romeo291

Anybody done this before?

Make a smaller eye brow to give the headlights a similar look to the 2012 W204s? It would look dope if it was molded onto the hood so that it's seamless.



Sorry for the crappy MS Paint mockup, I am at work :P

Matt-erhorn

I thought i saw something like this on google the other day from some Chinese place. I forgot the link though. But it looks cool and if your car is white or black you could try it with plastidip for cheap to get a rough guess in real life.

chewychiu

Can you vinyl wrap it or use a darker tint?

Matt-erhorn

Your right vinyl is the better option but I was thinking as a real cheap sorta mockup so he could see it and if he doesn't like just pull it off. Plus for white cars you can use the plastidip to cheaply cover the side markers

romeo291

The end goal is to weld a metal eye brow piece on to the hood so that it's permanent and paint the hood again. But yeah, using vinyl to mock it up and see how it will look at different angle is the way to go. If it looks good, I can make a plastic version, and then the permanent version once the car needs to be repainted.

Bosnia1992

Very noticeable. IMO makes the car look less aggressive/sporty. if it in your taste go for it !


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funkedelic

That's a sweet idea. Never thought about it but I do like the look of the facelift headlights much better then the original ones. To me it makes the car look a lot more aggressive and mean. If you just used vinyl or plasti dip, wouldn't light just go through it at night and look ghetto? How would you integrate something into the hood without effecting the headlights natural design?

ONE-9-T

like this easy way

maybe its possible to upgrade the hood this way.....or does the headlights do probs

sorry if u dont understand what i mean....ive learnd english by my self...haha

romeo291

When I say weld the eyebrow into the hood, I meant something like this: VW guys do it all the time to change the way their headlight looks. Except, on our cars, it'll be less work.

funkedelic

That's pretty sick but think even on our cars it'll be a lot of work. Might attempt it when someone else successfully does it

Matt-erhorn

[QUOTE=funkedelic;5563790]That's a sweet idea. Never thought about it but I do like the look of the facelift headlights much better then the original ones. To me it makes the car look a lot more aggressive and mean. If you just used vinyl or plasti dip, wouldn't light just go through it at night and look ghetto?

Yeah light would shine through only slightly but thats why we suggested those as more of see it in real life type test. Instead of a permeant solution.

To the OP: Good luck with the hood thing, looks interesting but also seems like a lot of work in comparison to new headlights and a new hood.

romeo291

[quote=Matt-erhorn;5564699]I think you would at least need the headlights, hood, front bumper, fenders, and custom brackets to make it work. That's 1000% more money than just welding a piece of metal on, sand it smooth and repaint IMO

funkedelic

[quote=romeo291;5565705]Try it and hit us back with the results!

Matt-erhorn

Lol I'm not saying it's cheaper. Personally though I would probably just save up and replace the headlights and hood.

romeo291

So, I ended up buying Kevin Vernal's car, he's a member on here. So first DIY I want to do is this mod. I started trying to make these a few hours ago. Here's my first template. Just cutting some paper and coloring it red to get an idea of the curve I want:

romeo291

Went around the house looking for plastic to use to make the eyebrows. I needed something fairly thick, flexible, and easy to work with........so i found this plastic lid for one of my storage containers. You can get these at walmarts for like $5-8, plenty of plastic to work with if you mess up.



Traced the paper template:


Used a dremel tool to cut it out, making sure to leave space so I can clean it up:


Sanding it down with the dremel:


Sanding it smooth with some sand paper:

romeo291

I am not too happy with how sharp the curve is, so I am redoing it to make it flow better right now.

romeo291

I re-did the curve a couple of times and couldn't get it looking right until I realized that I had to change the angle of where the curve should begin so it'll flow with the lines of the hood better. Notice the difference:

romeo291

So now the curves are sharper in a way but actually flows better overall so that the eyebrows will make the headlights look more like the 2012 models.

Cillys

We are talking about doing modifications to a Mercedes, not a Civic or Accord or another import. If we are going to do it, lets do it right! Spend $$$$$$$$$$$

snowmuch

+1

romeo291

If you read through my posts in this thread, you'll know that this is temporary to see how it looks. If I like, I am going to modify the hood to incorporate the shape so it flows seemlessly. It may or may not look good though, only way to tell is to try it out. Doing things right doesn't just mean you have to spend a lot of money up front. I like to do stuff myself rather than drop it off a shop and pay them to do everything. Don't knock it until you see the final product.

Cillys

Wasn't knocking you ... Just saying is all ... Actually cannot see your mod because I am in Afghanistan on a military network and flicker and photobucket and youtube and sites like those are blocked

I have been able to see some mod's where wire nuts were used

romeo291

Oh, well, just to sum up what I am doing. I am making eyebrows that would work with our hood to cover up the stock headlights in a way that gives it the same look as the 2012+ headlights. I am in the mockup phase right now, where I am making it out of plastic to get the exact curve I want. Once it's there and I think it looks good, I am going to use the plastic pieces to get metal pieces cut out of it. Afterwards, I would weld these metal pieces to the hood and repaint it so that it's a more permanent mod and it'll flow seamlessly. The VW and Audi guys have been doing this kind of mod forever, and the results are usually very nice.

I know another user was suggesting just getting the 2012+ headlights, hood, fenders, bumper, and mounts......but anybody who knows bodywork would know that would cost so much money that I mind as well just sell my car and get a 2012+ model instead. I am not going down that route, it's too and it's definitely not easier in any way imo.

Cillys

are you going to do a template maybe and mass produce this face-lift feature?