xenon headlights on a p38

I have been given a brand new set of hid xenon headlights. They are the correct size for my 20002.5 dhse, the reason im asking this question is ? can you fit them to a range rover with out messing the becm ecm any thing with in the box of horrors. I was told there just plug and play fitted by a sparky with no problems, then I was told they mess about with the electrics.

Has any on fitted these to a standard headlight p38 with out any problems.

Thanks

Well I certainly didn't!
My Rangie is mostly used at night and out in the country so I thought that I'd treat myself to the brightest headlights that I could.
I bought a set of 'plug & play' Xenons for my 2000 DSE.

All that I had to do was to fit the bulbs and connect the original wiring into the box of electronics for each one.
I did this and firstly the headlights took a long time to come up to full brightness, I'm talking of maybe ten seconds. They would flare up briefly, then die away and then slowly come up to full brightness. Swiching to main beam meant a few seconds of relative darkness before I could see again. This didn't worry me initially as I thought that the bulbs and their ballast packs might 'burn in' a bit and become faster with time.

On top of this I had bulb failure warnings for every headlamp that I turned on with the messages coming up on the dash and bong noises from the sounder, and more worryingly I noticed the airbag warning light coming on whenever I turned on the headlights, changed from dip to main or even just flashed the lights.

So I bought an extra loom that connected straight to the battery and was only supposed to use the original wiring as a low power switching circuit. The headlights came on slightly faster but I still had to put up with all of the bulb failure warnings and I now noticed that I had another warning light along with the airbags. Right now I can't remember which one it was but it was one more worry.

So I bought some extra devices that are supposed to stop the bulb warnings, which had now become so annoying that I had disconnected the sounder on the back of the instrument binnacle. These extra devices had no effect whatsoever.

I was now, with all of the warnings seriously worried about screwing up the Rangie's ten year old electronics so I removed the whole lot and VERY carefully started again just to make sure that I hadn't made a stupid mistake. The warnings all came up no matter what I did.

I have now reverted to normal bulbs, well extreme brightness ones but still standard wattage and have got myself a bull bar. On this I intend mounting some of the Australian Xenon spotlights and wiring them up on their own circuit and using the main beam lights to power a relay.

So, in my garage I have Xenon bulbs for both the dipped and main beams on P38, all of the ballasts and wiring, two separate looms to connect these from an external supply and four devices that are supposed to stop the bulb failure warnings. Total cost, over £250. Total failure.

Any other soul willing to bet their BECM to fit these?

Oh and by the way, I'm an electrical/electronics engineer.

There`s some posts on the Disco forum about legality of HIDs. Seems new mot regs against retro fitting unless washers and auto headlamp leveling fitted? No knowlege of this myself but check it out if still tempted even after reading Dogsbody`s post.

I wasn't even worried about that part as my argument was that I've got washers and the whole car self levels.

dogsbody said:

So, in my garage I have Xenon bulbs for both the dipped and main beams on P38, all of the ballasts and wiring, two separate looms to connect these from an external supply and four devices that are supposed to stop the bulb failure warnings. Total cost, over £250. Total failure.






Oh and by the way, I'm an electrical/electronics engineer.

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i buy them off you if price right...pm me.

then why you fit them?surely you must relise the implications of lack of load on crt that senses bulb failure...and as an electronics engineer it should be a **** of **** to sort it...(give the sense crt a gnd,assuming it senses earth via bulb..not too difficult...)

always always wire hids directly to battery,you knew this though..

also..unless you using h4 moving type..ie switch to high beam alters the focal point of bulb then hids are NOT suitable for high beam due to slow turn on time...i have h4 "moving type"..they are wonderfull...

I knew that I would have to deal with the bulb warnings but thought that I could live with them whilst I sorted the rest out but the constant bonging and flashing warnings on the dash whilst I was driving along country roads eventually got to me.

Yes I could have built a circuit to fool the BECM but I'm very nervous about those ten year old mosfets that power the lights and I like to do things so that any poor sod who has to follow me can see what I've altered.. Eventually it was the thought of having to repair or replace the BECM that finished me off.

Don't get me wrong, when they were on they were great.

P.M. on it's way to Zen.

dogsbody said:

I wasn't even worried about that part as my argument was that I've got washers and the whole car self levels.

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pity the headlights don't self level, thats the bit that matters
the body self leveling doesn't count at all

gegs88 said:

pity the headlights don't self level, thats the bit that matters
the body self leveling doesn't count at all

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Tell me where in the construction and use regs it specifies that the headlights must self level as a separate issue from self leveling with the whole car?

i aint read em m8, just going off what i got told when i asked a tester when i looked into fitting em on my car. he said no good so i listened to him.




looks like he was wrong as well

Aftermarket HID (Xenon) headlamps

gegs88 said:

i aint read em m8, just going off what i got told when i asked a tester when i looked into fitting em on my car. he said no good so i listened to him.




looks like he was wrong as well

Aftermarket HID (Xenon) headlamps

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Yup, he was. Under "Construction and Use", so long as "levelled to compensate" In thecase of P38 it's automatic via EAS and the whole car levels; if I had an MOT issue about this I'd be calling in VOSA Inspectors same day!

Are the whole headlights HID or just the bulb/ballast kit? Spoke to a seller of HID kits and he says they fail the MOT anyway because of the effect it has on the beam pattern and have to be changed to standard bulbs come test time (not to mention self levelling/washer legality stuff)

I have them on my old one never got round to sorting out the wiring to stop the car thinking there was a bulb out all the time,

i have both main beam an h4 hid kit fitted an i was told hid kit drew less power off cars electrics then standard bulb

ive got a set of hid out of my old car i pluged them up today and they work with no warning messages
only prob is there a single h1 blub with no high beam i was wondering if i could swap the bulb with these
H4-2 6000k Xenon Dual Beam Bulbs Kit Hi Low 35w HID on eBay (end time 20-Apr-11 00:42:09 BST)
and wire the full beam to the halogen bulb
can anyone see off any potential problems?

gfromleeds said:

can anyone see off any potential problems?

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yup - its illegal.

When you say its illegal do you mot fail or will I get pulled by the plod

gfromleeds said:

When you say its illegal do you mot fail or will I get pulled by the plod

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If plod stop you for one of their psuedo not random breath tests or some other minor infringement and they notice the lights they might just add them to the list of infractions.

Datatek said:

If plod stop you for one of their psuedo not random breath tests or some other minor infringement and they notice the lights they might just add them to the list of infractions.

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and then we are back to the question asked by gfromleeds. WHY?

This is what it says on the DfT website re: HID's. "In the Department's view it is not legal to sell or use after market HID lighting kits, for converting conventional Halogen headlamps to HID Xenon"

HID retrofit is not legal as it does not comply with ECE regulation 98 or 48 . Under RTA 1988 s65 it is an offence to fit, supply or use vehicle parts that are not legal in EC . Having read S65 and its referrals, if the retrofit kit has the requisite parts ( self levelling etc) then it can and would be available as a retrofit. - Example is to buy a vehicle which ahs HID as an option but originally it had standard halogens. A subsequent owner could fit HID without a problem.

First part is the headlight unit it self. This is the reflector and lens or alternatively projector. These are tested and approved only for one type of bulb. NO headlight hold E certification for more than one sort of bulb. So fitting any other sort of bulb would render it not road legal.

Second is that the specification of bulbs make it impossible to have HID bulb with any of the halogen bulb fitting formats road legal. The specs are mutually exclusive. So using any such bulb would not be road legal.

Illegal retrofitted HID conversion kits - UKPOLICEONLINE Discussion Forum

I was at the bike show @ the Excel. A stand selling HIds had the twin H4 , plus the wiring for the Becm bulb/message centre so no warning lights. Quick acting dip to high beam on relays .. will dig out the flyer if anybody interested?. The guy knew about the p38 problems and had the solution. To be honest , plodded don't pull you unless your lights are dazzling . VOSA. Maybe? I will speak to my mate , he is an MOT tester .