1st Gen R53 Cooper S My 2005 R53 Daily Driver build thread

I am going to do the restoration of my headlights, but not just the outside, but also inside. The projector lens on the blue daily driver is hazy compared to the one on our Chili Red (1/3rd the miles). That requires opening up the lights, but we've done that for other lights before. If you are careful, nothing will happen to the precious OEM housings and they will go back together. I have the same hairline cracking going on in the plastic as seen in the top image. It's not bad, but I will get it all clear and crisp to match up with the new D2S bulbs in the cleaned up reflectors plus some bright LEDs in the high beam location..

Dave, which ceramic product do you use on plastic? I was thinking of putting clearbra on once refinished, but if the ceramic coat does its thing, I'd prefer that due to increased optical clarity.

 

Here is a summary of what is/can be coded on my electric blue Mini related to bulb monitoring. The car has HID factory low beams, which explains why there is no cold monitoring for those. Some things are a bit odd, like the existence of a coding slot for a second rear center brake light, but it's off anyway. I created an easy to read table in Excel to list the settings in one view. First image is what is current coded, the second is what I hope to be able to change it to. The first column is the type of language in the ECU code you have to locate and then modify the associated value (see last two columns for hot/cold monitoring and their settings. Meaning of each is obvious without translation, I assume)



the desired state I am shooting for to get rid of the flicker in high beam, front position lights, interior and license plate lights. Also for fogs to protect those HIDs.

 

I have a lot of Gyeon Prep left over from the Mohs I put on last year. I am doing at least one more car this year, but there's plenty left in the bottle for all that. Also still have Gyeon Cure and Gyoen Wet in the detailing box - probably no so useful as a first application, but they'll help once everything is coated.

The ceramic coat on the car has held up incredibly well over the winter. It was always amazing to see how the water in the car wash booth would shed off the car taking dirt with it. I never touched the paint with a brush or sponge since the last full hand wash in fall, and it still looks fantastic. I'm definitely doing this to the other cars as well, just need to wait for warmer weather...

 

Day one after re-coding the first bits of the lights module in the car, and it still runs without any issues. I will do a more detailed post about what exactly is involved to do this. Meanwhile, I noticed today that I didn't get the right circuit that makes the boot light flicker. I am guessing the setting monitoring interior lights only cares about lights that may be of some sort of importance. Perhaps that would be dash lights. The boot light must be hooked to the circuit of either the license plate, tail or brake lights. I will disable those next time around, just because that light is most annoying (no back seat in my car). Every time I turn the key in the dark, I think something is broken.

While testing the LED high beams I took a video of what I was doing. Here is a frame grab showing the condition of my headlight plastic. This is all within the plastic, fine cracks that are barely visible when the light is off.



It looks very different from the kind of plastic decay I removed form my Tundra a while back, so I am reluctant to break out the buffer and sandpaper to shave down these lights. It is still far too serviceable to risk destroying the housings, and as we all know, no replacement plastic is available without buying a full assembly. Would you polish these lights?

Also note the color temp of these "SuperNova V3" LEDs in the high beam position vs. the Philips D2S HID bulb.

 

The silent movie about what I did on Sunday, I wanted to show the flicker of the bulbs prior to coding the checks out, but the little go pro like camera had a blue LED flashing, so it looks like the blue LED pulse is the flicker I was talking about. Skipped that and will do a better job next time around. Got more cars to do this on

 

Not afraid at all about opening them. My son has taken apart some large Toyota Camry lights in my kitchen oven and I am an expert ski boot liner baker myself We bake a lot of low temp cakes with plastics, I am saying.

We also have spare sealant glue strips from the Retrofit Source to glue lights back together should the OEM stuff somehow not do the job. This year, we'll be opening a lot of Mini lights. I plan on gutting my dark silver car's lights for a custom HID projector install some time later in fall, and this car will get opened up at least to clean the haze off the OEM projectors. 13+ years of crud buildup is making the projectors look like they are frosted.

Now, I don't expect to need to sand/buff/polish anything on the inside of those covers. All I know is that they UV damage is usually the outside hardened layer, not the core plastic, and really never on the inside. There may be some dirt on the inside surface, though.

The thing is, I don't want to sand down the outside surface of the lights only to find out the problem is not on the surface, but inside the core of the material. At that point I'd be removing UV protection and harder plastic that protects the lights only to find out that my lenses don't improve. So if what I am seeing (better visible in the video when full screen than that screen shot) is something somebody else also saw and successfully removed with the classic sand and polish tools, I am going to do this next week.

I've been looking for just the clear lens plastic of the headlights, but can't find that for R50/53 lights, only for R56 and later, plus everything like that seems to be wholesale - container from China type of stuff.

 

Just for giggles, I tried the same plastic polish I used to shine up the tail lights on the high beams of this car. The outside surface got smoother, but the core issue, deep cracks in the plastic, cannot be touched. I doubt a proper sand and polish will deal with this issue either: None of the other cars in my garage have plastic that looks like this



I've been looking for replacement glass, but none for the R53 can be located. Aftermarket complete lights can only be found without washer, and the problem is far too minor to throw new OEM lights at this car. If it ever gets real bad, I'll have to revisit the issue but for now it'll just have to do. It's the "daily driver" after all, for crying out loud!

Here's my winter commuter setup - during our slushy snowy season, the bike did about 1500 miles, the car about 500 miles. picture taken just before the dark silver car came out of hibernation 3 weeks ago (it's on the right under the cover behind the styrofoam board).



Due to lack of parts for the other car's exhaust job, I think I'll tackle the engine damper on this car this weekend.

 

Put the car on the jacks today to pull the weird non-Mini engine harmonic balancer off the car. I had it all prepped until I realized the bolts were still not the wrong size. Had to do a run to Home Depot for some 100mm long M6 bolts, re-cut the rusty threads in the holes provided for pulling the damper so I could finally rig up a proper puller setup. Lubed it up, and started cranking. Hand tool was all it took, unlike the crank bolt that needed impact tools and breaker bar convincing before it gave up the locktite grip. I really want to buy that air compressor - electric impact guns only go so far.

The removal rig with the n0-name damper on the floor


I got curious about the specs, given it is a lot fatter than the OEM (have that on the shelf from the dark silver car), and the new ATI super damper. Diameter does match exactly, here next to the other two
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The interesting part is the weight of each unit

ATI 5.98 lbs


OEM 5.13 lbs


No name part removed 7.14 pounds


now, I don't know what the weight will do for actual balance performance, but I was surprised to see the super damper is actually heavier than OEM. Lots of folks pay money to drop weight from that part of the motor for faster response. Anyway, I am getting that now, given my engine was lugging around an extra pound over ATI and 2 extra pounds over stock. Also making the front end of the car lighter

Last thing I did tonight was to pull the old crank seal and put a new one in. Clean up the motor behind the damper, although the old seal wasn't leaking. All the oil on that side like came from the dip stick tube. Tomorrow I am finishing up with the new damper install. Hot here this weekend. 4 weeks ago it snowed several inches and now its humid and 94F...

 

Messed up my nice K060532 belt when the new balancer went down on the shaft faster than I anticipated (had pre-heated on a griddle), so it squished the belt behind the damper.

So I had to learn how to pull the ATI damper, as the belt was stuck behind it, wedged against the timing chain cover. You need a breaker bar and torx bits to get three of the bolts out of the ATI, then a whole different set of long bolts to attach the puller. I was lucky to have those in my puller case. Got it off, got the belt off, but it's showing markings from the squeeze it got. Oh well, it has seen 1500 miles of service, so probably a good time to replace anyway ;-)

Ordered a timing chain tensioner, too. Guess while I am in the area replace that bugger, too. Need to really do that on the dark silver car, since it has done the crazy rattle when it was real hot after highway travel last fall. This car is newer, but not by a lot of miles.

Putting the damper back on now, but it'll be 2 days before I get a new belt. I had two 535 belts on the shelf, but none for this 17% pulley car... Will get more with the next RockAuto order when it's subframe drop time on this car.

 

I got lots of images of the LED high beam install, but dang it, one of the new H7 bulbs is a dud. So they may have a good price, but you may need to deal with returns, plus there's that chance they won't last very long. Not a huge deal for high beams, but I am now sitting there with one bulb installed and the other side waiting for another Amazon delivery.

Here's the one that needs to be replaced - note the size difference to halogen... it's a very tight fit behind the reflector and you must keep some extra room in all directions to allow for the leveling action to have space for up and down tilt.



My first install attempt shows what the rear of the high beam position looks like with the heat sink straps spread out. Note that I had to swap the bulb position by 180 degrees, since the fat bulge near the edge of the hole prevents the cap from closing even after I dremeled some plastic off the inside of the cap. It then dawned on me that the ring that mounts the bulb allows for that 180 degree swap. Duh.



For an install like this you have to be ready to do this, even if it turned out to be unnecessary. Always take extra time to think these mods through. I was a little too fast with the dremel decision, likely because in this case it doesn't compromise the housing to return to stock.



Installed it looks quite stealth from the outside.



Summary of where I am at with this: The bulbs fit very tight, but with enough careful tucking away of the braided cooling straps and the driver unit located near the side access panel below the high beam reflector, there should be enough room for the self leveling action. That is the most important consideration when placing the LEDs inside the housing. It beats drilling holes and patching them to move the driver outside. In fact, the connectors are so large, the holes would need to be quite large. With the right sealant it may still be on the table should I run into fit meant issues regarding the self leveling. The rear of the bulb is close to the cap, but there should be enough room before the cable makes contact with the cap during leveling. In addition to all these concerns, there's the bulb check coding of the ECU you need to go through to avoid random flashing of your high beams (at startup every time, then every couple of minutes while driving). Getting that feature disabled in the ECU is absolutely essential, or you'll find yourself behind a state trooper on the freeway flashing your extra bright high beams into his rear view mirror...

Why go through all this and deal with fitment and likely reliability issues? I'd never do this just for the cold 6500k light look alone, but these latest generation LEDs are so incredibly brighter than halogen bulbs, it is a total upgrade for your high beams. I am guessing double the output. Not all LEDs are capable to deliver more light than halogens, so unless you know the bulb will outperform the OEM setup, all this work is a complete waste of time only for the brief cold light high beam look. You'd be much better off with a full HID bi-xenon projector swap into the HID housing than what I am doing here, but we're talking daily driver and $50 invested for more light during the few percent of the hours you drive in the dark when you can use high beams. I really only miss extra bright high beams when I travel on remote desert roads in the west, but those few hours every year or two are well worth the extra output, and it saves me slapping external driving lights on the car. I am not really a fan of the look of auxiliary lights on these cars, plus, there' are 6 bulbs in the front of this HID car already. My son in his Chili Red car doesn't share that view, so he will add 4 more lights to the front of the car this summer. Will document how that works out (custom built mounts)