headlight replace

[greenie60]

I have a 87 Daimler '40' and the near side headlight had filled with water and was a golden brown colour !
I bought another one, breeze block size and shape type. simple 4 nuts to remove and bulb disconnect so I thought.
with all the millions of pounds development jag put into this model what idiot thought it would be a good idea to capture the head of the mounting bolts by surrounding them with the flimsiest and most brittle plastic known to man ! and then to hide the heads so you cant get on them to stop them turning.
job done after hours of grinding/cutting/swearing and butchery

[BrianG]

It gets even more annoying if you have an XJ40 Sport with the twin headlamps on each side, as mine was. Some years ago I had the misfortune to hit a pheasant on the nearside pair. Expecting some cracked glass and scarred paint, I was pleased to find everything looked fine. Then, back home, I found that the headlamps were all flopping around on their mountings: the plastic leveller/adjuster clips had completely broken and fallen out. Needless to say you can't buy replacement plastic bits, so I had to bit the bullet and fork out for a new twin headlamps unit in its mounting frame assembly. Then, as you found, the fun starts when trying to remove the old bits before you can fit the new bits. I gave up and transferred the new plastic bits to the old frame!

[RichardSEL]

So it turned into a bit of an unpheasant job then...

[steve_m]

Luckily they are still bred to be shot otherwise they would have been extinct a long time ago.
Stupidest creatures ever but very tasty.

[PeterDavisX300]

Just a thought. Plastic, whether clips or captive are very less brittle when warm. So even a hair-dryer pointed at the plastic mounting will make it very less brittle or more malleable. If you're outside like me in very North Scotland weather, these items become a norm' for use. I regularly use a 'Heat-Gun' for these types of jobs, the plastic clips, (especially those on the exact headlight mountings that are talked about, that I have successfully replaced on my 24 Y.O. X300) just ease-off because they are so much warmer and easy to work with. Don't get too close with a heat-gun though, it could easy melt the plastic.

[greenie60]

unfortunately heat will expand the plastic quicker than the steel bolt head so the gap will increase between the bolt head and plastic.
if I had a welding set I would have tacked another bolt on to the stud so the new bolt head would have given me a hex head to put a spanner on then wound off the existing nut onto the new bolt then cut it apart. don't have a welder though.
I think the drivers headlight is on its way out too so prepping myself mentally for that job