This weekend I completed a front-end refresh on my E46 M3 that I started thinking about last year. Last March I sent my headlights to Lightwerkz and had more modern projectors retrofitted into the stock assemblies. That got me thinking about what else up front should be refreshed.
So this weekend I replaced the plastic lenses on both headlights, all rubber gaskets, the trim pieces below the headlights, and the corner lights. The prices were pretty reasonable by BMW standards. The lenses weren’t original or in terrible shape. The owner I bought the car from in 2014 had replaced them at some point. But nothing looks new after 11 years and on the E46 the lenses simply clip on, unlike subsequent models where this job would be far more complicated. The trim pieces below the headlights, sometimes called beauty strips, were original and a little worse for wear.
The best videos I found detailing the process were from The 50sKid and FCP Euro. There were a lot of variations in the videos I found. FCP didn’t mention how the driver-side headlight had to come out with the HID ignitor, 50sKid removed the front bumper (!) and was the only one to show gasket replacement. Other videos showed how to replace the lens without removing the headlight from the car. I was familiar with removing the headlights from last year and decided to make any game-time decisions required.
I ended up splitting the difference. I fully removed the passenger-side headlight to make the swaps. On the driver-side I did the work with the headlight on the car, avoiding the hassle of removing the ignitor along with the headlight assembly. There were pros and cons to both methods. It was easier to remove and replace the beauty strip with the headlight on a table. But of course, I had to reinstall it, and there is always a little back and forth needed to get the lower attachment points to line up.
Obviously, leaving the headlight on the car removes that hassle and can save time. But there is less room to attach the trim piece, and it’s harder to reach some of the clips that secure the lens. You need to be careful with 20 year old BMW plastic. A tip for the next DIYer out there – the new, fuller gaskets make it very hard to push the lens in far enough to get the clips to catch. You just have to be careful and use some force.
Some pictures below of my M3 front-end refresh. For a total refresh I need to replace my fog lights, which I’ll eventually get around to doing. There is a DIY next weekend and I’m replacing the sensor that controls the movement of the headlight projectors. I’ll update this post to include that work.
UPDATE 4/18 – Another excellent DIY event at BimmerWerks in Beltsville, MD. The owner Amr was a generous host sharing his expertise with club members. I replaced the front headlight level sensor and arm on my car. I also replaced all the 20-year old wheel lug bolts and replaced the recently changed oil filter with the proper Mahle OX 187.
Unfortunately, the new sensor didn’t solve the problem of the headlights getting misaligned each time I turned them on. I knew this was a possibility but the swap was inexpensive and easy to do. For now I’ll stay with my low-rent solution. Simply unplugging the leveling motors keeps the lights at the perfect height. We do what we have to for these modern-day classics!
