Fender Skirts & Low Profile Headlamps (87 Accord)
 

My first ecomod project was the fender skirts. I made them out of the sheet metal from the top of a S10 cab. I pounded them out on a sand bag with a rubber mallet. They are held on with two 1/4" rods, one at the top and one at the bottom. The bottom rod slips through metal clamps and is drilled and pinned in place. The top rod is held at the front buy one screw in a bracket and in the rear slips through a bracket. So it is only held by two pins and one screw. I only needed to drill one hole on each wheel well for these to mount. I did notice that the car is quieter with the skirts on. My dad says I need to stop watching American Chopper.

I have people ask me "how are you going to change a tire?" I always tell them I have airless tires.

The second mod were the headlamps. After driving at night and realizing I was losing 4 mpg I decided to change them. The headlamps came from a 1996 Grand Prix, cost was $17.00, they are mounted to brackets made from the arms from satellite tv dishes. The lights happened to be the same height as the turn signal/side maker. I am going to weld the light doors on to the hood and put lexan over the lights. I think it already looks better than the pop ups. I did have to also modify the radiator support slightly to make room for the lights. I also used diodes from a bad alternator in the wiring so the low beams would stay on with the high beams. I didn't gain any noticeable mpg but I won't be losing any either.

Geo Storms have the same lights but the bucket was made of plastic. The ones from the Grand Prix are metal so are much easier to work with. Some years of Camaros have them also.

Nice job on the metal work :thumbup: The wheel skirts look good.

Are the grand prix headlights dimmer then most? One of the big things that some are addressing is electrical load. Running both would add an extra 70-110 watts or the equivalent of about 1/7hp if I'm not mistaken. Which could be why you haven't seen noticeable results.

I think they look good by the way. :thumbup:

Thanks. I have had cars before that if the high beams were on the lows were too, I thought they were all that way. You are probably right about the hp loss. But with the original headlights up I lost 4 mpg, so that won't happen now.

This weekend I got the headlights doors welded to the hood and completed the lexan covers for them. Will post pics tomarrow

I had those flip-ups on my last car. (1991 Plymouth Laser RS) At 70 MPH, I could feel the car slow down a little when I hit the raise button.
But, in 1999 I got my Honda CRV and a big load of drag that's always there! :(

Nice headlight swap :thumbup:

I've never liked flip-up headlights and always thought "how much easier would it be just to put properly shaped headlights there?" No complication with extra motors or having them get stuck up/down. Simplicity rules.

Here's the finished product...
 

The results with lexan and doors welded to hood corners. The only thing left would be to make filler panels under the headlights to give it a more finished look. But all in all it turned out good for a $17.00 mod and a little bit of time.

pop-ups
 

For decades in the US,DOT laws forbid carmakers from doing aero headlights,so pop-ups were kind of a compensation.Glad those days are behind us.

I had the exact same car, and wondered about FE night versus day from the headlights popped up. Word from a Honda tech I know is the wiring goes bad and the so do the drive motors on the pop-up doors.

Your new lights look great, same with the skirts!

I sort of checked it during this bonzai run from The SF Bay Area to Wendover UT (Bonneville). I left at 3:am, and I thought I measured about a 1.5mpg decrease because of the lights. But the more I think about it, my test was far from scientific. I was speeding the entire way and going over the Sierra-Nevada mountain range. I can't conclude anything other than at 90mph most of the way, popped up headlight should have decreased my FE :-) LOL

Any ideas on skirts for a '99 Cavalier? I am contemplating this mod.

Gas suckin popups...
 

I checked mileage one time with lights popped up vs daytime with them down. Weather conditions were the same and the pop ups sucked a whopping 4 mpg. That's when I decided to change them. Plus it looks better too.

I think I could actually gain a bit more if I made some flares for the rear doors to smooth the air flow to the skirts. I am sure I will get to that eventually.

I had an '89 Accord and could hear the difference in airflow with the lights popped up.

It's worth mentioning that the mpg hit from the pop up lights up also includes the additional electrical load. So it won't translate exactly to a 4 mpg savings by going to the flush mounts - but it's going to be better than before.

Nice work!

Thanks for the compliments. I am going to start working nights. I will post the difference in night vs day mileage next week.

The power being used by the lamps does eat up some power/HP,
but even if the lights weren't on, I could still feel the heavy drag on my 1991 Laser RS when I hit the Flip-up button.

And, when I was zooming along with them already flipped up, and switched on the power to the lamps,
I really didn't feel much of a drag, if any at all..

What is 200W translated into HP?

Hi Xringer,

200/749 is .267 HP

What many folks don't understand is that those "low" beams are actually low/high beams with dual filaments. Thus, while your "low" beam headlights were on with the highs, they were on high beam, not low beam. The headlights you installed and many new headlights only have a single filament per headlight.

Dang!! Seems like those rap guys with the 800 watt subwoofers are wasting
a considerable amount of gas while annoying everyone in the neighborhood..

Heck, the power going to my high beams could power an E-Bike for miles!!
http://www.ecospeed.net/photos/bike3.jpg

I know this thread is old, but I'm sure since it's linked on the mods thread, people see it, and this quote, which is not wholly correct.

Dual filament bulbs turn off one filament in favor of the other, so only one at a time is on. If they were wired correctly, both could be used, but the heat would destroy them quickly. This is most common with sealed beam single-headlight (per side) designs.

Now, Look at EF/ED Honda Civics (These I know for sure). They're Two-bulb composites (per side).

When you turn the headlights to low beam, the low beams come on. When you turn the headlights to hi-beam, the lows stay on, and the highs come on. Thus, 4 headlight setup, all working at the same time. These bulbs are 9005/9006, by the way, so they're not dual filament bulbs.

While one could argue that this is inefficient, removing the wiring and such to stop this action, and make only the highs come on when the highs are on, and only have the lows on when it's the selection, would ultimately be a waste of time. The physical energy would be better spent utilizing some other method than attempting to gain .1 HP of efficiency loss.

Verdict: Wiring all four headlights to work at the same time in tandem while in hi-beam mode is safer due to added lighted area, and saying that it's a waste of efficiency is simply splitting hairs to find a reason to say someone else was wrong.

BTW, OP, nice job on the hood... looks spiffy as a clean unit. Don't forget to remove the motors and frames under those buckets... extra weight :D

that looks pretty trick, like it came that way from the factory..
gives the front end a more agressive look if ya ask me..

I need to do this to mine. How long did this take to do?
Four more mpg, would be nice. I would bet side mirrors are costing us the same mileage as lights.