusiast community. Not saying what's right or what's wrong. Just sayin'.
There were inner lenses out there at the time that were smooth, but they weren't available for purchase separate from the light. Making my own lens wasn't a feasible option. Removing it was the 3rd, and cutting a hole it in was the 4th. I explored the options I had to me. At the time, I had extra outer lenses lying around that were damaged from taking rocks or had broken clips, so robbing the inner lenses from them to experiment with wasn't a big deal. I got a glass hole saw bit on eBay for $5 and it took me about 20 minutes to drill the lenses.
Any deviation from stock is a deviation aesthetically, so I did my best to put something in the car I was happy with from a visual standpoint without ruining the functionality of a xenon retrofit. The retrofit is a lot of work. Even just the aiming alone takes a good amount of time. The projector has to be in the correct horizontal, vertical, and rotational position. It has to be secure. It has to be accessible. It has to fit in the housing with enough room for proper adjustment. Fabricating a mounting system that achieves all these things with simple hand tools and hardware store stuff isn't something that can be done in a few minutes. Then, on top of that, you have to make it look pretty.
I personally didn't care for the hole in the lens look, as the edges weren't perfectly clean. I opted for just removing the lenses. But i've seen other guys that pull it off and it can look just fine. Unless you're looking for it, it's doubtful that most people would notice it. And that's half the point of doing it.
People trim the edges of their strut reinforcements so their camber plates have full adjustment range. People trim their bump stops when putting H&R lowering springs on. There's some pretty red neck stuff that's perfectly acceptable within the enthusiast community. Not saying what's right or what's wrong. Just sayin'.
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