Lighting Help

2 Questions: I had some HIDs on my car and one bulb decided to go out. I decided to check it with the opposite side ballast and it still didn't work. I sent it back to the place and they called me after testing it and telling me it fired right up. They told me that I could not have it on right or our wires can't support the voltage. I don't know why this would be considering my driver side was working perfectly and I used that ballast. Any advice?

 

Next question: I currently have my regular stock lights as I get this situated. I've noticed that every one in a while when I slow down to a close stop my lights will go dim for about a split second then bright again. It's kind of like when the A/C in your house is about to come on and use all the power it sucks all the electricity causing your lights to dim real fast. Is this normal? Or could I have some bad wires?

 

Thanks, Mo

mine does that too. once in a while. I really dont pay any attention to it as long as it does stall out

Bumpster

That's why Volt and Xtreme kits are low draw so you will never experience these iisues,

The '05 LGT seem to have some electrical issues. The flickering headlights is pretty normal. After I noticed it, I took it to the dealer and they "couldn't reproduce it," which is short for SOL, thanks for buying a car from us. I also had one of the bum ECU's and I had to have it replaced, but it took about 4 trips to the dealer to get them to admit there was an issue to begin with (still took me bringing in a copy of the official known issue memo from Subaru themselves, which technically the public isn't supposed to have). I believe they worked that out pretty quick. I have one of the earlier models.

 

HID's, especially DDM/Apexcone, tend to have an issue with the passenger side not lighting up right away. So far, mine have always ignited after a try or two, but some people's just quit working altogether. I think there is probably some underlying electrical surging going on with the car itself somewhere, possibly in the computer.

 

Bottom line, don't worry about the headlights flickering. It's normal, at least for this model year. Don't know what to tell you about the HID's...get a new kit or dump them altogether.

Hey guys,

 

Have you heard about the CANBUS electrical system in the GenIV Legacy? You need a compliant ballast to work properly with this type of electrical system I suspect. European (Phillips) and good quality Japanese should be compliant, but it may be worth checking directly with the supplier/manufacturer. Funny things can happen with computer based systems that are not interfaced correctly or filtered from high frequencies generated by the ballasts.

 

Open for comments from other electrically minded Suby lovers.

 

Kind Regards,

 

Mark.

Thanks all. Since re-installing the HIDs, I've had no issues with flickering...

That's why Volt and Xtreme kits are low draw so you will never experience these iisues,

 

Can you inform us of the Controller Area Network (CAN) bus compliance of your Volt and Xtreme HID kits?

 

I have done some recent research and identified that the CAN Bus electrical system in our Legacy/Liberty's is susceptible to Electro Magnetic Interference (EMI) and Radio Frequency Interference (RFI). Please refer to:

 

http://www.cvel.clemson.edu/Presentation_Slides/AuE881_presentation.pdf

 

and, if you are more electrically minded or qualified, then:

 

http://cnfrs.institut-telecom.fr/pages/pages_ursi/URSIGA08/papers/AEp2.pdf

 

I found these two docs while simply Googleing for CAN Bus susceptibility. The CAN Bus is sensitive to spurious noise from high voltage switching circuits and these are what ballasts are.

 

With so many computer and communication systems in our vehicles dependent on the CAN Bus system, we need to ensure that ballasts have high quality filtering which is suitable, compliant and compatible with our the other systems in our vehicles.

 

The main point about spurious electrical noise (through common mode or differential mode injection) is not that cheaper kits cause damage, as a high priced kit from any country may generate too much noise if it lacks appropriate design and filtering.

 

Most of the time the impacts of too much spuriou noise goes unnoticed until a specific item or function is needed. Other times, the impacts are infrequent and intermittent. Some of you will claim the cheaper kits operate well and for long periods of time and have "never" caused any problems. Well, in my opinion, such a claim cannot be made based on satisfactory operation of the kit itself until you re-test all the other computers and communications systems in your vehicle to qualify that they are all still working without suffering any of the susceptibility issues! Not a practical thing to do.

 

Some cheaper HID Kits are not CAN Bus compliant. I have pursued a couple of kit resellers who cannot obtain this information from the manufacturer. I have also noticed that some resellers actually offer a standard kit and a CAN Bus or European kit. These appear on the surface to be the versions we should pursue for our Legacy/Liberty's

 

Personally, I invested in a vehicle with 5 star NCAP safety compliance and would not want to potentially undermine the saftey systems compliance by saving a few bucks on a non CAN Bus compliant ballast.

 

With so many computer based systems in our vehicles today (including safety critical ones like airbag inflation, central locking opening the car doors after impact, etc), we need to insist on HID Kit (ballast) suppliers that the aftermarket products need to be compliant with the current standards for Electro Magnetic Compatibility (EMC), EMI and RFI within the targeted vehicle.

 

Therefore, when choosing to install inherently noisy (electrical) equipment (ballasts) in our vehicles, we need to be mindful of the potential consequenses, whcih may or may not be visible to the user.

 

I am not an electrical engineer, but I have had extensive experience in the Control and Communications area of electronics including RF and Data communications. However, I would like to hear from any electrical engineers through this forum their assessment of CAN Bus susceptibility to EMI and RFI and indeed the potential for ballasts to have direct adn indirect impacts.

 

I have also seen some good work on this forum in testing and showing the output waveforms of some kits and this is great objective work with which I thoroughly endorse (if you care for my opinion). See http://legacygt.com/forums/showthread.php?t=99296

Keep up the good work Bugblatterbeast!

 

Not trying to bag anyones product and I am not a reseller, just looking for a good quality HID Kit that I can use without undermining the other systems in my "pride and joy".

 

Kind Regards,

 

Mark.

Another question -

Comparision between -

35w HID

50w HID

55w Halogen globes (standard for the headlights), wouldn't 50w HID be hotter or cooler than 55w halogen globe?

Cheers

AP