Hi all. I am the proud new owner of a pristine 1987 xj-s with 67,000 original miles. We have been fixing various things in the car but the headlights have us stumped. When you turn on the headlights, neither of the dip beams work, and when you turn on the brights, only the inner lights come on. (The car is a 4 headlight configuration) I seriously doubt that all four of the outside lights are dead and the schematic doesn't shed much light on this. My next thought is the earth for the lights. Anyone know how/where the headlights are grounded and if this could be the problem? Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

 

As I recall the headlight grounds are about where the radiator mounting panel attaches to the inner fenders.

Also check/clean the fuses in the headlamp fuse box, left fenderwell.

Cheers
DD

 

Grounds are ok and all fuses are ok. We even took the time to clean the fuseholders. This synchronicity has me wondering though, what do the four outer lights have in common with each other that the inner ones don't according to the schematic, the main beams just break off the same source as the inner beams so it doesn't make a lot of sense that the main beams aren't working. Could the relay be bad?

 

What are the connectors like behind the headlights? prone to disconnecting?

 

Today, I was trying to adjust the chrome bezels around the headlights. I took them off to see how hard it was to remove the headlights. A couple minutes later they were out and amazingly some PO had unplugged the outer headlights! This issue had been stumping me for months and they were unplugged all along. Reconnected and tested them and all works as it should. :-)