Bi Xenon Retrofit on a pregen

[choneofakind]

Hey all,

I finally got around to doing this project on my bike. I really like it and I would like to share it since I've gotten some interest on it, so here's a rough write-up on how I did my retrofit.

To start out, let's go over a quick list of things you'll need:

• H4 hi/lo HID kit from DDM tuning. Discard the bulb. This harness has everything you need to run an HID bulb and control a solenoid with the high beam switch. Everything is plug and play with this bad boy.
• A basic projector off fleabay (or wherever) Mine appears to be a knock-off of the Morimoto Mini
• A 35W D2S bulb in the color of your choosing. I chose 4300k because it's very white, only hint of blue is around the edges. I figure that gives me good light output without attracting too much blue-headlight-attention
• a D2S adapter like this one to power the D2S bulb with the HID kit
• Whatever fancy LED's that you want (optional)
• a dremel tool
• a number 2 phillips screw driver
• a standard length flat head screw driver with a nice wide blade
• a hammer
• a heat gun or a good hair dryer. Both work.
• a cardboard box big enough to fit the headlight in
• a utility knife
• spray paint of your choice (optional)
• a file will be handy
• a spare headlight if you want it
• some idea of how to wire in an HID kit. (peruse one of the other 1000 threads online)

Okay, now for the how-to.

First, take off the fairings from your pregen. I'm not going to go over this because it's pretty simple. You should know how to do this anyways.

Right now, your bike looks something like this:


Take off the headlight as well. There's 4 bolts on it. Just take off the bolts and unplug it.

Now get into that HID kit. You should have a few pieces here. The harness:


The ballast and ignitor:


and the bulb:

put the bulb somewhere safe and out of reach so you aren't tempted to put it in the headlight and blind people. I suggest the circular file

This is where I won't be too specific, this step is just an HID install, it's not super hard, and there's tons of write-ups about it all over the web and youtube:

For the harness, you only need one of the connectors. This kit is meant for a car with 2 headlights and they sent it with one ballast as a "motorcycle kit". Ha. Anyhow, you can either cut off the one with longer wire, or do what I did; coil it up, keep it contained with a ziptie, and stick it in that nice little spot between the battery box and the undertail. It fits there perfectly.

Next, you want to lengthen the hot wire that will go to your battery. I found it was easier to lengthen that and hide the electronics up front than to lengthen the multiple wires in the black cord. To lengthen the hot wire, I used about 14" of 14 gauge (the wire is 16. Larger gauge won't hurt anything, smaller gauge is a bad idea) and soldered that into the hot wire. Don't be lazy here; solder and shrink-wrap.

Now get your harness installed, run the wire the hot wire up under the tank and stuff the electronics up front. Zip Ties are your friend here. I used a few to get the ballast stuck to the frame about here. It tucks nicely up in front of the tank:


Now make all your connections with the harness. In front in this picture is the power from the harness to the ballast, and in the background is the input from the factory headlight plug. In the bottom left, you'll see the connector that controls the solenoid that gives you high/low beam control. For now that shouldn't be connected to anything, so just leave it dangling for later:


You'll also need to loosen one of the bolts from the birdcage and use it as a ground. Just slide the ground in and tighten it up again. All good there. The harness is installed.

Next we're on to the projector retrofit!

Take off those 3 metal clips with your flat head screw driver. Take off the rubber boot. Keep both for later.

To get the headlight apart, hack a hole in top of your cardboard box with a utility knife that is big enough to sit your hair dryer in. Make another hole about the size of a quarter in a bottom corner of the box. This will be your vent hole. Put your headlight in the box, put the hair dryer in the top hole, and put it on high temp, low fan speed, and leave it there for about 10 minutes. Use a towel to seal the the dryer in the top of the box; this is why there's a vent hole. If you use a heat gun, don't seal it, and keep an eye on it. You want to heat the entire housing, not totally cook it and ruin it. Heat guns get really hot.

Now use the screw driver to pry the lens off. Again, there's plenty of videos on youtube about this, so I won't go into detail. Just be careful, don't crack the glass, and be prepared to burn yourself at least once.

After you get the lens off, use the phillips head screw driver to back the adjusters out the whole way, and then pop the reflector off of the ball and socket joint at the top right corner. You now should have a reflector, a lens, and a housing that are all separate. Take a dremel to the little tab that secures the standard halogen bulb. It is no longer needed.

At this point, there's 2 things you'll want to do. 1) take your hammer and bend the tabs back on the H4 mounting things. This will make more space for the mounting rings on the projector. It will look like this:


and 2) you'll want to take your file and file off the nub on the H4 mounting plate that comes with the projector. This is to keep the projector from spinning which is good, but the pregen H4 bracket is angled so the left side of the cut-off is higher than the right, effectively blinding people. File that nub so you can get the cut-off level. I also filed the edges of the mounting ring because it was kinda sharp on the corners and was catching on the H4 bracket/cutting my fingers.

Take your dremel and make a hole in the oem reflector, just below the mounting hole. This is what you will run your solenoid wires and LED wires out of so they don't show from the front.

Now is the time for painting. Let it dry for a long time. Mine dried for 48 hours to make sure I didn't leave paint vapors in the headlight. Install the projector onto the oem reflector using the H4 mounting plate and the mounting ring. Make it snug enough so the projector doesn't wobble, and doesn't rotate once you get it level with the bottom of the oem reflector plate.

This is also the time for LED fun time. I used JB weld 2-part epoxy to secure my halo to the projector shroud. I chose this because it is okay up to 600 degrees F, it sticks to anything, and it does not conduct electricity. This ring is why I painted my shroud white. It blends right in.

You will now have something that looks like this:


Now you'll want to install it back into the housing. This means snap the ball and socket joint back in, and then screw the adjusters back in until the reflector is lined up with the housing (pointing forward, not right or left) and relatively level with the housing as well (midway between up and down).

It will look like this from the front:

and this from the back (same picture as used already):


Now you'll want to place the lens back on, and stick the whole assembly in the cardboard box setup again. 5 minutes to heat it up again, and the press the lens back into place. Stick the little metal clips back on, and let the whole thing cool back down.

Get the rubber boot that you took off earlier. Use your utility knife to trim some of it off so that it seals around your D2S adapter. Install the D2S bulb and adapter so that the adapter facing the right (not the left like my picture) and put the rubber boot back on, carefully running the LED wires and the high beam control wires out as well. It will look like this:


note:
I trimmed the outside bundling off the D2S adapter so that there was only an inch or so of it left. This gave me 2 power wires that are more flexible. It made it easier to get them to meet with the wiring harness without stressing the connectors.

Here's me testing the LED halo. For some reason, the bottom 3 decided not to work, but I like how it looks. They are all very white, no hint of blue like my later picture will show:


Now just re-install the headlight, plug in the bulb with those 2 connectors on the harness, and plug in the high beam solenoid. Everything should be operational. Put on your fairings and enjoy.

Here's pictures of mine once I got everything installed:



no glare on low beam:


high beam:


note the lawn mower battery on the side. I drained my battery playing with the headlight and didn't want to wait for the charger, so i jumped it

Finally, as you know, the headlight of the pregen is fluted on the inside, as seen here:


unfortunately this does affect output a little. The good thing is, it doesn't make glare or ruin the ability of the high vs low beam.

This is the projector doing its thing without the lens:



And here it is with the lens on. Notice that the cut off is still in tact; it's still clean, but it's not nearly as sharp as before. The light on the garage door is not glare, it is soft light. Trust me, I can look at it all day as long as I'm looking at it from above the cut off:



Compare the projector behind the fluted lens to the HID kit in the oem reflector with vinyl to cut glare. Much better! The oem reflector just doesn't do the trick. The light has some bad hot spots and there's lots of glare off to the sides:


Overall, this is a great mod. The light output is tons better. There is not nasty glare off to the sides like with the oem reflector, and the oncoming drivers are not blinded. The light output is very wide, I can see the whole road, and the high beam makes a nice arc up into the trees and oncoming road. I really like this. I'm not finished with the wiring yet. I plan to make the halo my running light, and have an a handlebar switch that will flip between the headlight and halo.

[choneofakind]

I'm done writing for now, Just let me know if you see any glaring (see what I did there??) spelling/grammar mistakes or if there's anything that I missed that makes this confusing.

[alex.s]

i used the bmw mini-cooper bixenon projector and hid/ballast and its great.

[Alex]

Nice!

[choneofakind]

Originally Posted by alex.s

i used the bmw mini-cooper bixenon projector and hid/ballast and its great.

alex, I wanted to use factory components, but the install for my setup was too easy. I already had the DDM kit and the projector was like $30. I've read good things about the Mini Cooper projectors though.

[alex.s]

you have oversized big-toe nails. so do i. i've been told only about 10% of the population has them. congratulations.

[choneofakind]

I what?? those are normal darn it!

and thank you for not pointing out my bad looking toes. I've got big calluses from running and soccer, and the second toe on my left foot has been broken during soccer, so it's bad looking.

[csmith12]

Nice write up Chone but that isn't gunna crash well at the track. ijs....

[cerberusrex25]

If that were red, it would look like a Zaku's Mono eye, I dig it.

[choneofakind]

Chris,

For track I'll take out the headlight, get one of those headlight replacement panels from airtech streamlining and glue it to the extra headlight housing that I have. The rest is all wiring and should be protected fine by my fairings. That should work right? I mean there's already a full EFI system on there too

If I damage it worse than cosmetically, it's not gonna be pretty any way you look at it haha. But I have a car so it's not the end of the world.

http://www.airtech-streamlining.com/...8-06.htm#price

[csmith12]

There you go!

[siebadn]

I am slightly concerned by the random huge hole in the garage floor!

[choneofakind]

That's our sump pump well. No one has fallen into it and gotten eaten by the lock ness monster...


yet.

[nickjpass]

Nice post a+ ebayer would buy from again.

[Motofool]

Originally Posted by choneofakind

I'm done writing for now, Just let me know if you see any glaring (see what I did there??) spelling/grammar mistakes or if there's anything that I missed that makes this confusing.

Many thanks for this, Chris.

The projector retrofit is a little confusing to me, who has never done anything like this.

What is this for?:
"A basic projector off fleabay (or wherever)"

"Now is the time for painting".......what?

"to secure my halo to the projector shroud." Any angle or position?

Cost of parts?

Time estimate?

[choneofakind]

Hmm, let's see here. I'll answer here, and then go edit my post later if my answers help

Originally Posted by Motofool

What is this for?:
"A basic projector off fleabay (or wherever)"

That's what is used to control the HID bulb. It is designed to keep the bulb in the focus of the reflector bulb (think foci of an ellipse), similar to the halogen reflector.It also has a little cut-off gate that flips up and down to control the "high" beam. It is what makes bi-xenon without glare possible.

Originally Posted by Motofool

"Now is the time for painting".......what?

I painted the OEM reflector and the shroud that came with the bi-xenon projector. Paint is optional, I just did it because I like the look.

Originally Posted by Motofool

"to secure my halo to the projector shroud." Any angle or position?

I just attached it to the front of the shroud because I wanted a halo around my projector. This step also isn't necessary, and you can use any kind of LED's that you want. Or not. Up to you.

Originally Posted by Motofool

Cost of parts?

The DDM kit was about $50. The Projector was about $30. I'd say the other parts and shipping brought it to right around $100, not including the spare headlight. Including the spare headlight, it was about $130.

Originally Posted by Motofool

Time estimate?

The DDM harness was already installed. That alone took about 2 hours from taking the fairings off to riding off. YMMV, but I bet it would be faster without taking pictures and figuring it out as you go like I did.

Getting the headlight apart took about 30 minutes total, including convincing my lovely GF to loan me her overpowered hair dryer

Paint took 48 hours to dry. JB weld sat for about 12 hours to dry.

Install and picture/play time took about 45 minutes.

Overall with planning ahead of time, I had it done in a few days. I started Saturday that I got back for break, and was out riding by Tuesday. Definitely plan this one for the off-season so you don't waste riding weather like I did.

[Motofool]

More than helpful,........even I can understand now.

The first question, however............may be some basic dimensions, shape, hole for bulb, etc.?

Now that you have it done, I would include cost and time.

This is going to help many riders, including myself, to improve the night view.

Again, thanks.

[choneofakind]

For dimensions, check out the ebay listing of the projector I bought. I think this is similar in size to the Morimoto Mini Projector sold by TheRetrofitSource, but I'm not sure because I've never seen a Morimoto Mini in person.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/2-5-HID-BI-X...#ht_6221wt_952


One thing I should mention and I definitely need to put in my write-up: My tail is raised a good bit and my nose is dropped a little. I also don't weigh a lot, so the rear doesn't sag much. As such, I need to aim the headlight up quite far. I found that I need to aim it up so far that the projector touches the inside of the lens. I adjusted the headlight brackets a little so it would aim higher and that solved my issue. However, most bikes aren't modified like mine is, so you should have no aiming issues with this at all. The solution would be to make a mounting plate that replaces the oem reflector (like what Tri did in his newgen retrofit) that holds the projector back further. I just got lazy and was happy with it as is. If you're wondering what my adjustment method was, it consisted of a little hammer tap on a screw driver to push the bottom bolt hole back a few mm It's still nice and sturdy

I'll be sure to edit my post later on with some of this info. Thanks for getting me thinking on the revisions Hernan.

[CZroe]

I always wondered if the Ventura headlight protector could be used as a clear lens replacement but the British guy who had some new-old stock finally sold out:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/KAWASAKI-ZZR...p2047675.l2557

[choneofakind]

I looks like it's a protector that goes over the lens, not a lens replacement.

Seriously though, if you can find a clear lens that for sure fits this headlight, please let me know. I'll buy one.

[CZroe]

Originally Posted by choneofakind

I looks like it's a protector that goes over the lens, not a lens replacement.

Seriously though, if you can find a clear lens that for sure fits this headlight, please let me know. I'll buy one.

I know, but it seems that you might be able to use it anyway after removing the original lens. It might have to mount to the fairing instead. It can obviously take the heat.

[choneofakind]

After some reading on HIDplanet, I think I want to make some foreground limiters to make the distance vision a little better because I noticed that my foreground was a bit overpowering.

I might also attempt a mounting plate for kicks and giggles. I have too much time on my hands for a month starting the second week of December.

[menikmati]

dem toez.

Awesome write-up.

[Jono]

I'm gonna call your ninjette cyclops!

[choneofakind]

That's what my mother said as well.

[ricochet08]

Looks amazing from the first pic (This is the projector doing its thing without the lens), it seems to be aimed a bit low for the low beam. Maybe my eyes are playing tricks on me?

[choneofakind]

It was a little low at that point because I just stuck it on and turned it on to test. It's higher now, but still not quite perfect. I need to do some more tinkering over the winter to get the reflector/projector about 1/4" more space so I can aim the projector up a bit more. Right now it's about half way between where it was in the first picture and the line on the garage door (where it should be). It's usable, but could be better.

And yes, I was surprised how decent that projector is considering I got it for ~$30 on ebay. I wasn't expecting much. Even with the fluted pregen lens, it's still tons better than the HID in the oem reflector. Much wider, and the light is much better controlled.

[exploring/carolina]

Great write up!

[choneofakind]

OH! After more reading on theretrofitsource.com about this, it looks like an alternative method to install a projector is to cut a hole in the back of the oem reflector and the epoxy the crap out of the projector so it stays stuck to the reflector bowl. Then just use the oem aiming screws to aim it properly.

I might look into doing this, as it seems easier than making a mounting plate, it gets the projector further back, and I already have a spare reflector bowl that's got a massive hole cut in the back. I just need to clean up the edges and mix some JB Weld again.

I'll do this over winter break, expect some updates and pictures (hopefully I remember) sometime between now and mid-January.

[Motofool]

Originally Posted by choneofakind

......to cut a hole in the back of the oem reflector and the epoxy the crap out of the projector so it stays stuck to the reflector bowl......

Caveat: Epoxy softens very much with heat application.

[choneofakind]

Hmmm. The JB weld I was using said it was good up to 600 degrees F. I would assume that would be ok.

From reading on HIDplanet and The Retrofit Source, people using epoxy to glue some types of projectors into reflectors works fine.

I'll look into that more Hernan. Thanks for the heads-up.

[Motofool]

For work on model airplanes, applying a heat gun is the only way to relocate wood parts that have been glued with regular epoxy (5 or 30 minutes).

Maybe JB is a more resistant epoxy, maybe the source of light is not too hot, don't really know.

A previous test may not be a crazy step to take.

[EMSRacer07]

idk why not one has asked. but how are your gauges glowing?

[StephenA]

Originally Posted by EMSRacer07

idk why not one has asked. but how are your gauges glowing?

[choneofakind]

Haha, I was attempting to change my gauge faces. I bought some white ones, but I couldn't get the needles off. So they were glowing because I have no clear plastic, or black hood over the gauges. What you're seeing is the green LED's (that normally light my gauges) glowing on the white plastic that contains all the wiring under the gauges.

Normally it looks like this:

[choneofakind]

Another update on this retrofit. I talked earlier about making a new mounting plate so I could aim it up more. Turns out that's not needed.

I installed some preload spacers in my fork to compensate for the shorter length of the EX500 springs. They made a massive difference, changing my static sag from 2" to about 0.75". This made enough difference in my headlight to get it aimed right where it needs to be. In fact, I may need to aim it a little lower.

Here's how much different my static sag is:


And here's the new aiming of the low beam. The bike is within a foot of the same spot as the other pictures I've taken, and it's on the same stand aimed at the same garage door.


^^ compare this to the HID in oem reflector and the Halogen in oem reflector, and you'll see that it's much closer to where it should be. Still less awesome than it could be because of the dumb lens, but way more controlled and better light than the HID in oem reflector

I still want to do a foreground limiter in the projector, but I'll worry about that in the spring after I wire in my LED halo and get a chance to ride with it as it is. aka, I'll change it if I feel it's necessary to change. So far, I'm still impressed with the bright, even, WIDE light output. I can't wait to ride with it.

[lolibater]

Wanna make some $ doing retrofits? I got $ in hand for ya

[choneofakind]

No, but thanks for the offer Rick. I'm flattered Riding and tinkering for me isn't a way to make money. It's a hobby that I enjoy doing and sharing with others. This retrofit really isn't too hard, it's just a bit time consuming. Plan it out and have an idea what you want it to look like and it should turn out great for you

On that note, I got sick of taking pictures of my ugly garage door, so I went outside with really great results

Really dark back yard:


Low beam, cut off hits the ground about 50 yards out. The bike is still leaning a touch to the left:


High beam, Hey look, a Tree and a whole back yard!! The back fence is about 80 yards back:


I'm still debating on a foreground limiter.

[Xer0-]

What size angel eye ring is this?
looks like a perfect fit for that projector did you have any issues with fitment?

[choneofakind]

I'm pretty sure it was an 80mm ring.

No issues with fitment. I just epoxied it on there.