The hallmark of a textbook custom car is something truly handmade, and the headlight retrofit world embodies that spirit. While it may have been popular back in the day to fit another car’s taillights using leadwork to smooth everything over, these days, people are swapping entire projector setups from modern Acura headlights into older headlight housings. The results are striking to say the least.
Retrofitting projector headlight elements into reflector-style housings certainly isn’t anything new. Perhaps one of the most famous (infamous?) common retrofits involved the rather unique projectors from the final Infiniti Q45. The seven lenses on each Q45 projector unit resembled a Gatling gun, and although they weren’t the most effective projectors out there, the name and style stuck simply because of how cool they looked.
Twenty years later, and another Japanese luxury brand is at the forefront of projector swap hotness. See, back in December 2012, Acura unveiled something it likes to call Jewel Eye headlights on the then-new RLX. Essentially, each headlight features an array of LED projectors that each produce precisely metered, aimed, and managed light. From there, the tech spread throughout the Acura lineup, giving headlight enthusiasts a whole array of components to build their dream headlights with.
While swapping dedicated LED projectors into headlight housings is the proper way of giving an older car LED headlights, it’s not for the faint of heart to DIY. To start, modern headlights are either sealed with butyl adhesive, which can be baked soft in an oven, or with stronger stuff that necessitates cutting the lenses off the housings. From there, a significant amount of fabrication is required. The housing itself will likely need to be modified to clear the new projectors, new shrouds will need to be fabricated either through 3D printing or plastic welding to cover up any unsightly gaps, and oh yeah, you’ll have to go through the painstaking process of aiming the projectors correctly.
One of the better demonstrations of a Jewel Eye headlight retrofit comes from YouTuber IT Performance, and man, does it ever look difficult. He claims to have spent more than 40 hours modifying both headlights in his Mitsubishi Eclipse to accept Acura’s arrays, and while the end result looks spectacular, there’s no denying that this probably isn’t a project for beginners.
So, if it’s a pain in the butt modifying headlight housings to accommodate these Jewel Eye headlight elements, why are people doing it, other than that they simply look cool? Well, if you have the OEM headlight ballasts from Acura donor headlights, you actually only need to connect four wires per light to make Jewel Eyes light up. There’s a common ground, one power wire for low beams, one for high beams, and one for daytime running lights. Connect the dots and presto, let there be light.
There are way easier ways to get a sharp, glare-free headlight setup in an older housing, such as a single bi-xenon or LED projector in each housing, but Acura’s Jewel Eyes just look damn cool. Build a setup for a third-generation TL and it looks like a new car. Same with a first-generation TSX.
Plus, if you dig the look but aren’t willing to jump into your own Jewel Eye retrofit head-first, depending on what you drive, specialists are out there to make your dreams come true, so long as you’re willing to splash the cash. DC5 Creations promises built-to-spec Jewel Eye headlight retrofits for several popular Honda and Acura models, and the price tag ranges from $1,800 to $2,000. That’s a lot to spend on an older Honda, but for the truly obsessed, it’s worth it. Talk about a wicked cool OEM Plus upgrade.
Of course, we need to mention that the legality of retrofitting a projector array into a reflector housing is questionable at best. Even though, when done right, the light beam should feature a crisp cut-off that won’t blind other drivers, that headlight housing was only DOT-certified in stock form. So, is this a risk worth taking? Well, that’s up to you to decide. For a show car, I’d say absolutely, because this is one showstopping mod that gets the people going.
(Photo credits: YouTube/IT Performance, Acura, DC5 Creations)
Support our mission of championing car culture by becoming an Official Autopian Member.
-
Here’s Why Geniuses Are Swapping BMW Transmissions Into Everything From Muscle Cars To S2000s
-
Some Geniuses Are Swapping Honda CR-V Parts Into Civics And Going Crazy Fast
-
Some Geniuses Have Figured Out That A Crapload Of Audi Engines Bolt Right Up To Porsche Boxster Transmissions Including A V8
-
Some Geniuses Are Turning Toyota Pickups Into The Perfect Diesel Trucks By Using Refrigerator Engines
-
Some Geniuses Are Turning Old Ford Rangers Into The Perfect Small Trucks By Using Volkswagen Engines
Got a hot tip? Send it to us here. Or check out the stories on our homepage.
photos please. would be nice.
Oh how original another “some Geniuses“ article….
Makes your stuff feel like tick toc life hacks videos..
The lights on that Eclipse are definitely never going to aim correctly. But as a retrofit afficionado I do appreciate the effort.
There are people out there that will spend $2k no problem on a CF intake and engine cover, so that much for something that not only looks cool but actually upgrades your vision at night really isn’t bad.
I’ve been retrofitting headlights since the early 2000s – It was done out of necessity since getting a quality set of HIDs weren’t available in every make/model at that time, and this was a cheap/fun way to get some extra lumens while customizing your ride. Opening the headlights requried baking them in the oven for 10-15 min to soften the glue.. with weird looks from the wife to follow. Now builders use a dremmel tool since glue is more like cement.
What you wont see in these videos is the inevitable moisture issues that are soon to follow the first rainfall or car wash. Some builds were more water tight than others, but once you crack those headlights open its going to happen. Builders stuff silicon packets or drill extra venting holes in there to combat it.
My favorite builds were a set of bi-xenon Acura TLs in my ’06 Hyundai Tucson and TSX in a ’04 R53 Cooper S. In both cases I added a gap to maximize the blue color band at the top of the beam pattern which gave it a beautiful blue flicker when others see you. Good times.
I agree fully. I’ve done a few retrofits over the years, most recently a morimoto hid retrofit into my wife’s 2010 FXT headlights along with black-housing the chrome, and a brand new set of lenses. Worked on it over a whole weekend, and loved it after I got it back together! After all of that, I got to take the lenses right back off a week later after we got some rain and they steamed up.
I ended up drilling a drain hole at the bottom, squeezing another coat of sealant in the seams, and so far (knock on wood) they’ve been good ever since.
One of these days I’ll do the same retrofit in my 23 Crosstrek sport. Unfortunately they didn’t offer my trim with the awesome directional LED headlights, so I was left with lousy halogen reflectors. I’ve seen that one company makes an adapter harness to run them off of the halogen plugs, so I may just go that route with a set off of car-part.com or something.
“beautiful blue flicker when others see you”
I’ve always thought this was kinda tacky tbh.
Popular to mod these on old Accords too
https://www.driveaccord.net/attachments/s-l1600-1-jpg.542518/
https://img.benlevy.com/auto/meet/stayill20200927/img_9016.jpg
This seems like it works best on headlights where the housing matches the shape of the Jewel Eye light array best. The RSX is too large of a housing, and it just has an awkward expanse of black plastic filled in. Something like the Eclipse linked in the video looks great IMO, it fills out the housing nicely while looking clean and modern.
Side note, looking at DC5’s website, now I know why it seems impossible to find a clean mostly stock RSX. Seems like they’ve all become gaudy #StanceNation show car disasters…
Well, this is certainly better than retrofitting those awful aftermarket headlights on older F150s, but that’s just damning with faint praise.
This reminds me of an old C/D column or two where HID units were getting ripped off of cars: https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a15132881/in-new-jersey-they-steal-the-blue-from-your-eyes/
I want to say there was something more specific with the Acura TL, where the 99-01 units would just bolt on to an Accord of the time.
Does the DSM video address the fact they are aimed inwards to be cross-eyed? I aint watching all that. In most applications they probably won’t be aimed correctly.
probably not. they’ll be aimed right into our eyes.
Hearing a RSX referred to as an “Old Car” is like a stake through my elder gen Z heart.
Does it though? *higher register*
Nope, awful, looks like a weird bug.
And, yet, you easily spend $5 at Amazon for a cheap blue tinted LED bulb that flickers and drop into a reflector housing just blind oncoming traffic. This seems like so many extra steps.
I mean to each their own but personally… not my cup of tea lol
Yup. It looks like when guys in the early 2000s would put 18″ Enkei wheels with low profile tires on their 1965 restomod Mustang…It just doesn’t fit the look of era.