I know everyone is doing headlight mods, especially IronMan... so I decided to go a slightly different route and create a light rod project. I was looking at the BMW 5 series and the light rods they have in the tail lights and in the head lights that wrap around the top. The new Cadillac CTS has one of these light bars going vertically down the front and rear lights.

So here's my little project:

The thing I have to stress the most is that the bar isnt as bright as shown in the pics. Anytime you take a pic of a light source it makes it brighter.So here they are:


Nice and baked,

Back of the headlight housing, need to remove 3 screws to pop it from the lens


Using a sample piece of the 1/2" rod to see how much to notch the housing. This was VERY tedious!


Notching to allow the rod to sit behind the housing. This required going back and forth to make sure it was a perfect fit. Otherwise the hole would be too big and look stupid.


Notched all the way and you can see through it.


Slide the rod into notched side first, used a heat gun to bend it, then marked where I wanted the 2nd bend to go. Took the heat gun and bent the rod into the second hole.


Testing with a 9v battery. I used a 10mm LED with a 3.4v input. I used 330 ohm resistors PER LED, which LEDCalc.com said to use fore 2 LEDS in series, but i didnt want to chance it. So this may be why they are not as bright.


Taped the wires down. I had to notch the projector shroud as I have the AFS lighting, so when the shroud turns it would hit the LED back. I filed down and notched both LED and shroud.


This side was ok, plenty of room for wires etc.


Taped the wires to the fog wires because they were internal and already sealed. Turns out after I installed the lights and tested, It doesnt look good when the projectors are on since you cant see it. So I drilled two 1/16th holes and routed the wires through the fog light cover and sealed it. Now lights come on with city light.


Wires attached. This means next time i want the lens off I need to cut the wires...


While I had everything opened I changed from flat black to this great metallic blue. I've painted my amp and sub shroud with this color combo too.


Note, I also painted the fog "bullet" blue to match


City lights on! I like the look, but is only good for shows... not bright enough otherwise.



Clearer pic

those lines were created by hand. I used an xacto knife and sliced the rod every 1/4" along and made sure to cut at least half of the circumfrence. This is because when you walk up to the light, if you dont cut all far enough, you can see where it stops. hard to explain without seeing in person.



other side.

My other project! The genesis to the headlight project! Lighting the cupholders!


The bottles do light up pretty well


Spent some time on these!

 

it's pretty cool! nice and subtle when it's lit

 

Very nice...love the cupholder mod too...Does it light up when driving? Also, how did u hook it up to the battery?

 

whoah im really digging the cupholder mod.. nice headlight mod also.. very interesting

 

wow very nice!! dont think anyone has done that before.

 

Note that the cupholder has an insert, and that is what I drilled into. I then drilled into the center consol, ran the wires directly down and tapped into the cigarette lighter wires which are right there. This was a BITCH, because i didnt have much room to solder and they connection kept coming undone. The light is on all the time... so if i close the cupholder top, it will block the light.

 

+1 for being unique and different

 

Needs moar amberlamps.

Looks good!

 

mod fails without amberlamps...

/thread

 

^haha looks clean love the cup holder too never thought about that before

 

Nice mod. Interesting

 

good to see people are being more innovative with their ideas. good work man i wish i was talented enough to do stuff like this haha