65aircooled

Hi all,
looking to upgrade to bixenon headlamps and I found these. I know they are 07 and up (facelift) and I'd like to know if they fit the 05 cars as well. They have a nice pricetag and it would be impossible to pass if they fit. Not a fig fan of mix and match but I love the idea of the OEM bixenons.

beejAMG

they'll fit.

65aircooled

Thanks,
I am sorry I didn't use the handy dandy search button, shoveling all the snow today left me a bit slow.
I read some of the posts regarding my questons, also seems like the ones I am interested in are xenon and not bixenon. Still not a bad price IMO, I'll see if I can ****** them tomorrow.

beejAMG

for me, xenon or bixenon, its good either way because of the upgraded look . good luck mate!

Drag0na5h

You'll need to do some wiring I believe. Check out this thread and the links found within. They should answer your questions about this conversion.

https://mbworld.org/forums/showthrea...386&styleid=18

65aircooled

Pretty excited, I can now have factory xenons cheaper than the Mtec xenon kit I was looking to buy.
Got me a set of genuine xenon headlamps for $200.00 all tabs intact and in like new condition. It pays to lurk around craigslist.
Now I need to gather all the misc parts needed to make the swap.

LemonSqueezy

Heh I found a pair of bixenons for $400 recently and I thought that was cheap, but $200? WOW, that's a good find!

65aircooled

I think so, tho mine are not bixenon, just low beams.

beejAMG

thats great! dont forget what Dragona5h wrote, it will fit like a glove but you may have to modify a lil with the wiring. good find and good luck!

irondad

Does your car have Xenon's originally? If not, search this forum about what all you need to do so retrofit. Not easy considering the wiring and levelers and programming, etc.

65aircooled

It wold be a retrofit, my car came with Halogen projectors and no airmatic. I have so far only find 1 single thread from a person who successfully did the swap from halogen to xenon with the SLS. He said he spent A LOT of money but then again he paid something like $1500 per headlight, I only paid $100.00 and he speaks about two sensors (axles) one control module under the seat and harness extensions. I have PM'ed a couple of members from here and other forums, for now is a waiting game, no rush anyhow.
I can see myself spending $500 in parts to get this done, if it gets significantly more expensive than that I will abandon the project and stick to brighter bulbs. I don't like the idea of the aftermarket xenon bulb in a halogen projector.

AMGAffalterbach

You're honestly better off getting HID low beams, fog lights, and doing Phillips DiamondVision high beams to match... or even going the 5000k LED route all around since those are available now. Not auto-leveling but they look stock since they're fitted to a car with the proper projector. Worth considering a kit from DDM Tuning or Morimoto in my opinion.

Good luck if you decide to go through with the retrofit though!

65aircooled

I was put in contact with Steve MBenzNL, if he has a way to do the retrofit and keep it at a decent price then that's the route I'd rather go. If not, if I am able to aim the new Bi-xenons correctly and have them in a fixed position then that would be my second option. Third would be to leave the car as is. I respect what others do in their cars, but I don't want to do any mod that will end up throwing scattered light in all directions blinding others on the road. My intention is to upgrade the light output, not to make the car look better if you know what I mean. After reading hrs upon hrs on this subject, I am one of those weird guys that don't 100% agree with installing an HID kits in halogen projector or reflector lamps. Hence my desire to do an OEM install if possible.

Thank you all for your input and advice. I'll try to post any progress I can get done.

LemonSqueezy

HIDs in halogen projectors are perfectly fine! just not reflector housings. If you want to upgrade light output, swap out your 35w HID kit for dedicated true 55w kit from a good source and you will definitely notice more light output.

I've had times where the the halogens on the car in front of me are so bad that my lights actually cast a shadow of their car in front of them! Then again I don't know where my kits are from because a friend of mine specs them out I think.

JoeNobody

Anyone tried installing LED H7 bulbs? There are some nice looking 55w led kits for under $100. The output might be better than even retrofitting xeon.

65aircooled

Well, directly from the horses mouth, in a nutshell, I don't think it'll be worth doing the swap.
The following from MBenzNL:
"these are facelift headlights...they do not fit the connectors that you have" I already knew this from other threads and was not that big of a deal to me.

"and the whole levelling and cornering stuff won't work either...your curent SAMs will not be able to support the citybulb LED either"
That pretty much helped me make my decision, sell the recently acquired facelift Bixenon lamps and get the correct ones eventually.

AMGAffalterbach

As LemonSqueezy said HIDs do not scatter light on these projectors... you're not making much sense I didn't install HIDs on my car for looks and they won't create an improper beam pattern. They are the same lens from HELLA as the OEM xenons... except for bi-xenons have autoleveling and cutoff. They're basically the same bulb just get an HID kit for $100. HID = Xenon it's the same technology same focal length I suggest you read more about it. Trust me with 55w low beams you'll be happy with the output, and mo they won't melt or scorch housings that's a myth

LemonSqueezy

"Xenon" tends to be factory and "HID" tends to be aftermarket. Our halogen projectors are very good! They do not scatter the light and blind oncoming traffic as you might think.

For $100 I don't think you will find very good 55w HID kits but you will probably find decent/good 35w kit.

65aircooled

I respectfully disagree. It makes no sense that MB would use the same optics on for xenon and halogen lamps when the beam patterns and behavior of them are completely different. The shutter on the bixenon letting more light in combination with the halogen bulb on the high beam has nothing to do with the lens patern and the cutoff. When you guys retrofit aftermarket HID kits on halogens, you can not mimic the same light pattern of the xenon or bixenon oem lamps. True, Hella projectors don't scatter light as much put there will be a "hot spot" that oem bixenons don't have and the cutoff is not even close nor as clean as that of the bixenon headlamps thus proving my point is the scattered light, not as bad as the reflector, agreed. There are videos of (MB) cars on YouTube with aftermarket retrofit kits that show how the cutoff is not even close to that of the OEM bixenons.
As I said, I respect everyone's opinion. If these kits make you happy then that's great, but I don't think that's the route I want to go. I'll just stick to the halogens and upgrade the bulbs for now.

Thanks for the feedback

65aircooled

I believe the HID kits, depending on the color temperature won't blind oncoming traffic with good projectors, but, they are still not as effective as OEM bixenon lamps in spreading the light pattern, so it is hard for me to believe that a retrofitted halogen lamp is as good as some people believe.

vettdvr

It is unfortunate MB did not put in better low beams at the basic design level. Mine were never bright enough on low and on dark two lane roads it was marginal IMO with other traffic on low beam.

AMGAffalterbach

I did a search on Mercedes EPC and there is only one part number for the part containing the non-removable projectors in the North American market, and I can tell you from having done the conversion and seen an OEM bi-xenon setup in person the cutoffs are pretty much the same without any light scattered beyond the cutoff or hot spots.

65aircooled

I really have no bases to go against what you are saying, the youtube video I watched was not a W211 so in this case I will stand aside, for all I know you may (and very possibly) be correct!

AMGAffalterbach

Yeah absolutely no disrespect to you man since this debate has come up before and it seems like there's never been consensus over it. My theory behind this is that Mercedes used the xenon optics on both factory bi-xenon and halogen systems since the focal length and optics of the lens don't matter as much on the halogens due to lower light output - if you look at the entire headlight and bumper assembly the xenon leveling/bulb system is labeled as a different part than the housing that contains the projectors. On cars that have both xenon and halogen projectors on them, the xenon projectors tend to be a bit "wider" in the back due to a different focal length of the bulb and different dimensions of the projector itself but on the (facelift) W211 both appear to be the same. The part did change in 07, but the HELLA sourced projector could very well be the same once again

The Thomas J

Ok, so if i'm understanding what you are saying this means that I could purchase a quality HID light & swap my current halogen light. If this is correct than please tell me what brand would be the best to do both low beams & high beams.

I'm also curious what your thoughts are on the fog lights.