gergrx7

ok well after seeing Jareeds thread about makeing new headlights with 2 small lights, i decided to attempt it my self and i did. i got everything working, except how to get them to move up and down. i dont want to use a pivot controll switch becuase it will be hard to set it to the same spot everytime so the lights wont be aligned. and i dont want to cut the arm from the motor becuase if i do the motors will burn up becuase its goign to try to move farther than it really is. has anyone sucessfully done this and got the lights to move up bythem selvs so they will allways be aligned.

heres a pic of the lights, i want them to raise to this height adn close to stock.

91mazdarx7

i cant help you with the motors moving and all but those look real good nice job on them

ilike2eatricers

Right now I replaced my headlight motors but dont have the arms set correctly so when I turn on the headlights they flip up all the way and then halfway down. The thing that sucks is the FSM says you need to remove the front bumper cover to adjust them. I am referring to the big nut holding the large arm.

bcty

just cut and reweld the arm

NZConvertible

That will not work. The headlight retractors work exactly like a piston/conrod/crank arrangement in a piston engine. Half a turn of the motor raises them, half a turn in the same direction lowers them. If you simply shorten the arm (the "conrod") the headlight will bottom out before the motor completes its half-turn. The only way to shorten the stroke and still have the headlights lower to the correct position would be to shorten the arm and raise the motor mounting position upwards. I've never looked to see if this is actually possible...

MakoRacing[S13]

any way to make it do a quarter turn? how does it know when to stop?

1SxyRXy

i know 1fastt2 did it

Kenteth

If you cut the arms, you could move the switch to have the motor shut off when they reach the appropriate height.

Trav

I can't remember who did it, but someone mentioned actually changing the 'stroke' of the arm by welding on an extra bit of metal and moving the pivot point. The point here is that the bottom end has to be the same place, but to not extend as far as it did before.

Have to see if I can find that link. I have no idea if it would actually work or not, but when I read over it, the concept seemed solid. Never had the desire to do it myself, so just speaking from memory.

If it would work, I'd have to think it would be a whole lot easier (and cleaner) than trying to rig some sort of electronics solution to it by either mounting secondary *****, switches, etc. or by modifying stock elec. components to behave differently.

NZConvertible

That still won't work. Apart from the fact that the limit switches are integral with the motor and not adjustable, the motor only turns one way and must make a comple revolution for each up/down cycle.

Kenteth

I understand now, I thought it went both ways.