So I'm a total newb here lol. So stick with me here.

Got a 2004 mini Cooper with regular halogen head lamps.

My understanding is that I can swap them out for oem hid light housings.

True??

Does it matter what year they come from? It seems like all the housing for any year or model are interchangable?

On my way to pick up now.



So My main question is. Any other Modding needed to get these to work? And do I need to install the washers? Cause I don't have them on my current car and don't need them

thanks

 

If you have halogens and want to change to OEM HIDs you will need to have your ECU flashed for the HID upgrade. Any BMW/MINI Service place should have the proper software to do it.

 

Oh ic. Anyone know how much that runs?

Will they nit work at all unroll the flash or just an bulb out light?

 

Technically you need to reprogram the body module and wire the headlight levelers and washer system.

But I can tell you that in reality you don't have to do that. Just install the new Xenon lights and plug them in. The connectors are the same and they will work. But you will have to make sure you adjust them so they don't blind on coming traffic since you won't have levelers, but they will work fine. I've done this swap both ways. So I know it will work.

 

Nice! Good info thanks. Any linky to a diy how adjust the xeons??? I don't see how you could aim them since they attached to the hood??

 

There are adjustment screws on the back of the housing. Once you look back there you'll be able to tell what I'm talking about. They stick out pretty far and look like the straight end of a hexwrench is poking out of the back of the plastic housing. One screw is for vertical adjustments and the other for horizontal adjustments.

 

I think it depends what year. I had an 03 w/ halogens, and swapped for a set of 04 xenons. They worked great. I then swapped those out for a set of 05 xenons and they worked as well.

While investigating before I made the purchase, I found a few threads about the subject. Search around a little. I think it depends what year your car is, whether you are going from hals to xenon, and what year the xenons. I read that some people had issues going from 04 xenon to 05 xenon, but just needed a CPU flash, but going from 02-04 hals to 05 xenon didn't. Let me do some searching and confirm this...

 

Here's a thread I started when I looked into this as well..

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...s-diaries.html

From what everyone posted, these are the results:

02-04 cooper w/ hals ----> 02-04 xenons ***YES
02-04 cooper w/ xenons ----> 05+ xenons ***YES
02-04 cooper w/ hals ----> 05+ xenons ****NO
05+ cooper w/ hals ----> 05+ xenons ****NO

And in my case, I later remember that I used the guts from my 02-04 xenons in my 05 xenons. The original wiring was used, which is why it worked.