Let me just start by saying this job is a LOT of work, and as I write this I'm still not finished. I did want to get this started because as it is taking so long I am going to start losing some of the details. Before I started this I did not realize how deep the world of customized headlights goes. There is SO much information out there on what the best projectors are, why stock US lighting isn't stellar, etc. I will not even begin to touch on any of that. I did some research, made a few decisions, and here we are.
EDIT Before diving into this be sure you are aware of any/all effects, whether they be positive or negative, regarding projector swaps.
My goals for this build are mainly to (finally) finish my LCI lighting upgrade and not spend an exorbitant amount of money on headlights. Make the lighting better than stock if possible, and to have the headlights be serviceable/modifiable in the future. I've seen a ton of mods out there that aren't really for me. A lot of stuff that, while done very well, doesn't offer much more benefit than being unique. My goal here is both.
Aside from looking WAY better, the LCI headlights operate quite differently than their predecessors. The LCI lights get rid of the flash-to-pass halogen inner lights for cornering lights. These lights turn on under certain driving conditions* when you turn the wheel (*can change w/ coding). I have them on my X5 and I do like them, but they can be better.
Also, something that our M5's lack in terms of usability is fog lights. I figure I can replace the standard cornering lights with some fog lights that can operate as both. After sifting through newtis and realoem I am pretty confident that I can at least make this work from a control/wiring standpoint.
My plan:
With all that being said, lets get down to business.
I bought two separate headlights from Ebay that were in various states of disrepair. Both cost me a little over $300, and after being reimbursed for one that got damaged in transit I only spent about $200 for the two!
I had no intention of re-using the lenses which came with the lights so I didn't care what removing them took. I have seen a couple threads where folks were reinstalling and re-sealing the lenses where they trimmed them. This seemed like an ugly job that doesn't have the benefit of being serviceable in the future, so I decided to dig through the depths of the Chinese marketplace and find actual LCI lens replacements.
Here is a photo of the headlight after the lens was removed.
![Image]()
This tool worked great! Best to plunge the broad side of the cutter into the lens and slightly angle it in the direction you want to trim. Trying to skim caused too much vibration and was unwieldy. I tried cutting as close to the headlight housing as possible, but I don’t think that is necessary anymore. Cut wherever it is most convenient. You’ll have to do some extra trimming later.
The blinker assembly is actually attached to the lens and should come with it. Mine was stuck w/ a rather liberal application of permaseal at the factory, so I had to separate it and the lens, then trim it off the permaseal afterwards.
You cannot buy replacement lenses with the eyebrows installed nor can you buy the eyebrows separately. You’ll have to remove them from the lenses as well. I used an exacto knife to cut between the lens plastic and the eyebrow. This is helped by the quick-grip pulling the lens away from the eyebrow.
![Image]()
The eyebrow is two separate pieces. All the electrical bits are in the inboard side. The sealant which holds this all together can be ripped off the back of the eyebrow once you can get a little bit of leverage on it. It is best not to hack away at it as this weakens the sealant and it won’t pull off in once nice piece.
![Image]()
Now would be a great time to do this mod if you wanted. I chose not to.
Ultimate Eyebrow Upgrade - 5Series.net - Forums
Before moving the eyebrows to the new lenses I wanted to verify fitment w/ the housings. I did a TON of internet sleuthing to find LCI branded E60 lenses. There are some really affordable options on Alibaba, however the shipping price didn’t make sense unless I was buying multiple sets. So I found some on Ebay that looked the part. They have the same photos as the alibaba set and they have the port hole on the inboard side as well. I could even tell from the photos that there was a marking where “HELLA” is stamped on the OEM lenses.
![Image]()
The lenses appear to be identical to the OEM ones with all the proper markings. They also seem to fit just right. Jackpot!
With fitment confirmed I went about securing the eyebrows to the new lenses. I just jammed them back into the lens and sealed them up with black RTV. This will keep the moisture out and help keep them in place slightly. Really they are compression fit (jammed into place). After installing and removing them multiple times I can assure you that they will not move w/o intention.
![Image]()
In the center of the photo you can see some really ugly voids in the sealant. This is before RTV, and should look more uniform after sealing.
I will tackle the blinker assembly later…
To continue disassembly of the headlight housing there are 5(6?) torx screws holding the shroud assembly in place(circled in blue below). This contains the cornering light, angel eyes and shrouds (chromed parts). You may also find that there is more permaseal holding this in place in the area circled in red in the photo below.
![Image]()
![Image]()
Here is a photo of the backside of the shroud assembly. On the left you can see the angel eye projector. At the 1 and 7 o’clock positions of the bulb housing you can see the fiber optic tubes (I think that is the appropriate term to use) which feed the inner angel eye. Now that I’m typing this I’m wondering if wrapping those tubes will create a brighter inner eye? I may have to try that out.
The outer angel eye is lit from the projector bowl. Most of that light is blocked by the cornering light which is mounted inside of the angel eye.
With the shroud assembly removed we’re left with the Bi-Xenon projector, AFS assembly (left/right aiming), headlight aim adjustment bits (including the height control motor), and the wiring harness.
To remove the Bi-Xenon you have two torx screws (circled in red) holding the retainer bracket, a ¼-turn plastic mount for the height control motor (circled in green), and two retaining clips (circled in blue).
![Image]()
All of the wires from the AFS assembly must be removed except for the small 2 wire connector which controls the high beam shutter. The entire headlight wiring harness is self contained and can now be removed for repair. I had to completely repair one of the headlight harnesses while the other only needed some repairs.
![Image]()
I used various diameters of shrink tubing to slip over the wires that I de-pinned one at a time. Other locations with larger pins I had to cut and slip the new heat shrink over the wire from the middle. YMMV here. I also bought some color shrink tubing which allowed me to keep the wires color coded.
Re-installing the wiring harness with thicker wiring was a bit of a pain, but it can be stuffed in there.
Next was removing the rest of the headlight aim adjustment hardware. I’m removing this so I can bake the plastic housing to make removing the permaseal easier. The aim adjustment hardware was a couple plastic gears that all clip into place to hold it all together, and one metal screw with a square flange that takes about a million tiny turns of a wrench to remove.
![Image]()
Now comes the worst part. In order to reuse the housing most of the permaseal needs to be removed. It sucks.
I clipped the remaining lens back towards the housing in one of the corners. Then placed the entire thing in the oven at 250F for a couple minutes. Once heated the permaseal becomes a bit more pliable and the plastic becomes more flexible. This allowed me to grab the remaining lens and peel it out.
I know what you’re thinking. “If you can use the oven to separate this, why go through the trouble of cutting the lens?” Without the ability to flex/tear/peel the lens from the permaseal it will not budge. You need to have the structure of the lens removed in order for this to happen.
To scrape the remaining permaseal I bought some permaseal removal tools. I found that they don’t work for sh!t without the permaseal being heated. Back to the oven! Scrape until you start to feel the tools not working anymore, bake, scrape again, etc. Testfitting the new lenses will show you where you need to scrape more. Repeat until the lens fits pretty cleanly in the channel. I did not remove all of the permaseal. Did I mention that this part sucks?
If I had to do this again I might consider buying new housing carcasses from Alibaba.
Congratulations! The sucky part is out of the way. Let the fun and upgrades commence!
Instead of replacing the Bi-Xenon projectors with something from TRS I figured I would just do a clear lens swap as the stock hella projectors are supposedly quite good and it wouldn’t require custom bracketry or grinding of the AFS assembly.
I had purchased the clear STI-R lenses prior to disassembling the headlights far enough to know what I was really in for. Although the lenses are very close to the stock lens geometry they require some tuning. So of course, knowing this, I purchased the lens spacers too. Well, the lens spacers work great if you need to move the lens closer to the projector. If you need to increase that distance they can’t help. Guess what needs to happen?
To be continued...
EDIT Before diving into this be sure you are aware of any/all effects, whether they be positive or negative, regarding projector swaps.
My goals for this build are mainly to (finally) finish my LCI lighting upgrade and not spend an exorbitant amount of money on headlights. Make the lighting better than stock if possible, and to have the headlights be serviceable/modifiable in the future. I've seen a ton of mods out there that aren't really for me. A lot of stuff that, while done very well, doesn't offer much more benefit than being unique. My goal here is both.
Aside from looking WAY better, the LCI headlights operate quite differently than their predecessors. The LCI lights get rid of the flash-to-pass halogen inner lights for cornering lights. These lights turn on under certain driving conditions* when you turn the wheel (*can change w/ coding). I have them on my X5 and I do like them, but they can be better.
Also, something that our M5's lack in terms of usability is fog lights. I figure I can replace the standard cornering lights with some fog lights that can operate as both. After sifting through newtis and realoem I am pretty confident that I can at least make this work from a control/wiring standpoint.
My plan:
- I bought a headlight switch with the fog light button (p/n 61316925254) which I'll install in place of the stock one.
- Run a wire from pin 7 on the new light switch to pin 34 on the LM2 for fog control.
- From the LM pins 6 and 44 (on non-M cars) send power to the right and left fog lights. Pins 12 and 50 control the cornering lights
- I should be able to jump pin 6 to 12, 44 to 50, and have the lights turn on as cornering lights when the fog lights aren't activated, or just be on as fogs with the fog light button.
- I'm sure there will be some coding options I'll have to play with to get this all to work properly.
With all that being said, lets get down to business.
I bought two separate headlights from Ebay that were in various states of disrepair. Both cost me a little over $300, and after being reimbursed for one that got damaged in transit I only spent about $200 for the two!
I had no intention of re-using the lenses which came with the lights so I didn't care what removing them took. I have seen a couple threads where folks were reinstalling and re-sealing the lenses where they trimmed them. This seemed like an ugly job that doesn't have the benefit of being serviceable in the future, so I decided to dig through the depths of the Chinese marketplace and find actual LCI lens replacements.
Here is a photo of the headlight after the lens was removed.
This tool worked great! Best to plunge the broad side of the cutter into the lens and slightly angle it in the direction you want to trim. Trying to skim caused too much vibration and was unwieldy. I tried cutting as close to the headlight housing as possible, but I don’t think that is necessary anymore. Cut wherever it is most convenient. You’ll have to do some extra trimming later.
The blinker assembly is actually attached to the lens and should come with it. Mine was stuck w/ a rather liberal application of permaseal at the factory, so I had to separate it and the lens, then trim it off the permaseal afterwards.
You cannot buy replacement lenses with the eyebrows installed nor can you buy the eyebrows separately. You’ll have to remove them from the lenses as well. I used an exacto knife to cut between the lens plastic and the eyebrow. This is helped by the quick-grip pulling the lens away from the eyebrow.
The eyebrow is two separate pieces. All the electrical bits are in the inboard side. The sealant which holds this all together can be ripped off the back of the eyebrow once you can get a little bit of leverage on it. It is best not to hack away at it as this weakens the sealant and it won’t pull off in once nice piece.
Now would be a great time to do this mod if you wanted. I chose not to.
Ultimate Eyebrow Upgrade - 5Series.net - Forums
Before moving the eyebrows to the new lenses I wanted to verify fitment w/ the housings. I did a TON of internet sleuthing to find LCI branded E60 lenses. There are some really affordable options on Alibaba, however the shipping price didn’t make sense unless I was buying multiple sets. So I found some on Ebay that looked the part. They have the same photos as the alibaba set and they have the port hole on the inboard side as well. I could even tell from the photos that there was a marking where “HELLA” is stamped on the OEM lenses.
The lenses appear to be identical to the OEM ones with all the proper markings. They also seem to fit just right. Jackpot!
With fitment confirmed I went about securing the eyebrows to the new lenses. I just jammed them back into the lens and sealed them up with black RTV. This will keep the moisture out and help keep them in place slightly. Really they are compression fit (jammed into place). After installing and removing them multiple times I can assure you that they will not move w/o intention.
In the center of the photo you can see some really ugly voids in the sealant. This is before RTV, and should look more uniform after sealing.
I will tackle the blinker assembly later…
To continue disassembly of the headlight housing there are 5(6?) torx screws holding the shroud assembly in place(circled in blue below). This contains the cornering light, angel eyes and shrouds (chromed parts). You may also find that there is more permaseal holding this in place in the area circled in red in the photo below.
Here is a photo of the backside of the shroud assembly. On the left you can see the angel eye projector. At the 1 and 7 o’clock positions of the bulb housing you can see the fiber optic tubes (I think that is the appropriate term to use) which feed the inner angel eye. Now that I’m typing this I’m wondering if wrapping those tubes will create a brighter inner eye? I may have to try that out.
The outer angel eye is lit from the projector bowl. Most of that light is blocked by the cornering light which is mounted inside of the angel eye.
With the shroud assembly removed we’re left with the Bi-Xenon projector, AFS assembly (left/right aiming), headlight aim adjustment bits (including the height control motor), and the wiring harness.
To remove the Bi-Xenon you have two torx screws (circled in red) holding the retainer bracket, a ¼-turn plastic mount for the height control motor (circled in green), and two retaining clips (circled in blue).
All of the wires from the AFS assembly must be removed except for the small 2 wire connector which controls the high beam shutter. The entire headlight wiring harness is self contained and can now be removed for repair. I had to completely repair one of the headlight harnesses while the other only needed some repairs.
I used various diameters of shrink tubing to slip over the wires that I de-pinned one at a time. Other locations with larger pins I had to cut and slip the new heat shrink over the wire from the middle. YMMV here. I also bought some color shrink tubing which allowed me to keep the wires color coded.
Re-installing the wiring harness with thicker wiring was a bit of a pain, but it can be stuffed in there.
Next was removing the rest of the headlight aim adjustment hardware. I’m removing this so I can bake the plastic housing to make removing the permaseal easier. The aim adjustment hardware was a couple plastic gears that all clip into place to hold it all together, and one metal screw with a square flange that takes about a million tiny turns of a wrench to remove.
Now comes the worst part. In order to reuse the housing most of the permaseal needs to be removed. It sucks.
I clipped the remaining lens back towards the housing in one of the corners. Then placed the entire thing in the oven at 250F for a couple minutes. Once heated the permaseal becomes a bit more pliable and the plastic becomes more flexible. This allowed me to grab the remaining lens and peel it out.
I know what you’re thinking. “If you can use the oven to separate this, why go through the trouble of cutting the lens?” Without the ability to flex/tear/peel the lens from the permaseal it will not budge. You need to have the structure of the lens removed in order for this to happen.
To scrape the remaining permaseal I bought some permaseal removal tools. I found that they don’t work for sh!t without the permaseal being heated. Back to the oven! Scrape until you start to feel the tools not working anymore, bake, scrape again, etc. Testfitting the new lenses will show you where you need to scrape more. Repeat until the lens fits pretty cleanly in the channel. I did not remove all of the permaseal. Did I mention that this part sucks?
If I had to do this again I might consider buying new housing carcasses from Alibaba.
Congratulations! The sucky part is out of the way. Let the fun and upgrades commence!
Instead of replacing the Bi-Xenon projectors with something from TRS I figured I would just do a clear lens swap as the stock hella projectors are supposedly quite good and it wouldn’t require custom bracketry or grinding of the AFS assembly.
I had purchased the clear STI-R lenses prior to disassembling the headlights far enough to know what I was really in for. Although the lenses are very close to the stock lens geometry they require some tuning. So of course, knowing this, I purchased the lens spacers too. Well, the lens spacers work great if you need to move the lens closer to the projector. If you need to increase that distance they can’t help. Guess what needs to happen?
To be continued...
