Buy the kit that we all have been drooling over off ebay and save yourself a few dollars. Unless you don't mind being bent over and raped by the dealer.

I bought an HID kit for $80 shipped and installed it in a few hours. Pix in the thread "UPDATE INSTALL COMPLETE".

 

I have fitted the factory Xenon lights and it was simple. All you need to do is add a ground wire to each headlight. You will need to open the headlights to access the wiring.

I can give you step-by-step directions if you need them. While the headlights are apart you should inspect the internals because there is a good chance the little plastic pieces that hold the reflector in place are broken. Most headlights for sale on ebay are from wrecked cars and have suffered a big hit- and it doesn't take much to break the brittle plastic pieces.

I still have my halogens taken apart in a box in the garage so I will be able to take all the pics you need.

 

Front bumper needs to come off. You will also have to take your new headlights apart to rewire them to work.

 

Truly I was going to go with that route and buy the factory hid lamps but the cost wasn't worth it! Just get the kit spartan is talking about save yourself a few hundred dollars and go from there. When I was looking I could get a left and right headlight assembly for about 300 but than you don't know how long that hid bulb is going to last especially after the car they were taken from were just in an accident plus the tabs may be broken. Save yourself some hassle in just taking the back of the headlight apart cutting the harness and putting the aftermarket hids in......not to mention the bulb is under warranty for a year or 2 or 3...since you have to take the bumper off and the headlights out re-align them and all that plus add a ground wire just save yourself the time, money and hassle and go aftermarket and you are looking at the same thing...although the factory ones have auto adjusting on them but still you probably wouldn't know the difference...even if you did you won't remember it when you think of the at least 220 bucks you saved!

 

The auto-adjusting does not work when using factory Xenons on a car that was not originally equipped with them. I removed the stepper motor and used the stationary piece from my halogen lights, but the stepper can be left in place. I already had the headlights apart do I had time to play

aquill1 is correct. If you are just looking for Xenon lights and don't need the factory headlights then go with the eBay kit. For the money the eBay kit is really the best deal out there. However, the parts quality on the OEM Xenon lights is going to be nicer. Not to mention the reflectors for the lights will be designed for Xenon and therefore distribute light more appropriately. Will you be able to notice a difference? Probably not.

FYI- The eBay kit is nice, but it uses generation 3 xenon ballasts & ignitors. The OEM headlights use Hella original parts and they are generation 4 ballasts and ignitors. I have no real world knowedge of the difference between gen 3 and gen 4 xenon equipment, but as with anything else as new technology comes out, things are updated to keep up. I'm glad I have current generation parts and they were designed from the factory to last 100,000+ miles. I'd be very interested to see how many of the eBay kits are still working 2 years from now.

 

Actually my buddy does have a set he's had for over a year and half now and hasn't had a problem...even if not for 80 shipped you can't really complain if you get a year out of them...buy a spare pair and hang onto them to swap them out and if it blows send it back to the ebayer...yeah i forgot to mention that the auto adjust wouldn't work which was also a reason I said screw buying them because it wouldn't be worth it! Are you sure that the reflectors are different on our non vs. the hid versions tokyo...mine still have the cutoffs but that is more from the projector...
You say the stockers would last 100k but wouldn't you think that it'd be less when the car has had solid impact plus I know our shipping here in the states has a high tendency to get thrown around! Plus those don't have warranties...one last thing the stocks are 6k aren't they?

 

I agree that for $80 you can't beat the deal for the lights. That is about what a replacement bulb costs so it's worth getting a spare set.

The reflectors are definately different. They are the same basic shape, however the material on the Xenon reflectors is MUCH heavier and thicker, I'm assuming to cope with the heat the Xenon lights emit? Also, the outer edge of the reflector in the Xenon headlights has a lot of little "ribs" to diffuse the light evenly. Although the differences seem minor by looking at them, I'm sure Jag paid a lot of money to have engineers design them that way for a reason. That being said, I doubt you'd notice the difference in light pattern, but the only way to tell for sure would be to put a factory Xenon car next to a eBay Xenon car and identify the differences in light pattern.

I agree that the ones from eBay out of a wrecked car have a 99% chance of having broken tabs. Hell, both my halogens had broken tabs when I pulled them out and I've never been in an accident in my car, just big potholes. You'd be amazed at how brittle the plastic tabs that hold the reflector are. Of the 4 total tabs in two headlights, 3 of them were broken, and the last one had stress cracks, it just hadn't completely seperated yet. On that same note, the OEM headlights I got out of a rear-end collision car from eBay only had 2 out of 4 tabs broken... I guess it's hit or miss with the tabs.

The tabs can be repaired- I just scuffed up all the plastic with some 80-grit sandpaper then used JB Weld to piece the tabs back together. I let them sit and harden overnight then applied a THICK 2nd layer of JB Weld over the entire tab- so now the whole thing is coated with a 1mm thick coating of JB, which is some of the strongest stuff on earth!!!! We will see how it holds up over time, although I think it would take quite an impact to break the tabs now.

I have no idea the light temperature of the OEM lights, but I know it is perfect. Not too blue, not too white.

 

Yeah I know that is what I want...I want it to look white and blue but mainly hid! I don't want too blue because to me it pulls away from the knowing that the lights are actually hid...the bluer the more bulb painted blue they look...

 

You need to add a ground wire to the headlight assembly. Thats it. The standard halogen light assemblies have a single ground. The OEM xenon (not bi-xenon) lights have two seperate ground wires per assembly.

I have finished my front bumper removal / headlight repair FAQ and will be posting it either tonight or tomorrow. I will be sure to take a picture of how I added a ground wire to my OEM xenons to make them work. The way I did it involved taking the headlight apart, but if you have the electrical components needed, you can do it without taking the lights apart.

 

Sweet lets see the pics...whats the upside or advantage to using bi-xenon vs. lesser expensive?

 

Correct me if I'm wrong but I was under the impression Bi-xenon is a single bulb for both high and low beam, such as dual filament halogens. My friend has a Ford F-150 Lightning (pickup truck with 400+ hp) and he has dual filament headlights (high and low beam all one bulb) so he had to order the bi-xenon option for his xenon headlights so he didn't lose his high beams when upgrading.

Jaguar uses a seperate bulb for low and high beams, so we do not need/utilize the bi-xenon bulbs. Standard xenon bulbs are fine, unless you want to pay more for the bi-xenon. The only reason I can think of to use bi-xenon bulbs is to replace dual-filament lights.

 

Thats what I thought so whats the purpose of using them in the jag when the regular hids still work with the high beams? So really there's no reason to buy the bi's as there's no need for it? Thats what I thought the bi xenon's were for but it makes no sense to buy them than does it?

 

Bi Xenons .....That sounds impressive indeed [:-]

 

 

Funny guy Caddie


Lookin forward to the FAQ post Tokay

Jim

 

Hey its jimmy!

 

LOL at what you said [:-]
Actually, Bi Xenons are really excellent items .Lookin forward to seein Tri Xenons as well (the last part is just for fun )