ATL ZHP - A TiAg Owner's Chronicle

[zj96sc]

As I see it, we've got probably 4 options:

1 - ensure you purchase at an extremely competitive price, somewhere in the neighborhood of KBB private party fair to good, for a well maintained car. If the car requires maintenance, adjust price accordingly such that your fully invested price to get the car to "retail" mechanical condition falls near KBB fair/good.

2 - when obtaining an insurance quote, have the insurer provide the "actual cash value" or "fair market value" that they're insuring the car for, or ensure that you're obtaining a full "replacement value" policy. If the values to not agree at that time, adjust accordingly with the corresponding increase in premium, if the company will even do this for you. a corollary here, as dane mentioned, is to definitely obtain a GAP plan in the case that you're heavily financed.

3 - accept moving forward and operating the car at some degree of financial risk

4 - choose not to own a ZHP

The 1st option is largely within our control and just requires you to be diligent in your search...and is probably good advice in the first place.

The 2nd option is something that never really dawned on me to ever do, but given this experience I feel that this may be quite critical for the ZHP.

The 3rd option is probably not the end of the world as the chances of this situation affecting most of us are relatively low in the grand scheme of things.

The 4th option is just heresy.

[Marcus-SanDiego]

I know the E30 M3 guys had similar issues as their cars were going up in value. Insurance companies were not friendly.

Any E30 M3 owners have a story to tell? Any helpful hints?

Good work, Paul.

[95m3ltw]

I went through this when my E36 M3 LTW was totaled. State Farm offered blue book for a 95 M3 which was something like $20k at the time. I told the adjuster I would be sending 10 ads for LTW's and a bit of information for him to educate himself to the differences between normal M3s and LTWs. I also scanned the window sticker showing the $15k difference in price. Next day they raised the offer to $32k which I thought was more than fair.

With a ZHP, it might be a tad difficult justifying the difference since it is only a option package and not a model. While I dont know the legal side of things, I have found when push comes to shove, they typically pay the book value. I've known individuals who have gotten a few thousand more based on proof of condition and service records etc. Squeaky wheel gets the grease kind of thing.

[zj96sc]

updated photo links for e90 bowl retrofit as requested.


Big update!

So I pulled both headlights apart. I found both xenon bulbs to be quite cloudy, driver’s being the worst:



I also found that my driver’s bowl was indeed burned (right) but the passenger bowl was actually still in perfect shape (for now anyway):







I did a lot of reading on all of the possible solutions, including just putting new ZKW bowls back in, swapping to AL assemblies and buying the 3-wire bixenon controllers, doing a lightwerkz retrofit, on and on, and finally stumbled across a guy on E46F, member “fgin,” who claimed that E90 projectors were a 90% plug and play kind of swap, minimal drilling, no JB welding, etc. ZKW got their head out of the sand and made the e90 bowls out of metal. They also use an identical in function and design bixenon solenoid with connectors that accept the E46 wiring. E90 projectors pop up on ebay for about $30 without bulbs, so this sounded like it was worth a shot. Ordered two for $70 shipped.

How they arrive (along with my headlight and the tools I needed):



First you have to unbolt the adaptive lightning motor:



Then drive the adaptive lighting hinge pins out with a long thin screwdriver + hammer:



Unscrew the two screws holding the bixenon shutter on, then use a thin screwdriver to separate the bixenon shutter from the bixenon shutter solenoid actuator pin:







Using a thin screwdriver, lift the retaining tab on both sides of the bixenon solenoid, and slide it off of its tracks:





Remove the last 4 torx screws holding in the bowl:



Now you’re down to just the plastic frame, which is ready for you to modify as needed:



At this point, I’ll have to use some of fgin’s pics. I didn’t take pictures as I worked through driver’s side as I planned to do all the pictures on the passenger assembly. When I got my passenger OEM bowl out to find it wasn’t burned, I had already assembled the drivers’. So here are pics of where the plastic frame needs to be modified (3 holes drilled, adaptive arm cut off, few other trimmings), all credit to fgin on E46F (his link here: http://www.e46fanatics.com/forum/sho...d.php?t=845704)



Once you’ve completed those mods, the basket will hold the bowl and attach to your projector lens perfectly. The only remaining issue is that the E90 projectors use D1S bulbs whereas E46s use D2S bulbs. To remedy this issue, you have to modify the bulb holder (piece of bent wire). The bulb sits in the socket fine. Fgin’s design used some screws which I didn’t like. I wanted it to be 100% removable by hand. I spent a solid 1.5 to 2 hours farting around with this wire, but eventually bent up a shape that retained the D2S bulb in the D1S socket very solidly (let's see if someone can spot the cap from the medicine i needed to stay calm while bending this stupid wire) :







Reassemble all and here is the pattern you get:



Note that the mirror smooth reflector design of the e90 (driver’s) has a much smoother light output pattern from the center of the output down whereas the angled reflector bowl of the e46 ZKW (passenger) produces noticeable patterns in the light below center. They’re not a 100% match, but I don’t care. These are like daylight compared to what I had before.

I actually realized when my passenger headlight was out that the bixenon solenoid was pretty rough in movement and feeling, so I replaced it with the smooth feeling unit from my now-junk driver’s bowl.

I’ve filled both lights with 4300K replacement bulbs from Khoalty. I plan to order some Philips 4300K at some point as the bulbs from Khoalty are no-name Chinese bulbs, I question their reliability and don’t want it as an asterisk in my head down the line. I also spent a good bit of time polishing both the bowls and lenses with a microfiber. Both shined up quite a bit, the lenses especially were just plain dirty.

So there you go. For $70 for two E90 projector assys, and about 3 hours of fiddling with drill bits, torx drivers, and pliers, you can remedy the ZKW bowl flaw permanently with all OEM parts, retain bixenons, no JB weld and no codes. Do it.

Paul