How to Paint Tesla Model S Headlights: Black Bezels and a Frosted DRL (DIY, About $35)

0:00I

0:30Alright, so we have the car right here looking all good, looking all prepped.

0:47The first thing you have to do is you actually have to remove the front bumper and it's

0:50actually pretty easy.

0:51You don't have to jack the car up or anything, you just have to put the car

0:56and high mode. suspension very hot. That should give us some clearance on the

1:02front. Just to clear some tabs so there's just like there's ten tabs on the

1:08bottom, two screws, two torque screws on the sides, so one and push-tabs on the

1:15bottom and then right here there's about like two tens or something like

1:18There's intents of this. That's all it really takes to remove the front bumper

1:29All the tabs in the bottom next thing you want to do is remove the torque screws

1:34Torke screws are pretty easy. There's like one right here one on the other side. So let me show you

1:40I don I donöff for my torx kit,

1:42but you can use an Allen key and

1:44I'm using a 1 8th

1:47You should be and it's reallyt hard, it's hard to see, but it's where the fender and

1:52bumper meets up.

2:17tool. And that exposes the headlights. That way the bumper can come off. Clips off. Let's see if we can just pull this bad boy off, off. More, more clips. So the next thing

2:45you guys want to do is you're going to remove the 10s. There's two, one on each headlight.

2:50So let's start crack-moving. That's already loose. And this one's already good too. Cool.

3:03So it's starting to remove the headlight. Just to remove the headlight. So the way these tabs work on my car is, so it's plugged

3:13and it's a little bit easier to show you one side of the car but you just pretty

3:18get some kind of tool and you probably see how it goes back a little bit you

3:22pry it open like this then some just one person what I'm gonna do is remove

3:27there's one ten right here one ten there's not ten right here yet to

3:32remove and then there's one ten right this bracket and then there's another ten right

3:39here and I don't think you even need to remove the whole bumper. It's kind of a

3:44pain in the butt to remove. Make sure because there's so many sensors, autopilot,

3:50parking sensors, and so forth. Just make sure you have everything kind of

3:54or on this area and then just remove this

4:00this group for screws

4:06they will do without take out the bumper I just pulled

4:11and this is

4:12the bad bull right here in question that we need a change now we just got on this

4:17side for you remove that he said or anything you want to remove this group

4:21first right?

4:22I'm using 7mm, but I'm pretty sure it's something Imperial.

4:27It's not a metric bolt.

4:29Alright, so we have the little workbench set to the headlight.

4:33We're going to be basically removing the adhesive, but my friend Greg over here does a lot of

4:39of headlight.

4:40I passed it on to him because he has more skill and experience and

4:45than me doing it and having it

4:50I will use a basic tool, a heat gun, which I got from Harbor freight by the way, and

4:59a flat head screwdriver, also from the Harbor freighter, and an inch and a quarter,

5:01also from Harbor Freight and inch and a quarter this is like a paint scraper tool

5:07tool inch and a quarter the width that doesn't matter the width I like the width

5:11because you don't make no pry marks on the headlight and it's also bent so

5:16it's doesn't bend easy I got this for 10 years already and it's still

5:22working first thing first but he gonna in so your goal is to heat around the

5:30headlight and that even continuous motion you don't want to stay too long in one

5:35spot because you could burn the plastic or the lens and you have and go around the

5:42for about 10 minutes not all the headlights that they have a clear code

5:59from the factory the lens do and some clear-code are strong and they could take

6:05take heat some clear code are bad and they cannot take they have like if you put

6:10in the oven for 10 minutes that they get a spider web effect or it looks like

6:13somebody sanded it oh I see some of the some of the site or they have like bubbles

6:18it makes the plastic a lot weaker that's very BMW Mercedes Ford is well known

6:24for that Japanese car they're more safer to put them in the oven but not all the

6:29Japanese car like I say Nissan Central has a European head that's not a

6:30like I say Nissan Centra has a European head that's not a Japanese head

6:34I had seen the spider web cracking on a the newer Toyota MR2 spider the bigger

6:40headlights yeah they're really big and that if you put it in the oven it'll

6:44accelerate it all right it's been 10 minutes put it on the side for now

7:01take a flathead screwdriver where are you gonna start? we're gonna start I'm gonna a

7:07start on this side of the headlight on the bottom before we break it we

7:12start on a bottom go all the around your goal is to remove the glue or unpin the

7:18glue from the glass at least on this side of the groove then what they will

7:24there will heat it up again and do it inside

7:27I should've got my

7:38forget the clothes oh yeah your goal is just to go all the way around the

7:44headlight and get the get the glue loose from one side of the headlight or one

7:51side of the how do you say bitch what do you call this if you can see right here

7:58better yeah I move it like that from the lens

8:05loosen the glue on one side the other side you can't listen because you can't

8:09get to it but do get where loosen the glue where you can do that upper part now

8:18and don't over bend it to you don't want to over bend it play with it I don't know

8:36if you could zoom in but you could see right here how the glue unsticks from

8:41the lens if you move that's what you're looking for if it's

8:47if it's not unstickin that means you're cutting the glue you don't want to cut it

8:50you want to unstick okay from the lens from the from the lens yeah

8:54it looks like you're you don't you don't want to unstick from this mean you

8:58you will eventually want to unstick from the plastic the housing but your first

9:02goal is to unstick from the lens once you remove the lens then you'll stick

9:05from the plastic we're gonna pretty much just go all the way around and then move

9:17on from there, now we use the flathead and loosen all the outside

9:24edge all the way around the headlight and the work time is only 10 minutes so we had

9:33and we'll pry it from inside after this. Take a heat gun and heat it up.

9:44Alright it's been 10 minutes

9:47the second heating stage is done this we'll try to remove a temp to remove the

9:54headlight lens apart from the housing so I'll start on this side right here

10:15man the headlights hot still again you see that oh yeah I

10:31I see that he's right from the black housing mm-hmm looks like this

10:36I still oh I see it yeah that was a big one so you just do it just enough but don't

10:50don't don't bend don't over bend the plastic so if you see me I I go slowly a a little bit

10:55little bit not too much I don't go like like all the way around the plastic I

10:58take it like this so you could take it like you could you could spin it like

11:03that it's safer it might grab you might not

11:06grab it's a bit better better be better be safe I'm sorry

11:13you can look over here

11:20see that's on going from behind it goes slowly it's not a fast thing you can

11:26actually see that piece of bull every time you yeah so that's what you what

11:29you're looking for you can see it from the inside you might not see the

11:32the place is not moving but you see that so now that I know this part

11:46already it's taken even though you can't tell I could easily take a flathead screwdriver driver

11:50and bend it out of place without bending the plastic because it's very important

11:56to loosen the outside first this is the outside up this plastic we're here

12:03up this plastic over here where the tabs are is a strong sectional plastic so you

12:16could pry it right here without being worried and it's you like this tab is

12:20holding take your other hand and just move it out of the way so it looksc

12:36we got half of the headlight from here to here so bottom section is loosened

12:42the glue is hot but not hot enough for it to be right so we'll heat it up again for

12:47another seven minutes this all right seven minutes past this is the third time

12:57hope hopefully I'll take it apart this time so get this edge

13:04Okay looks like it's holding here by thread already so much

13:27Oh, pops out. This looks good. Oh, looks nice. Yeah, it is built in. Yes, you see how

13:34looks good looks nice yeah it is built in yes you see how I wanted to paint the

13:40frost part but unfortunately it's basically like it's built in they painted the

13:45thing this is this is separate you have to take that apart you could take this one

13:49apart and paint it separately but the glass is built in with the bezel it's just

13:54the part of it scrum probably part of a square done they have a regular LED

14:03cool. They have regular LED diffuser so this is good quality. Yeah these actually last really long.

14:09The newer one the LED headlights. I've seen these parts being burnt on the new ones.

14:18Okay. The older headlights, I guess they...

14:20. Is this like a turn signal?

14:21That's the daytime running light.

14:23Does your have it? No, yours has it right here.

14:26The neural model section has it broke.

14:29That's cool, I've seen it.

14:30models have this section as a both day and turn signal I'm pretty sure this could be

14:34swapped to the newer one if you have a new headlight broken yeah that's an idea

14:42huh that's an idea all right so the lens are nice and frost I'm gonna let it sit for a

14:56bit before I mask it off and paint it black but um yeah that's how it looks like it's

15:03for when it's frosted it's not as clear it's a lot a little bit more opaque kind of

15:10see my finger you can do more coats I actually did ten so yeah hopefully the

15:17black will make it pop out a little bit more I wanted to meet more frosty but this

15:22is how I do it all right so we just it is still a little bit wet so we took it when

15:45I was a little bit a little bit wet but look at that it's beautiful it's

15:50definitely frosted and you can kind of see the way the light hits the camera

15:55even exaggerate to even more that's clean that's that's sick dude all right now

16:04we'll clean this glue off remove it from here from inside the groups you don't

16:12have to but I will take the DRLs off using a seven millimeter bolts head to

16:22remove the bolts and I noticed one thing they're missing one of both from factory

16:27I guess somebody who did their job forgot to put one of both in pretty much it

16:33okay now take a five-head screwdriver and we'll start removing the glue caution

16:49and the glue is hot you're trying to get underneath the glue okay now just pull

17:11Now just pull it and when it starts ripping, take a screwdriver and help it out like this.

17:19It's beautiful.

17:49and the Morimoto looks like this and then we put it inside the grooves or how do you the call

18:01that dish what do you call that I like to use this I like to use this electric

18:08vacuum duster it's straight it pulls air through this filter so you don't have

18:14condensation so it's clean air when it blows and just blow the, the dust from inside of the head off.

18:36So you just kind of like just massage it in huh? I just want to make sure.

18:40I'll make sure it's aligned well, but it wasn't aligned there well, but then I'll heat it up a little bit more by 5 minutes again, I would do a continuous motion, you don't want to burn one side of the head like I'm pushing in together and make sure the tabs are popping it

19:03together make sure the tabs are popping it yeah the tabs

19:12man we're gonna do the bottom man the glue is heated so this is what allows us to get that extra

19:19I just want this one's a broken tab we'll do this one over here you can still clamp it though right

19:29yeah I have clamps that I'll clamp it you should see rich rebuilds his is

19:33You should see this rebuild his is leaking everywhere. I don't know

19:38I don't like that award

19:48And then we

19:56I don't like the gap, so I'm going to clamp it here too.

20:00I'm a clamper here too this one here I like to clamp it sideways because it has a

20:05groove ditch, ditch inside with some of it that to clamp it sideways so we're just gonna clamp it every spot we could it's coming out yeah we're heating for

20:18it up right with those clamps on it and the clamps are pushing it down and the

20:21glue seeping out which is good you want the good seat that you see that the lines

20:28perfect no gap for here it looks back like factory original yeah the clips are

20:33put down just go all the way around for another two minutes and then have it let

20:42it let it cool down for easily 30 minutes before the four you remove the

20:47clips so we're waiting for the headlights to dry real quick before we put

21:03Everything has been gone super smoothly, yeah the whole experience has been great, easy, fun,

21:10okay not easy, pretty technical especially when it's windy or you're waiting for paint

21:14to dry, it can get dusty because you don't have a paint booth and stuff like that.

21:19But yeah I mean overall the cost hasn't been too much so you guys can definitely

21:23do it.

21:24was 5, the black was like 8 bucks, 5-8 bucks. The frosted paint was not like 5-8 bucks. So let's the total be 20 bucks for the paint after taxes and everything.

21:36And then the adhesive part. I don't know how much it cost but we'll put a link right here.

21:42Definitely if you're local to me, check out Greg. Dude, he's been super helpful.

21:47And we're about to put these headlights back on once they're nice and clear.

21:51but uh other than that man wow i'm going to be excited by the way it's going to look

21:54i think it's on absolutely gorgeous and a block far and um

21:59i definitely want a two uh let me perhaps black out that area the area too but you know

22:02back out that area too but you know let's do the baby steps first because oh we got

22:06the headlights back at home base and they are looking fresh so let's get these guys in

22:15so we're in the final process just wrapping things up of course blue tape

22:18everywhere can't keep everything protected all the lights work see if I can

22:24demonstrate that real quick DRLs, HIDs, new CBBs,

22:33Now everything is pretty killer.

22:40Puttin' everything back, puttin' everything back.

22:45All right, the headlights are done folks.

22:48open my garage. Thank you Greg. Don't forget to check out his Instagram. He came in real good

22:59good. And here are the lights. Definitely more defined. It's just sick and with the

23:08CBBs they're a lot brighter and the things finally. They finally match the DRLs now which is all

23:16No social plus, still need to buff up the thing.

23:21Yeah, check those bad boys out.

23:25Now, I'm not done with the car yet.

23:27So there's definitely gonna be a modification

23:28still coming through, whether it's a front

23:30whethero whether it's a frontbumpa refresh or a the front lit you guys just have to

23:35wait and see anyways hopefully this was helpful there was never a really detailed

23:41video on how to get that frosted look and yeah I think we achieved that today

23:46boys thank you guys for watching see you guys in the next one