Intermittent Lamp Out Light with HID Kit

[Dirk37]

A few months ago I put a cheap HID kit in my car, and the lamp out light would come on and off intermittently. Then while pressure washing my engine bay one day I accidentally took out the driver side ballast, so I put a normal bulb in and no more lamp out light.

Fast forward to this weekend, I (finally) put a new ballast in and the light has returned! I checked all the connections and they're good, and the HID doesn't flicker or anything either, but the lamp out light will come on and off and sometimes be on half illuminated.

Since the HID's don't have a high beam that may explain the light lamp out light going on and off, but when it's half illuminated it freaks me out a bit.

 

[Bryan]

Not to be off topic, but is it actually safe to wash your engine off? I have been meaning to try it, but I am afraid she won't start up again after I do it.

 

[Dirk37]

Not to be off topic, but is it actually safe to wash your engine off? I have been meaning to try it, but I am afraid she won't start up again after I do it.

I've never had any problems doing it except for the ballast failing. As long as you're careful not to hit any connectors and keep water out of the spark plug wells there's not too much that can go wrong.

 

[SHOdded]

More details on the HID kit please. Wattage? Harnessed or just ballasts? I know that DDM kits have had more issues than TRS kits, for example.

 

[Dirk37]

It's a POS Xentec kit I got for $30 on eBay. They're 35 watts, have no high beam, and use an adapter to connect to the stock headlight connector.

I was thinking maybe the lack of a high beam might make the light come on, but that doesn't explain why it only happens with the drivers side, and why the lamp out light is intermittent and sometime partially illuminated.

 

[SHOdded]

Really sounds like an intermittent short to me. Obvious question, but I have to ask. Did you try swapping between left & right sides (bulbs only, ballast only, adapter only, in combination, etc.)? From what I have been reading, the ballasts are a major flaw in cheaper kits, even defective brand new. But at this point, a defective bulb cannot be ruled out.

If all else fails, you can try getting a harness to power the HIDs directly from the battery.

 

[Dirk37]

I've tried swapping them but it still happens. The strange thing is the HID's work perfectly with the lamp out light on or off, if there was a short then the drivers side one should flicker or cut out but it doesn't.

If all else fails, you can try getting a harness to power the HIDs directly from the battery.

If it keeps coming on I'll probably end up doing that.

 

[Dirk37]

Lol so now that I put an HID in the driver's side the passenger ballast side fails. It seems like I can only have one HID because every time I have two, one of them fails I decided to take them off and am back to normal headlights.

As I was removing the ballast on the passenger side I found that the power transistor inside got hot enough to melt through the case

I'm thinking that during warmup they draw more power than the wires can provide, that would cause the voltage to drop, so to compensate they'd draw more current further dropping the voltage until eventually they draw in too much current and overheat and fail. It works fine with just one because the wires can provide enough current. I'll try a relay next time and see what happens.

Here's the burned through ballast between a good one and a disassembled one.

 

[SHOdded]

A heavy duty capacitor in the circuit should also help, if you want to go that route. Alternatively, get reliable ballasts from TRS/Morimoto.

 

[ACEsSon]

the lamp out happens because your no longer usuing the programmed wattage that the computer is used to from your incandescent... HIDs are nothing more than parking lot lights, uses less current and energy to produce more light, getting water on the ballasts wont hurt them, fyi. also load resistors or if you can find the right size capacitor they go inline with the ballasts to tell the car that everything is fine... same rules apply to LEDs .. and same rules apply to every car

 

[91Shonewbie]

Wow That's crazy, im looking to put hids in and That is the kind if problems I'm looking to avoid thanks for the heads up, remember you get what you paid for. Also isn't There suppose to be a relay in the system to prevent That light out problem, thought I saw That on a YouTube video.