7" retrofit (GDAA WRX)

[satrya]

Sanding the uneven protrusion from the notches on the edge, as well as other bumps. This is the left hand side cover.


Putting tape behind the notches to catch any of the excess material that hopefully can fill the gaps.

[satrya]

This is coming together very nicely. Ever thought about updating the sidemarkers as well? Three yellow spots behind the yellow glass might look good and would match the city lights in your headlights. Take care.

The sidemarkers on the fender right behind the headlights? The original is amber; I replaced it with a yellow one (clear sidemarkers with yellow film). At some point, they were lit up with amber LEDs, but they're now regular tungsten amber bulbs.

Interesting concept on the 3 dots.. it would have to be vertical but slightly tilted then. Either that or 3 in a stacked 1-2 arrangement.


After the foglights, my plan is for the taillights. No HID of course; just some experiments in acrylic.

[Crossgolf]

This is coming together very nicely. Ever thought about updating the sidemarkers as well? Three yellow spots behind the yellow glass might look good and would match the city lights in your headlights. Take care.

[Fstrsn]

What about just the low beams? Can you make use of wiring from the previous retrofit version?

Right now the Murano's are hooked up, but I'm missing / don't have the right splitter to run the secondary projectors.

[satrya]

I know how that goes. Between work, school, (Thermodynamics, DFMA, FEA, and the start of my Capstone project), and life in general my Murano's have been installed for a little over a month now and I have yet to finish the wiring. X_X

What about just the low beams? Can you make use of wiring from the previous retrofit version?

[Fstrsn]

Life got in the way. It's been going on with ideas that didn't pan out. This was the first recent one that might pan out.


I plan to, but possibly with ABS plastic to discourage stress concentrations in the filled area. If not, I'll have to use something less rigid, say, molded polyurethane.


From what I can tell, the ABS plastic's shape has been quite stable; having been exposed to the elements and the sun's heat & UV for many months now.

I know how that goes. Between work, school, (Thermodynamics, DFMA, FEA, and the start of my Capstone project), and life in general my Murano's have been installed for a little over a month now and I have yet to finish the wiring. X_X

[satrya]

I was wondering what happened to this thread.

Life got in the way. It's been going on with ideas that didn't pan out. This was the first recent one that might pan out.

After sanding can you fill in the slits with a bondo or epoxy?

I plan to, but possibly with ABS plastic to discourage stress concentrations in the filled area. If not, I'll have to use something less rigid, say, molded polyurethane.

Or is thermal expansion/contraction a concern?

From what I can tell, the ABS plastic's shape has been quite stable; having been exposed to the elements and the sun's heat & UV for many months now.

[Fstrsn]

I was wondering what happened to this thread. After sanding can you fill in the slits with a bondo or epoxy? Or is thermal expansion/contraction a concern?

[satrya]

Smoothing off creases

To get the rounding of edges of the plastic piece, I had to cut notches to allow the material to flow when heat-formed. This results in some creases formed at the tip of the notches like so:


I tried to smooth it out by using a heated spatula; hoping that the plastic will be deformable so the crease can be "squashed". That didn't work too well.

As an alternate measure, I ended up filing the creases like so:


Luckily, there is enough thickness in the material not to result in a hole formed (yet). I suppose filing is all good, since the surface will eventually need to be sanded down for paint prep anyway.

[satrya]

Looking good.

Thanks. Still a lot of details to figure out.

[that_guy318]

Looking good.

[satrya]

Thanks. The area closer to the fender is a bit tricky, as it isn't constrained by any mounting mechanism. Since making the depth consistent relative to the bumper cover is difficult, I am leaning towards pushing it further back like that and come up with something to go with the shape.

Not sure yet.

[gold94corolla]

OK I did some quick edits.

First one shows what I feel like is the natural "line" that the shape should follow, in order to flow best

Satyra2.png



Next one shows the final product

Satyra.png

[gold94corolla]

yeah I'll do a quick photoshop when I get home

[satrya]

Yeah it would suck to trim the edge so that it looks good now, only to have it deform or something and leave a gap.

I can mark up those pics if you can't see what I see lol

Any input is welcome. I think I know what you're talking about, but it doesn't hurt to get feedback. There are other areas that need further work, particularly how the plastic has "relaxed" around the bumper corner area. I'm still brainstorming on how to correct that.