Fog lamp upgrade - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

rainmaker · #1 07-26-2001, 09:02 AM

I was walking around in the mall over lunch and came across these:

These are Hella's "DE Xenon" and are Hella's most compact driving lamps.

Since I can't seem to locate reasonably priced 94 500E specific Euro lamps, I could just put on standard 94/95 W124 Euro lamps and replace my bumper mounted fog lamps with these.

The beam pattern of the DE Xenons:

Seemed like it was going to fit in the 500E's bumper where the current fog lamp is. I entered the store and talked to their tech. We walked over to the car to try it on. Eyeballing it, he *thinks* it's gonna fit. Didn't have time to remove the old fog lamps or do the full install over lunch as I had to go back to work (<-- helps pay for all these upgrades!)

In effect, the fog lamps and the auxiliary driving lamps would "switch positions" as the fog lamps would now be on the inner headlamp position while the driving lamps would be in the bumper.

I'll find out next week for sure and I'll give those interested a heads up.

Potential problems I've thought of:

1) The fog lamps have a lens which are meant to disperse light. These might have to be replaced with a fabricated plain glass lens.

2) Supplied wiring might not reach all the way into the trunk. Does anybody know of a good +12V connection point in the hood?

Also, would anyone know what the 500E's bumper mounted fog lamps' rating is?

Michael · #2 07-31-2001, 07:36 AM

I run 55W lamps in the chin spoiler, which is OE...a larger bulb might melt the harness, so I stayed OE on my car.

There's a real good 12V connection up under the steering wheel...that's where the lead from the battery goes to...you'll see the big electrical junction up under there.

Good luck!

rainmaker · #3 07-31-2001, 10:28 AM

Actually, the Xenons use 2 15w fuses, lower than the 55w bulbs you use. Hopefully that doesn't give the existing wiring any problems. Also, I was planning to use the wiring that came with the Xenons (ballast and all) and was only going to tap into the switch of the harness for switching ability (on/off).

What worries me more, come to think of it, is the fog lamp lens. I'm still debating whether I install it behind the original lens (which will effectively "spread" the light out) or replace the lense entirely with a flat glass lens (not an easy proposition) or just mount it flush with the bumper and apply some body work around it *try* to make it look oem.

Michael · #4 07-31-2001, 12:44 PM

If you simply were to remove the OE lamps, couldn't you tuck the new ones into their place? Are they that much smaller than the OE ones? I definitely would not mount them behind the OE lenses...why bother?

ke6dcj · #5 07-31-2001, 01:59 PM

Why not install them towards the center of the bumper perhaps between the ribs/gills of the spoiler, or make and identical cutout on the left-side to match the right-side's tow hook openining?

That way you keep them all.

Is the 500E's fuse box in the same place as a 300E?

If so, you should be able to use a circuit from there as well.

Good luck and show us pictures when completed.

:-) neil

rainmaker · #6 07-31-2001, 03:50 PM

Michael,

If you look closely at the OE bumper mounted fog lamps, there is a projector behind the ribbed lens (i.e. there are two lenses, one round and spherical, and another one flat and ribbed). The Hellas are the same size as the spherical ones (i.e. would fit nicely inside) but instead of having a round spherical lens, it is round and flat. The diameter of both are the same, give or take a millimeter or two. If I take out the ribbed lens it wouldn't look right...like there's something missing...a surround or something. The easiest thing to do is to build a plastic or fiberglass piece using the flat ribbed lens as a template and mount the Hellas flush with that fabricated part. I'm just not sure how it would look...like the fog lamp shrunk or something. Still have to figure that one out....

Neil, installing them inside of the OEM lamps would not only complicate it further (having to cut a hole in the louvres) but it would look too busy, i think. Keeping the OEM foglamps is almost a non-starter since it doesn't put out much light to begin with.

For ready reference:

MBenzNL · #7 08-01-2001, 06:34 PM

Personally I would not want to have these lights on my car. I certainly wanted to keep the OEM lights on my benz, especially when it was a 500E/E500.

ricky, you might want to ask for headlights at www.mbatc.de . This is the original mercedes website that sells all kind of parts (new and used) with at least 50% discount (as they claim). mbatc is owned by mercedes self and sells parts of used and parted cars, new parts of cars that are no longer manufactured, new parts with little damage, new parts that were ordered in a too big quantity and so on.
Even when their search engine doesn't come up with the requested part, you might want to mail them. They have more parts as are included in their search engine. They say they ship parts all over the world.

good luck & greetingz,

rainmaker · #8 08-02-2001, 09:41 AM

That was really useful...they even replied really fast. Got an answer in 10 minutes.

Unfortunately though, they don't have it in stock. And they don't have a system in place to put you on queue for a part they don't yet have. I'll check often.

I was looking around and they even have a complete engine for an SL500 with only 14,900 km at around $4000!

MBenzNL · #9 08-06-2001, 04:42 PM

I recently ordered some parts there and will see how it works out.
A friend of my ordered an auto dimming mirror and chrome-stripped (elegance) trims for his W202 C class. The auto dimming mirror he got did not function and mbatc just send him another one (no questions and no returning the faulty mirror).

They even have a new 2000 heated two-toned leather driver's seat for a R170 SLK for 550DM (approx 300 US$)...unfortunately they don't have the passenger's seat to go with that.

greetingz,

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