PIAA 520 to 520 SMR conversion complete!

[mattadams]

The swap of all six 520's on my F-150 this morning took about an hour, and most of that was uninstalling the lights that were in the airdam and reinstalling them. All it involved was popping off the grill cover, loosening two screws and popping out the lens, removing the bulb and putting it in the new lens, then installing the new lens into the same housing. Later I am going to install some new bulbs, the PIAA Xtreme White line, and I'll let you know how those compare to the standard bulbs. I haven't had a chance to take any pictures at night yet, but they appear to be much brighter then the standard yellow lights.
They differ from the 520 in a few ways. The standard 520's differentiate from fog to driving based on the lens. The reflector is virtually the same. On the 520 SMR's they feature identical lenses, and the difference between driving is made by the reflector and the bulb housing. The driving is a virtually smooth reflector to focus the light directly in front of it. The fog's are quite different. First off the light from the bulb has a reflector directly in front of it, which mirrors the lights back to the reflector, which has a few contours in it to bounce the light outwards. Here's what they look like (i know the pics are kind of poor, I promise to take better ones soon)

This is the fog light.

This is the driving light.

Here are some before/afters.

If anyone is interested in getting the 520 SMR's or just the replacement lenses, I should have prices on them for the group purchase soon.

 

[Diablo3305]

what exactly is the difference between the SMR's and the normal 520's?

 

[mattadams]

Originally posted by Diablo3305
what exactly is the difference between the SMR's and the normal 520's?

Diablo... and I'm quoting directly from my above post here... They differ from the standard 520 in a few ways. The standard 520's differentiate from fog to driving based on the lens. The reflector is virtually the same. On the 520 SMR's they feature identical lenses, and the difference between driving is made by the reflector and the bulb housing. The driving is a virtually smooth reflector to focus the light directly in front of it. The fog's are quite different. First off the light from the bulb has a reflector directly in front of it, which mirrors the lights back to the reflector, which has a few contours in it to bounce the light outwards.

 

[Diablo3305]

hmmm i feel stupid..haha i must have totally been obliviuos when I wrote that, since you already explained the difference....haha thanks anyway matt... Im hoping to get a pair this summer sometime, hopefully the group purchase will still be available..

 

[taxx]

Where do you get the clear lenses to change from the amber to clear?

 

[mattadams]

anyone that carries PIAA lights can typically order PIAA parts, these are just replacement lenses.

 

[RoadEnforcer]

what the hell do you do with all of those lights?