GenVibe - Community for Pontiac Vibe Enthusiasts

Bare with me here and I will try to upload the pics I took today. On a side note: My car is not Orange! It is "Lava" but in this light looks can be deceiving! Here Goes Nothin.

Before purchase:

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Before any Mods:

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This one is obviously the newly painted grills:

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Just some randome shots:

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closeup of the headlights

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those head lights look really great now im going to have to paint my head lights! how did you get them out?over all the car looks tramindous!

Thanks for the compliments. As for getting them out...that's the tricky part. I took the whole assembly off the car (front bumper and everything) unplugged the headlamps from the housings, Cleaned the assemblies throughly, then "one at a time" I wrapped the assemblies in a big towel and put them in the oven. I BAKED them at 250 degrees for about a half hour each then carefully pulled the pieces apart. After everything was all apart I roughed up the chrome housing painted it Gloss black and let it dry for a few hours. After putting the pieces back together I put them back in the oven to soften the sealant and immediatly compressed the main housings back together making sure that everything sealed up the way it was before I ever touched them. It wasn't the easiest thing in the world and I am sure glad I didn't screw anything up.

Wow...nice work on the headlights! I'd probably end up with "melted plastic surprise" if I tried that.

phxlavavibe nice looking car! I think it would be sweet to paint them the same color as the car, so it would look sorta like the new vette's lights. since i break things when i mod, i would prolly buy a extra set of light housing off ebay or something and mod those

Looks great with the painted grill. I like the headlights with the red. Do you have plans to do the tail lights.

Quote, originally posted by PHXLavaVibe »Thanks for the compliments. As for getting them out...that's the tricky part. I took the whole assembly off the car (front bumper and everything) unplugged the headlamps from the housings, Cleaned the assemblies throughly, then "one at a time" I wrapped the assemblies in a big towel and put them in the oven. I BAKED them at 250 degrees for about a half hour each then carefully pulled the pieces apart. After everything was all apart I roughed up the chrome housing painted it Gloss black and let it dry for a few hours. After putting the pieces back together I put them back in the oven to soften the sealant and immediatly compressed the main housings back together making sure that everything sealed up the way it was before I ever touched them. It wasn't the easiest thing in the world and I am sure glad I didn't screw anything up.Nice work on the headlights, although I'm not sold on the red grille...I'd probably either paint the chrome strip red, or the grilles all black to match the headlights.PS If anyone else is interestred in doing this, you can find a link to the walkthrough I used to "JDM" my headlights at my cardomain page (in sig). Same process.

Yeah i thought about painting the chrome trim as well but I like it better this way...adds a little more contrast. The grills were black to begin with.

pretty gutsy putting them in the oven. glad it worked out. it looks nice

Yeah the red grill actually makes the 05+ fronts look a little bit more OK. Yeah 300 degrees for 15 mintues is a much better route to take when you're baking the ole headlights, well it was for me at least

i agree with painting the headlights the car's color. yours looks good too. however the grill seems like it's not a very close color match. it seems kinda dull too. have you thought about clear coating the? it will bring up brightness and under reflection, it will match the car paint better.

Thanks for the criticisim! It's nice to be noticed once in a while As for the headlights...I could have gone with the same color as the body, but I like/wanted contrast. I am going for a sort of Red/black combo. I love the black headlights and i'm not too sure about having them the same color as the car. Maybe I'll redo them in the future. Anyone have pics of theirs done the same as the body color?Grilles...the pictures don't do them justice. I think I cought them at a bad angle or something. Could be bad lighting or a problem with the camera I used.Anyway, I didn't want them to be the same color as the body (you know...contrast) They are actually an annodized red...very shiny, deep red. They look 200% better in person. It's basically a transparent metallic red over silver/chrome.

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/supp...e=CatFor step-by-step with photos - for headlight painting.Nice job!

ithink you posted the wrong link.