Smiley headlight question??

[tomson]

What are differences between smiley headlights and the other ones, are all e30 headlights interchangeable?
ie pre facelift and facelift

All input will be a help

thanks guys

[Brianmoooore]

Difference between smiley and non smiley ellipsoid projector headlamps is the smiley cut out. It was introduced to provide slightly better illumination of the road close to the car.
Think pre faclift and post facelift are interchangeable with a change of connectors, IIRC.

[tomson]

Cheers Brian, when you say "smiley cut out" is that what looks like a black strip inside the headlight in the shape of a smile? Sounds stupid cause it must almost definately be for that reason!!

Thanks
Tom

[Brianmoooore]

Cheers Brian, when you say "smiley cut out" is that what looks like a black strip inside the headlight in the shape of a smile? Sounds stupid cause it must almost definately be for that reason!!

Thanks
Tom

that's where the smiley nickname comes from. The "reflector" in these lights doesn't do anything, except for the parking lamp. The cutout just lets some otherwise wasted light out directly from the lamp onto the road in front of the car.

[tomson]

Thanks Brian!

[Ziggy]

Think pre faclift and post facelift are interchangeable with a change of connectors, IIRC.

And you're not wrong

If you're looking to go from pre-facelift non-projectors to smileys, just make sure you get the plugs for the wiring into the lights too. Easiest way is to just chop the wires off as far back as you can! The wiring's easy - basically you just need to swap the plugs. The pre-facelift uses one plug for 2 of the lights with a common earth (smileys have seperate for full, dipped, side), so you need to provide the right number of earths. It's all really straight forward though & they just bolt straight in. I'm not sure what wiring the non-smiley projectors use, but I'm guessing they'd be a straight swap (in terms of connectors) for one of the other sets - probably the smileys.

[Chris-W]

I'm not sure what wiring the non-smiley projectors use, but I'm guessing they'd be a straight swap (in terms of connectors) for one of the other sets - probably the smileys.

Yep - both facelift sets use the same connectors.