How do you Clear the corner lenses?

[RaiseEmUp]

I was wondering if it was easy to clear the front corner lenses and basically how do you do it

[Dilemma]

tHERE should be a tutoral on how to do it...

[RaiseEmUp]

it's down that is why i am asking

[BGR]

That temporary page will be gone by this weekend. As for the tutorial, I was told by my friend that tried using the instructions to clear his lights that they were inaccurate, so I never placed it back up.

Contact Pinoyesv6 as he has a more accurate tutorial on his website and I think a video. I had part of the video but it was corrupted halfway through it. Myself, I never fully endorsed this mod as too many people ended up jacking up their headlights while following the tutorial. Technically, it's not hard at all to do and all of us old timers did it without tutorials, we just started taking things off and going for it, starting with the grill and then the headlights. There are some plastic clips that hold the grill in place and you remove them with a flat head screw driver, starting with the clips on the top, near the hood release and then just following around in the grill to see the contact points. It'll become easier to remove when you dislodge those top clips, then you can sort of pull the grill back to get to the clips below. Then there are 4 bolts that hold the headlight in place. Remove those and disconnect the bulbs.

You're going to need a tool like a flat head screw driver but the tip is 'hooked' so that you can grab that reflector through the turn signal hole. I used one of those metal covers on the back of my computer (it covers one of the empty slots). Once you hook on to the reflector, you pull the reflector out of it's place and then while it's free floating inside the headlight, you'll take a pair of needle nose pliers and carefully break the reflector into small pieces that you will take out from that turn signal hole. Once you're done, you can use a vaccuum to clean out any shards. You'll end up scratching the reflector part around the hole but just try your best to be careful or possibly put tape around the inside of the hole before you start breaking the reflector with the pliers.

The other alternative is using a heat gun and essentially breaking the seal of the headlight and remove the clear cover. Once you do that, you take the reflector out, real easy like. The only problem with this technique is that there is a greater chance for condesation build up in the headlight, like after it rains or if you keep your Galant outside. If this technique is followed, make sure you do a really good job sealing it with silicone.

Your topic was posted in the wrong forum by the way. Topic moved.

[Tiller]

dude, if i were you i'd go the route of breaking open the headlight itself...

when i tried to clear my corners, i used swear words that i didn't even know existed...

just be sure to use LOTS of silicone to reseal them up good, or you'll get leakage...

[Supernova]

It took me like, 2 1/2 hourse to get the first amber plate out. Then, on the other tail light, it only took arounf 20 mins. We took out the head light, got a flat head screw driver through the light bulb hole for the tunr signal and pried the plate free. Then used the screwdriver, and hit the screwdriver ont he end of it so that it would break the plate into peices.. We did that about 5 times and then just got pliers to get teh pieces out. Then there were the little sharded, but there halfway easy to get out.

Looks way better with the plates gone, were going to order the new bulbs tomorrow. 8)

[mystik]

Damn took you that long???

It took me about a half hour to figure out the first one and just 1 minute for the second one! Got that shit out with the quickness :peace:

[pinoyesv6]

it takes me less than half an hour to clear the headlights. that includes taking out the headlights, the reflector and putting it back all together.

first of all, uhm taking apart the headlights its totally not necessary. no need to break that silicon seal. but i do recommend that u do take the headlights out of your car and remove the bulbs too. if you don't know to to remove the bulbs, take it out when you get the headlight out. you will know how to take it out and put it back, it leaves less quesswork.

as for messing up the headlights, yea many people scratch up the headlights. uhm, i did my headlights the way that bgr said to do it but, i do have a better technique for removeing the reflector. with the technique that bgr said, most of us old heads did it too but uhm if you were to scratch your headlights, you'd scratch that clean lens smack dab in the middle of the headlight. more easy to see. the reflector is held in by tabs on the top and bottom. if you watch the video, if you can look really closely, we took a flat head screwdriver, and put it down near the tab. and then we push on the tab to move the reflector towards the center of teh headlight. the good part of the technique is that if you were to scratch the inside, of the clear plastic, it'll be near the top or the bottom so its a lil bit harder to see. watch the video a couple of times. o yea i jsut finished watching the video, yea it stops when the reflector drops, then its pretty obvious from there.

the movie ('http://www.midatlanticgalant.com/TGC%20Files/clearing%20corners.mov')
the tutorial ('http://www.midatlanticgalant.com/TGC%20Files/TGCTutorials/8gclearingcorners/Clearing%20Corners.htm')

[Dram3000]

From what I gather, there are tabs that hold the orange lens in place. Once the lens is popped free, do those tabs break...and if so, is there a tiny piece of the tab that is still intact to where it connects...or once the tab is broken you can just shake any piece that might be left, out of its place?

[Dram3000]

One more thing, as for possibly scratching anything inside the headlight housing, why not just use something over whatever tool you choose to use, so that it isn't bare metal on glass, or reflector.

[pinoyesv6]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Dram3000)</div><div class='quotemain'>From what I gather, there are tabs that hold the orange lens in place. Â*Once the lens is popped free, do those tabs break...and if so, is there a tiny piece of the tab that is still intact to where it connects...or once the tab is broken you can just shake any piece that might be left, out of its place?</div>

when the reflector breaks off, one of 3 things will happen to the tabs.
A. it never breaks off from the reflector
B. it breaks off the reflector and it just trickles out one of the holes in the headlights
C. for some erason it stays in its original position and u shake the headlight vigorously to take it out

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Dram3000)</div><div class='quotemain'>One more thing, as for possibly scratching anything inside the headlight housing, why not just use something over whatever tool you choose to use, so that it isn't bare metal on glass, or reflector.</div>

thats a good possibility but the problem with that is that the area between the reflector and the clear lens is really thin. so u'd have to find somethign really thin and strong to do that

[dageezer]

I used a "cotter pin removal tool" which I got at Sears, it was about $7 and looks like a screwdriver with a hooked shaft. It made breaking the reflector free from the lens easy, then just cut up the bigger pieces with a small pair of wire cutters/snips.


Here is what the cotter pin removal tool looks like
scroll down to item 13800

http://www.mytoolstore.com/toolaid/handt01.html ('http://www.mytoolstore.com/toolaid/handt01.html')

[Dram3000]

I got around to clearing my corners earlier today. I just wanted to thank this board for once again giving me helpful info. Also thanks to pinoyesv6, his page on clearing corners definitely helped too.

After reading about how some people have accidently scratched various areas inside the headlight housing...reflector, inside face of the outer cover, etc. I thought to myself I would sure like if I can avoid that.

Here's what I did to help reduce that. After making a custom pry tool (just out of some scrap metal strapping) I simply took some electrical tape and tightly stretched it around the end of the tool (the part that would be used to get behind the lens). I only wound it around like twice, so the tool would still be able to get behind the lens. The tape was just to keep it from being bare metal. It protected the glass/plastic.

As far as protecting the reflector from being scratched during an accidental slip with the tool (even with the end taped, I could imagine a hard slip would still scuff up the relflector), I took one of my terry towels and stuffed it into the light hole. Once it was inside the light, the towel just sort of fills the area freely, so you'll still be able to manuever the tool in there. I figured in case of a accidental slip (which happened) the towel will cushion the tool from hitting the reflector straight on. This also worked.

Also, once I broke the lens free, I stuffed the towel to sort of block the lil passage from the corner area to the main section. And once I broke the lens all up and removed the main pieces, the little tiny shards that were left, all stayed within the corner area...and when I pulled out the towel, all the lil shards came out with it. I did that so I wouldn't have to worry about any lil shards falling into the main section and getting stuck anywhere.

I dunno, just adding my two cents. Thanks again to everyone on the board.

[Supernova]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Dram3000)</div><div class='quotemain'>I got around to clearing my corners earlier today. Â*I just wanted to thank this board for once again giving me helpful info. Â*Also thanks to pinoyesv6, his page on clearing corners definitely helped too.

After reading about how some people have accidently scratched various areas inside the headlight housing...reflector, inside face of the outer cover, etc. Â*I thought to myself I would sure like if I can avoid that.

Here's what I did to help reduce that. Â*After making a custom pry tool (just out of some scrap metal strapping) I simply took some electrical tape and tightly stretched it around the end of the tool (the part that would be used to get behind the lens). Â*I only wound it around like twice, so the tool would still be able to get behind the lens. Â*The tape was just to keep it from being bare metal. Â*It protected the glass/plastic.

As far as protecting the reflector from being scratched during an accidental slip with the tool (even with the end taped, I could imagine a hard slip would still scuff up the relflector), I took one of my terry towels and stuffed it into the light hole. Â*Once it was inside the light, the towel just sort of fills the area freely, so you'll still be able to manuever the tool in there. Â*I figured in case of a accidental slip (which happened) the towel will cushion the tool from hitting the reflector straight on. Â*This also worked.

Also, once I broke the lens free, I stuffed the towel to sort of block the lil passage from the corner area to the main section. Â*And once I broke the lens all up and removed the main pieces, the little tiny shards that were left, all stayed within the corner area...and when I pulled out the towel, all the lil shards came out with it. Â*I did that so I wouldn't have to worry about any lil shards falling into the main section and getting stuck anywhere.

I dunno, just adding my two cents. Â*Thanks again to everyone on the board.</div>

Man, i still have like, one amber shard left in my headlight. Its stunk in there good. Theres no way to get to it either. Its about the thickness of 2 grains of rice. You can see it if you look at it. Its not that noticable.

And got my APC clear amber bulbs in today. They look sweet. https://www.thegalantcenter.org/style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif

[pinoyesv6]

if you really want those shards out. wash the headlights out with distilled water. use distilled water so it doesn't make spots on the headlights. and o yea make sure it dries completely b4 puttng everything back together

[galant76]

What you can do is bake them in the oven for 250 degrees and then pull them out seperate them with a flat head. Once out and lense removed place back in oven for about 2 mins on same temp and then the adhesave that was on their would be good again i applied clear apoxy..tell me how it looks when your done