Angel Eyes

[Bhav]

Does anyone have the DEPO Projector36™ Performance Euro Ellipsoids + DDE Lightning™ headlights from www.umnitza.com ? If you do, how do they look on your 318ti? Do you have any pics of these headlights on your car that I could have a look at? I want to buy a full replacement headlight unit with the angel eyes already inside, I would like the halo rings to not join at the top and for them to be white and bright. Are there any other angel eyes that are similar to these that are worth buying?

Is it worth spending more money and buying headlights which are made from glass instead of plastic? My car is right hand drive, do I have to buy headlights that are specific for right hand drive cars?

Thanks!

[Viper3812]

Yeah anyone? I'm thinking of buying the same headlights for my ti. You have to get headlights for the door model. 318ti's are 4 door models.

[96ti]

I have the exact same set on my ti. They look awesome. Rings are brite and white. Unlike the LED type rings, flourescent rings illuminate evenly. DEPO housings are made in Taiwain, that's why they are much cheaper than ZKW and Bosh. I dont like the projector's beam patterns; they are not cut evenly as the one you see from an E46 projector. At first, I thought that was the problem of DEPO, but when I look at pictures of ZKW's beam pattern on bimmerforums.com, I see the same problem. DEPO is considered the flea market version of ZKW . Besides that, I am satisfied with the money I spent. By the way, the bulbs included are kind of dark (they are cool blue I think). You may want to replace them with HID or a pair of Sylvania's Silver Star so your head lamps don't look too yellow compared to the super white rings. I have Silver Star on my car, not really bright comepared to HID but much better than regular halogen bulbs.

[justintyme]

Just installed mine this weekend and I will post some pics ASAP for you guys to check out. Here's some other notes...they were shipped right away and arrived to me very quickly. My halos actually have a blue tint to them which is what I had thought to be the norm and that the "pure white" halos are actually an upgrade. The only problem was that the units were wired different internally, so after the initial install it led to some very wacky results. Specifially there are four connectors on the lights: ground, positive, negative and halos and these were wired different for the two units. It added about 2 hours worth of troubleshooting on to what would have been an easy install in about an hour. I would hope and imagine that this is an isolated incident. Anyway...they look really sharp and I am very happy with the look and performance over my old stock set of headlights.

[justintyme]

Hey guys,

Sorry it's been so long! Anyway, I said I would post some pics (being a man of my word) here they are. A few different syles and variations. The color is pretty acurate in that my angel eyes (depot form Umnitza) are a slight blue tint and the headlights are pretty white in color. Hopefully I get them uploaded correctly. Hope this helps you potential buyers out! Any questions let me know.:biggrin:

Justin

[gadgetphreak]

Justintyme, I ordered ZKW's with DDE and the wiring was also all screwed up. I had a fairly lengthy email string with Matt at Umnitza about it as it took me several hours to open up the headlights and fix the wiring mistakes. I was pretty disappointed to have spent as much as I did, completely install all lights and then have to uninstall them and tear them apart to fix the wiring myself. Overall I doubt I would order from him again. His response was they are a good product and they work now so whatever. He was pretty clueless overall about good customer service.

It didn't help my opinion that I was told 3 times that my order had shipped, then when I checked several days later I told it really hadn't shipped but was going out right away... Finally Matt called me and said he would "make it up to me" by sending it 2nd day air. Not sure how that made it up to me since I would have received the order a long time earlier if it had shipped when he said it had. Anyway at the end of the day they agreed to offer me $50 off my next order, which was pretty lame because the impact was to that order.

Maybe if he had offered to somehow compensate me for the hours it took me to uninstall my headlights, tear them apart ,re-wire them correctly (with help from them on the phone), and re-install them, my opinion would have been different...

Anyway, never really vented about this in any detail and felt the need when you said you had a similar experience.

Matt had better figure out what good customer service is and clean up some of the messes his team is making or he is going to lose the good reputation it appears he has had until now... It is much easier to get rid of a good reputation then a bad one.

Cheers,
Gadget

[justintyme]

The only problem was that the units were wired different internally, so after the initial install it led to some very wacky results. Specifially there are four connectors on the lights: ground, positive, negative and halos and these were wired different for the two units. It added about 2 hours worth of troubleshooting on to what would have been an easy install in about an hour.

Not to speak for someone else, but I have been PM'ing with Bhav, and I do believe that Bhav has had the same wiring problem. With myself, Bhav, and Gadget that would make at least 3 people so maybe this isn't as isolated of an issue as I had orginally proposed.

Here's the way that mine were ACTUALLY wired. I think the driver side was the same as the instructions and then passenger unit required a different set up.

Driver side unit (as viewed from rear of unit) - green at 12 o'clock, red at 3 o'clock, black at 6 o'clock, and white at 9 'oclock.

Passenger (as viewed from rear of unit) - red at 12 o'clock, black at 3 o'clock, white at 6 o'clock, and green at 9 o'clock.

Anyone else who has or plans to purchase the lights and runs into the same problem, this will save you a huge headache! (That is assuming that the wiring problem is the same on all units)

I have also has some "condensation" in one of the units, which I from what I understand is a problem with the sealing on the headlight and requires some additional sealant to prevent again.

I guess for me that the jury is still out as my overall satisfaction with the product.

[Bhav]

That is very unlucky. I am still waiting for a replacement ballast to arrive from Umnitza because when I finally figured out the wiring inside each of the headlights the drivers’ side angel eyes did not come on due to one of the ballasts had been damaged. This is because it had been wired up incorrectly. I followed the instructions on the Umnitza website which is obviously useless.

I found the after sales service ok from Umnitza once I encountered the problem as they replied quickly to all emails etc... The headlights took over 3 weeks to be delivered and I paid for global express delivery. I was also told it was shipped on different days, I was charged £65 in customs charges to the UK (but that is not Umnitza's fault). Also Umnitza have sent out replacement ballast without kicking up a fuss but I should be entitled to that as their wiring diagrams are incorrect.

I just can't wait to get my lights installed on my car because they have been sat in my kitchen for over a week now. I'll have to see how satisfied I am with the product once they are installed.

[Bhav]

I have installed my Depo headlights on my car and am impressed with the way they look. The only problem I have, is the main beam and full beam light looks very yellow compared to the bright white light from the halo rings. I just bought a pair of upgraded H7 bulbs which are supose to give out white light (I think the colour temp is about 5000k) but they still look yellow compared to my halo rings.

I am debating whether to buy some xenon bulbs with a colour temp of 8500k to see if these are any better. What do you think?

[schussey]

looks great, good call on ordering from umnitza. Anybody seen umnitza's new "predator" halos? They look pretty sick.

-chris