95 Zenki HID Retrofit Question

[ADIDASilvias]

Hola Zilvians!

I am in the process of retrofitting my Zenki headlights with FX35 projectors via the guide by greenkouki on HIDplanet.

A couple pointers for anyone doing this in the future. To separate the old lenses from the housing, bake them in the oven at 250 degrees for 12-15 minutes. The first guide I followed said 6 minutes, but all that did was cause me to mar up the edge of the housing because I had to pry all over the place. Plus it cooled too quickly and I had to keep putting the headlight back in the oven to keep the butyl sticky.

12-15 minutes was long enough to get the butyl soft enough to pry in a couple places and then grab both the lens and housing and physically pull them apart.

Now to my questions. I got the adjustment screws for the reflectors backed all the way out. My adjustment gears for the side to side adjuster were stripped and I had to remove the small white cover over the gears and use a pair of vice grips to back that side out.

Is there anywhere I can buy replacement gears? I thought I'd check Mcmaster-Carr and see if I can match the gear sizes and replace them with metal gears so it never strips again, but if I can buy stock replacement gears I might go that route since I wouldn't have to rig it to work.

I checked online and none of the diagrams show these parts, so I assume they just expect you to replace the entire housing. Unless I am missing it somewhere.

Also, there is a pivot ball joint that attaches the reflector to the housing, and I cannot for the life of me get the joint to pop loose to remove the reflector. You can't remove both screws on the attachment point since one is hidden by the reflector.

Any tips for getting this loose? I don't want to pull too hard for fear of breaking something.

[silviaks2nr]

I don't know if you've read the definitive lighting thread here on zilvia but that's me who you're referring to on hidplanet. it is VERY common that those gears strip out. What I do is 3d print hex head caps and epoxy them on to the little splined shaft that's left over. You have to be very very careful popping the ball out of the socket. Pry from the way far back point where it's thicker and use a towel wrapped around your screwdriver.

[ADIDASilvias]

Awesome, thanks! I'll keep prying at it, I just didn't want to break anything in the process.

Yeah, both of my headlights have stripped on the side to side adjuster. It appears the splines strip out on the gear, and the screw just spins inside. Every one of the gears is cracked, so that doesn't help either.

I tried super gluing the crack, but it didn't help, so I think the splines on the inside of the gears are toast. Do you have a pic of the hex head glued onto the spline area?

I looked through the definitive lighting thread awhile ago, but I'll definitely revisit it!

Also, I am going to cut some new clear covers for the level indicators out of plexi since they are so brittle they just disintegrate when you remove the screws

[silviaks2nr]

I've never broken the level sight glass, I wonder if yours have some kind of chemical spilled on them. I think the gears crack and then it loosens up and the female splined part on the gear in turn wears out. It's not worth trying to fix the original system since it's failure prone. The JDM lights have much better adjusters (all metal) so it's almost worth retrofitting them instead. Sorry I don't have any photos of the hex head caps at the moment.

[ADIDASilvias]

It sucks that Nissan went cheap on the gears.

I thought I might be able to get them to work with a really tiny set screw, as long as the glue holds to keep them from breaking even more. I'll have to drill a small hole in the white housing to access the set screw, but I think I can just plug it with silicone after tightening it down.

If I can find some metal gears in the right size it could be an option, but I'll still probably need a set screw to tighten them up against the adjustment screw. The trick will be finding a set that is the right thickness while still allowing for an area for a set screw.

Either that or I just remove the gearing altogether and tack a nut on the end of each one of the output shafts.

The sight level cover is plastic on mine, and the lobes where the screw holes are cracked off, into about 5 pieces so gluing it is impossible. Otherwise, they are totally fine.