My HID conversion kit has arrived :)

[sdavidwh]

Well, it's arrived, just got to work out how to wire it up now. I cant do it just yet as my car is currently in the paint workshop having the near side re-sprayed after it was keyed so wont get it back until tomorrow.

I'll post some pics of before & after

Here is the kit



Sourced the kit from here for £61 delivered after some discount. I went for the brand new 5000k bulbs (not on his website yet)
http://www.brightelectrics.com/index...&product_id=57

Dave

[jasonb]

HID is one of the easier takes to under-take.

Just drill a round hole in the back of the access panel on the Headlamps.
I think this is about 20-22mm, will be in your instructions.
The rest is plug and play.

The only challenge is where to hide the ballasts.
Since you have "two" boxes on either side (guessing one is a resistor?), you might find it more interesting!

S40/V50's with Bi-Xenons had the ballast modules secured under the plastic wheel arch liners.

Personally speaking, I am planning to re-locate mine in the bumper area when I replace the bumper shortly.

For the time being, mine are just "bodged" in place in the engine bay.

5000K is going to give you a near OEM colour, good choice :-)
OEM being 4300K but when the bulbs exceed 2000 hours, they can become 5000K'ish.

[andy_d]

those ballast's look tiny compared to some.

[y2blade]

I'm interested in fitting HIDs to mine...will be keen to hear if yours throws up the error messages (others have experienced) before I make any purchase

[SinspeedLtd]

They Slim digital ballasts, we used to stock them as well - now we stock the Super Slim ones which shave off about 2mm in depth and 2mm in length

Fitting them up is easy, all the plugs that you see will interconnect with eachother.. i.e. the 3 plugs from the ballast will plug straight into the bulb and the same for both sides. You will then be left with a positive and negative wire on both sides with spaded ends, find the positive & negative pins on your existing headlight wiring loom and slot them in - Job Done!

In regards to the drilling, it's not always necessary.. see if they will fit your existing headlamp as most commonly they're plug & play and will just fit into the existing holder but if not you can always buy additional bulb holders which again will help you refraining from any drilling.

5000k is definitely a nice colour, OEM changes from manufacturer to manufacturer.. we supply to Guy Salmon Jaguar & Landrover groups across the country and have been for 3 years now and every month they take 6000k from us and nothing else. Same with all new Audi's & Merc's coming out, they have a very slight hint of blue to them

Personally I prefer the 5000k but when a customer asks for OEM we always recommend 6000k as it seems most newer vehicles are steering that way and our Jaguar & Landrover dealerships prefer that temperature.

Get some pics up

[sdavidwh]

Originally Posted by andy_d

those ballast's look tiny compared to some.

yeah, he said they were the newer slimmer models

I saw the old ballasts he used to sell & they are quite a bit bigger

[sdavidwh]

Originally Posted by SinspeedLtd

They Slim digital ballasts, we used to stock them as well - now we stock the Super Slim ones which shave off about 2mm in depth and 2mm in length

Fitting them up is easy, all the plugs that you see will interconnect with eachother.. i.e. the 3 plugs from the ballast will plug straight into the bulb and the same for both sides. You will then be left with a positive and negative wire on both sides with spaded ends, find the positive & negative pins on your existing headlight wiring loom and slot them in - Job Done!

In regards to the drilling, it's not always necessary.. see if they will fit your existing headlamp as most commonly they're plug & play and will just fit into the existing holder but if not you can always buy additional bulb holders which again will help you refraining from any drilling.


Get some pics up

With regards to finding the Pos & Neg......say what??? How the hell do I do that...I like the sound of plug & play, thats all I am good for....??


The guy I bought them from said a 20-22mm drill hole is required in the cap?
& thats as hard as it gets he said apart from finding a location for your 2 ballasts.

I dont get my car back til tomorrow & for the rest of this week I have a lot of work on so wont be getting home til approx 8pm so chances are I wont end up doing my lights until Sunday-Tues but as soon as I do I'll post a write up some pics

Dave

[sdavidwh]

Cheers Jason, I'm not sire where I am going to fit my ballasts yet.

The guy on the phone said the closest to the true xenons which are at 4300k is the 5000k. I'm not a lover of the blue tinged look, I prefer the pure white...each to their own though

Dave

[Guru]

Originally Posted by sdavidwh

With regards to finding the Pos & Neg......say what??? How the hell do I do that...I like the sound of plug & play, thats all I am good for....??

Be advised that the right headlamp and the wiper motor are both earthed at the same spot to the right strut tower, and because of this, after market HID kits have a nasty habit of burning out the wiper motor on these cars.

To play it safe, do not ground the HIDs through the negative pin of the existing headlight wiring loom as SinspeedLtd mentioned, otherwise you risk burning out the wiper motor's circuit board. Find a separate ground on the car chassis.

[SinspeedLtd]

Originally Posted by Guru

Be advised that the right headlamp and the wiper motor are both earthed at the same spot to the right strut tower, and because of this, after market HID kits have a nasty habit of burning out the wiper motor on these cars.

To play it safe, do not ground the HIDs through the negative pin of the existing headlight wiring loom as SinspeedLtd mentioned, otherwise you risk burning out the wiper motor's circuit board. Find a separate ground on the car chassis.

Good Point!
Sorry should have picked up on this.. it's common practice to advise of this on VW Golfs and such but not heard about it on a Volvo. To find the positive you can trace the color of the wire back it should be red & black (red is positive, black is negative) but if you want to be 110% sure then use a multimeter with the headlights off and check the voltage on the red wire.. then turn the headlights on and check the voltage again.. you should now see power

Before drilling into your headlamps, try plugging them in first and checking if they will secure.. might save yourself the hassle.