As the title says, I picked up a set of reflector type OEM HIDs for my 03 Cooper and the driver side is not working. I've tried swapping ballast, bulb, and even plugging the headlight assembly onto the passenger side, but nothing is working. Did I get a busted unit or am I doing something wrong? The passenger side plugged in and turned on without any problems. Even after swapping bulbs and ballast, it still works. I'm not sure what year the headlight came off of as I bought it through ebay and he never stated the year.

 

Plug your passenger side into your driver side to test if the wiring is okay. If it works, it must be the ignitor since thats the only thing you haven't checked.

 

I will give that a try tonight and see what happens.

 

This guy on HIDPLANET.com is selling some ignitors for $25 each or $40 for both! Its a reputable site. They are the Bosch gen. 1 ignitors, which are hard to find, let alone at that price.

http://www.hidplanet.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=38199

GL

 

Burley,

How would I wire it up? I'm not sure which wires from the harness I would have to splice into.

 

Isn't the igniter and ballast the same thing on the Cooper or is there a seperate igniter that connects to the ballast?

 

I don't really know, but RealOEM diagrams only show the "Control Unit" as one piece. *shrugs* I'm sure someone here knows what's going on though.

 

After doing some research, it looks like the headlight does have an igniter inside the headlight housing. From the looks of it, removing the igniter will be a bit of a challenge.

Burley,

Since you've pulled apart the whole assembly before, is it possible to remove the igniter without having to pull apart the whole headlight assembly?

 

There are holes right next to the ignitor, but its too big to fit through, and its screwed in. You really do have to pull the whole thing apart. Also, the 02-04 xenons have ignitors inside the headlight, and the 05+ have them attached to the bulb.

Best way to go about this is to bake the headlight to pull off the lens, then take everything apart, There should only be 2 wires which you have to solder, and 1 plug an play harness that plugs right in. The soldering and splicing shouldn't be as hard as taking the headlight apart...

good luck, its kinda a pain in the ***. There are several tabs I broke in the process.

 

But ofcourse,

test the headlights before putting all the parts together when you are done!

 

If you asked a few weeks ago, I could have taken pics when they were apart. There are basically 3 major parts.

1. housing
2. reflector - connected by 3 plastic sockets that snap apart
3. shrouding - connect w/ several tabs into the housing where the lens does.

take your time and shoot me an email if you want to make sure you're doing it right. In some thread, I posted all the pieces I broke. It was a lot... like 10-12. I'd buy some JB Qwik to have ready.. bonds in 4 minutes & rock hard.

Take breaks, and dont drink and mod... Thats how I broke most of the pieces

 

Burley,

I maybe asking you on how you took apart the headlights later on. I'm working with the guy that sold me the headlight to get me a replacement, but if that falls through, I'm going to have to take it apart and put in a new ignitor.

 

I have a few extra parts incase you break anything. Last a checked, I have 2 glass lenses, 2 plastic lenses (for the housing), and a few plastic brackets that hold the reflectors onto the housing (this is what usually breaks when taking apart).

It would be MUCH easier to get the seller to replace the broken headlight. Was it ebay? If so, you can always get them involved. If you used paypal, they help you out w/ refunds as well.

 

I found him through ebay and paid him through paypal. I've contacted him numerous times without a response, but I told him that I will file a dispute through paypal if he don't respond by the end of this week. Will keep you posted.

 

Paypal's pretty good about refunding. They can actually take money from his account and give it to you. Keep all your emails, to and from, on file. They may want them.

I'd just file now w/ ebay and paypal to get the ball rolling. I have no patience w/ ebay sellers these days. I get blown off all the time once they get the $. Filing a dispute seems to be the only thing they respond to.

Good luck!

 

I went ahead and opened a dispute regarding the headlights. Now I wait.