1StGenCL

Has anyone made these? How do you think they would look. I saw a honda accord with them today and then look pretty good. He said he took his lights apart and painted them Could we do this?

CL-Z

Shouldn't be too hard.

I did it to my brother's 2001 Civic.

I can post a pic tomorrow.

RidinLow

I hope you don't mean that you want to paint the reflectors black too.

1StGenCL

No i dont want to hurt the light output but i heard it doesnt if you paint the right parts

CL-Z

The chrome surround trim can be painted. It is a seperate piece than the reflectors.

Kiljaedoen

paint yor head lights black? That sounds crazy bad for the light output. How does this work? im lost

CLpower

i'm planning on doing it..but i'm gonna do it in black chrome so i don't lose to much reflection

1StGenCL

Cool i kind of figured you might have thought of it since you wanted to black out your crome around the windows and stuff. Did you ever do your grill? When do you think you'll do the lights and i probably dont have to ask but can you post pics? Oh instuctions would be nice too

CLpower

haven't done the grill yet..i've been to busy w/ other shit...i'll hopefully paint them soon. I"m actually looking for an extra right headlight cause mine is fucked up

Kiljaedoen

Are you guys talkin about painting the reflective stuff in side the housing?

ThreePointZeroCL

if anyone has done this, plz post up a pic or two TIA

CL-Z

Okay! I took a pic last!!

I did this to my brother's 2001 Civic...

CLpower

there was a teg in super street about 2 years ago that had CL lights painted black...looked sick

CL-Z

Yeah! Someone with a black or silver CL should do it!!

BTW.........I did it the cheap way too, spray paint.

Hey CASPER you should do yours white!!!

1StGenCL

Hey i have a black CL and def. want to do it. What do i need? Spray paint, certain kinda and should i get glossy,flat, what? How do i remove the headlights? Then i heard you put them in the oven at 350 for 2-4 minutes Correct? Gently pry the lens from the casing and then what do i paint and mask off. Let it dry and then put a bead of silicon around the casing and put the lenses in place and apply another bead when dry? This shouldnt hurt the headlight performance either right? sorry for all the questions just dont want to screw up any help would be greatly appreciated Oh good job on the civic CL-Z

CL-Z

Thanks!!

This is what I did.
Keep in mind that you will need a full day to do this. It takes approx. 1-1/2 just to disassemble and reassemble each light. Then there's the painting part.

Tool & supplies:

(2) flat head screwdrivers
utility knife
exacto knife
heat gun or hair drier
masking tape
grey spray primer
semi-gloss black spray paint

* Remove the headlight(s) from the vehicle.

* carefully remove the bulbs and set aside and take the headlight cluster(s) inside (since it takes a while, I did it in front of the TV)

* the plastic lense is held onto the body w/ a silicon type adhesive. Pick a starting point and heat up the seam with the heat gun/hair drier (if you use a heat gun be very careful, it can easily get too hot and you will melt something. You are attempting to make the adhesive soft. Stick a screwdriver into the seam and gently pry, go very slowly it is easy to bend or crack the housing. Once you get it started it will get a little easier. Sometimes the adhive will stretch away with the lense, use the utility knife to cut it. There may be 6 or 7 looped tabs that fold over another tab on the lense, just push the loop off with the screwdriver. Once you get the whole lense off, set it aside.

* the chrome surround piece should unscrew from the rest of the housing (I am not to certain of this b/c I have not taken apart a CL light......yet, I've only done 3 99-2000 civics and one 2001 civic)

* once the surround is seperated from the housing you may have to tape off and reflector areas that are attached to it (I had to tape off the small circular areas behind the parking/signal bulbs on the 2001 civic) just apply th masking tape and only press it on tight where the paint will stop. I applied the tape over the edge of the reflector(s) and used the exacto knife to trim it with more precision.

* once the surround is taped up you are ready to prime it. Since the plastic has a chrome foil coating, paint and primer does not like to stick to it. Apply extremely light coats of primer. The first 2 or 3 should hardly change the color. The primer like to bead up so apply the coat very thinly. DO NOT sand the surround, it will cause the foil to peel off. Continue to ad primer until the whole piece is grey.

* Start painting with the black (or whatever color you want) paint. You can apply this with regular coats since it will adhere well to the primer, but it's still best to add thin coats. Also note that you do not need a lot of paint on these parts, they will be in a sealed enviornments and won't chip or anything, so just put enough on them to make them black (or whatever color).

* Carefully remove any tape from the surround. Once again I used the exacto knife to cut around the edge of the tape this will help seperate the tape from the paint (at first I just started pulling the tape off and it started to peel a little of the chrome off)

* Now it's time to reassemble the light, remember to allow the paint to dry thoroughly before reassembling the lights, the fumes from the drying paint can fog the lense(s). Put the surround back into the housing and screw it back in place. Try not to touch visable spots (fingerprints show up good on black) Becarful not to bump the lense into the newly paint surround, for some reason the paint clings to the lense platic and it will peel right off (I did that too, had to repaint a small spot on one of them) Using the heat gun/hair drier re heat the adhiesive and squeeze the lense back onto the housing.

* Put the light bulbs back in and put the light back on the car

* take pics to post for everyone else to see!


I hope that wasn't too confusing, if you need further clarification just ask, post or email!

GOOD LUCK!!!!

1StGenCL

Thanks CL-Z. Does this hurt headlight perfomance. I hope they look good when i do them. I cant wait but im going to have to cause im not sure when i am going home and i dont want to rip my car apart at school Anyone know how to rip the headlight out? If it involves removing the bumper forget it.

CL-Z

Not sure for the CL about the bumper removal. On both the 5th & 6th gen Civic I had to remove the bumper cover. But it was really easy.

As far a performance there is no difference. The parabolic reflective area is what aim the light beam down the road. DON'T PAINT THAT! The only difference is when the lights are on at night and you are looking at the headlights, the lense area is not as shiny. Now it looks like the light beam shoots out of the housing...............I don't think that made much sense........sorry.

[ 08-31-2001: Message edited by: CL-Z ]