zrheath

Hey everyone, I'm back looking for opinions on another topic. I have a 2013 C300 Sport with the Halogen headlights and I would like to get HID, but I'm not a fan of putting HIDs into reflector housings. That leaves me with getting projectors. From my research on the site, i have found 3 options so far.

1. Retrofit projectors into my current housing. This is not a route I want to go. I have done this before on other vehicles and isnt something I want to repeat with this one.

2. Aftermarket Projector headlights. Suggestions??

3. I learned through the forum that some 2013 C300s came with a
"lighting package" that included projectors. Does anyone have information on this? I looked but can't even find a picture. Is it possible to get my hands on a set of these and just swap them with my halogens? That seems too easy.

Any suggestions or other options would be great. If anyone has done any of these I would love to see pictures.

Zack

97 GSX 97

Considering you have the halogen lights to begin with your retrofit options are endless. You could use essentially any projector you please. Now coming from someone who has performed a retrofit himself before, you should look into Morimoto Mini H1 7.0's if you are on a budget and want an "easy" do it yourself job.

I have the headlight package on my 14 C300 with the C63 headlights, but honestly I'm going to end up opening them to mod and tune the projectors anyway. The headlights are decent, but the output of my Morimoto Mini H1's blew these way. At the very least I plan on swapping a clear lense in, and spacing the lense further from the bowl to get a sharper and blue colored cut off line.

If you were to go the "plug and play" Morimoto route you are looking at around $300 in supplies and around 8-10 hours of labor.

For reference these are the C63 "lighting package headlights" I have

LILBENZ230

My car has the lighting package as well, called the "ILS" for "Intelligent Lighting System" - however, this feature is crippled in the USA due to stupid laws. That said, I have had many cars with premium lighting and these are among the best I've experienced. I've no desire to modify them physically, though I am planning to try to code the car to open up the ILS features.

These would be very expensive to retrofit. I'm not sure why they are referred to as "C63". They are the same headlights as the C63, yes, but they're also the same headlights as the C250 so long as it is equipped with the package. It's probably for online marketing, sellers think putting "C63" next to something increases its value. You COULD get a C63 with halogens: https://mbworld.org/forums/mercedes-...c63-sedan.html

If I were you, I would go with Depo replicas of these headlights. Notice the link it says "C63 AMG style" which is nonsense, also these would be LED where the factory ones are Xenon.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/DEPO-12-14-M...BWHo-L&vxp=mtr

Star4life

yea it would be way too expensive to retro fit the oem lighting package projectors. i waited and waited until i found a car with the lighting package. I am looking into swapping bulbs on my lighting package to get a little more white-blue tint. the stock bulbs start pretty close to 5k when cold then when they warm up they are more of a 4300k.


the depo ones are probably your best bet for the money. I am not sure hpw they fit though. I waited to find a car with lighting package for this reason. It was one of the top search criteria.

For those reading this, if you are planning to buy the car, look for lighting package! Its a lot of work to get projectors after the fact.

97 GSX 97

They were developed for the C63, and put on our lower level cars as an after thought to make some more money. I'm not trying to make them sound more valuable I'm just stating facts Lol.

LILBENZ230

I wasn't calling you out, I was just poking fun of the way sellers refer to them consistently as "C63 style".

Where did you hear they were developed for the C63, though? I believe they were developed for the facelift car, regardless of model.

97 GSX 97

I used to work for Mercedes. If they were developed solely for the facelift they would've been universal to every model. They were essentially an afterthought and added to the higher end models.

I do agree some people throw the C63 term loosely though.

LILBENZ230

Again, not trying to argue or debate, just genuinely curious - especially since you worked for Mercedes. I think there was a misunderstanding on what I said.

They've been installing HID lighting on the USDM C-class since the W202 C43 AMG, albeit those were diffuser-based lights that didn't look markedly different than the halogen ones. HID may have been an afterthought at that time, and those may have been developed for the AMG car. But they continued with HID technology in the first W203s with diffusers, then to auto-leveling bi-xenons in the late W203s and early W204s - some model years with no AMG variant sold (like 2007). HID technology hasn't been exclusive to AMG cars, lighting packages have always been available on basically all models. That's what I meant by these are for the facelift cars, they are not AMG specific and have not been. For the W204s you can buy a C250 with these adaptive lights, and you can buy a C63 with halogens. Anyway, my point being they are not AMG-style lights, they are facelift lighting package style lights.

xEryx

These Bi-xenon's were designed with the whole W204 facelift in mind not just C63, the W204 facelift was released months before the C63 facelift. I have a September 2011 built C300 with OEM Bi-xenon.

LILBENZ230

This thread has gone way but it's at least informative. I have always assumed "C63" was attached to everything to try to increase the value.

zrheath

Thanjs for the suggestion! I've looked at a few different aftermarket options on eBay but I had not seen these yet. After reading what everyone has to say about retrofitting projectors into my housin and the high cost of getting OEM lights, aftermarket seems like it's the way to go. Does anyone have pictures of their aftermarket options?

rswaltz1614

I had great success with the DEPO headlights with LED's instead of HID.

Dr Ajking

Guys i just bought an used C300 2014, but unfortunately it doesn't have the lighting package. Therefore, I am stuck with the halogens. I was thinking, rather than replacing the halogen with a Morimoto Projector or swapping the Headlight unit, How about replacing the halogen bulbs for LED bulbs from gtrlighting.com
Ive heard that they are really good.
Any suggestions?

97 GSX 97

LED bulbs in a halogen headlight will be just as annoying as an HID kit in halogen housings to other drivers. Either retrofit the headlights (easy with the Morimoto Mini H1 or D2S kit) or buy the aftermarket headlights that already have projectors.