My wife's 2011 Mini Cooper countryman s is having a weird problem. 1st the drivers side headlight went out (xenon headlights) and now the wipers don't work. I disconnected battery negative to swap out bulb reassmembled and still not working. Took it apart again and put back in original bulb and everything worked. Went for a drive all was fine get home park turn car back on and headlight dead and wipers don't work.


We replaced battery about 6 months ago, all the fuses look good. What is wrong with this thing?

 

left field thing to check but ....

recently a guy brought his car to me cuz one headlight was out and a new bulb did not fix it.

I pulled the bulb holder and discovered all the insulation on the wires inside the light housing had crumbled off and bare wires were touching shorting the thing out.

I checked the other side and the same thing was happening but wires had not touched yet ....

when wires start touching and you get shorts or grounds all sorts of weird things can happen . . .

p.s. the only solution was new headlight housings . . . unless you wanted to try to take the headlight housing apart and rewire. This item is sold as a unit ....

 

had to take it in turns out it was a bad ground wire, $375 later and works fine.

 

Very interesting! With electrical things it's a good call to check grounds so glad you were able to figure out your issue. Thanks for updating your thread with your issue as it may come in handy for someone in the future.

 

375 is right around the cost of an OE headlight housing . . . .

one with a bad ground???????