hid lamp failure mode

A look at a dead hid bulb

[@krz8888888]

Kudos for proper hid use!

[@peteb2]

I WISH in my country we had the same laws. So many uncaring idiots fit LED or HID units to stock standard polycarb headlights and happily blind oncoming traffic while the lamp housing lens slowing turns a yellow-brown....

[@12voltvids]

We have the same idiots here.

[@AaronBilger]

sorry but im one of those idiots but if they made a projector lens for my 1990 ford f150 i would have used them but all i can find is stock headlight assemblies ive looked for a few days nothing but there's alot for the 1992 and up for f150's not fare i wanted something fancy looking but instead stock looking with halogen fitted only is all they have.

[@12voltvids]

@@AaronBilger They are hard to find for older cars. I drive a volt which already had projector lens assemblies, so I was able to get a lamp adapter, as the original bulbs were HIR2 whcih is the same as 9012, but they don't make HID 9012, just 9006. The shop I got mine at had a lamp adapter that the lamp fits in and that clips into the lamp housing, which holds the lamp at the correct angle so the projector focuses the laight correctly with a very sharp cut off. When I hit high beam the solenoid in the lamp housing clunks and the damper lifts to kick the light up. They really look great. I wouldn't drive with any other type of light. I did have to re calibrate the cut off position, which is just a screw on each lens.

[@peteb2]

Aaron bilger maybe 1990 makes for “old school” in the eyes of the companies who produce HID adaptor kits & the thought is owners prefer to run with factory original on what would be considered a “Classic” vehicle. I’ve seen old 1990s Volvo 240 station wagon headlights bodies completely turned to powder and disintegrated because someone had put in HID believing the big square glass lens would be ok. They had no idea of the heat+UV from HID which put pay to that. You gotta have the proper compatible system & I’d hate to be taken to court if I caused some oncoming traffic to be blinded & direct cause of a fatal wreck.

[@rexhavoc5643]

@@AaronBilger Yes you are absolutely correct - you are an idiot. Stop trying to make a 30 year old truck look like something it's not.

[@waltschannel7465]

Thanks for the education!! I've often wondered what the difference was between the housings. I've tried LED bulbs and got some improvement, but not HID - level improvement. I'm going to just live with it.

[@MichaelBeeny]

If you think that is bright, the average cinema xenon is 2/3 KW and forced air cooled. Even bigger one are water cooled. The reason it went pink is due to air mixing with the xenon gas. It wont light now because all the xenon gas has gone, all you have now is air. In cinema use you should NEVER look directly at the lamp, it WILL damage your eyes. In fact you have to ware protective body suit and eye protection even when turned off because of the possibility of explosion due to the high pressure in side, even when cold. If one should explode (and they do!) in use it often destroys the mirror and can even dent the metal lamp house. You are probably safe with that little dinky one!

[@12voltvids]

Yes I am aware of the cinema xenon lamps and how high the pressure is. Much uv from those when in operation. Even the little 200 or 300 watt units used in home projectors leave a mess when they expode. Yes I know the pink light was from a leak. You can see the cracks in the glass. They are still the best light source for cars. I run 4300 color as I find the 6000 too blue. Can't see as well.

[@SeanBZA]

Biggest problem with HID lights on a car is the requirement for instant high brightness, which is going to seriously damage the electrodes, leading to your cracking. The actual lamp envelope is quartz, but the outer glass is coated on the inside with a UV blocking film, or is doped to block UV, the glass itself does fluoresce with the UV light, just the lamp light overpowers the pale blue glow. The lamp contains no mercury, only a pair of doped tungsten electrodes, some metal salt ( rare earth oxide blend) and a fill of Xenon gas inside. Can be disposed of like an regular incandescent lamp, though the recycler will get the tiny amount of tungsten out, and the glass will be ground up and used to make new glass again. Rare earth fragments will just bne a small contaminant in the glass.

[@MarceloJavierMazaLuparia]

Funny thing: few hours ago I was thinking on putting led headlights to my new car (ford fiesta) and I tought: maybe i should ask Dave for his opinion. I had an aftermarket xenon kit on my old card (a 35w First that I felt too dimm and a 55w that was great until started to have issues) and they came with a metal "dome" or difusor so the people wont get dazzled. Do you recommend any particular kit of bulbs or aftermarket kit? I was considering led since installation is simpler and seems not to void warranty, but xenon always looks nicer.

[@Oufg103f]

Great video 👍

[@EldaLuna]

very neat. i watched a vid on about those vs led and halogen etc months back just cause i could. kinda cool to see how one works and what one looks like when it failed (yes im horrible for loving lights i have all kinds in my home it never ends it drives people insane when i can tell them history or where or not to use them or what chemical make that does which color etc.)

[@alexispieltin9379]

Hello! Another nice video. Please remind that these bulbs should never be touched by bare hands! Possible high temperature, fragile envelope with risks of explosion and projection of glass contaminants make the use of special gloves (and glasses) mandatory. The inner envelope is normally made of quartz. If it's broken, the inner mixture of metals and gaz has leaked and possibly mixed with the protective gaz, so no durable arking is possible. In these, as far as it's breached, it's garbage! Life expectancy of 10000 hours can be shortened by harsh environmental conditions like vibrations, so I suggest to check if everything is Ok in your car. A loose damper or screw can cause these kind of vibrations that destroy that type of direct hanging quartz burner. I've seen that before, and guessed about that when driving on bad roads as one side was flickering... As you said, most regulations block the installation of this technology in non adapted cars. The lens has first to match the focus length of the light source, that can't be achieved with proper mounting and lenses. And as you mentioned, the heath is also a problem with HID, as most front lights are mostly made of plastics. Last, the UV emission should normally be blocked by a filtering external glass. Many LEDs bulb are not yet as efficient as these, and a direct replacement of conventional light bulbs is mostly far from convincing. Many employs multiple discrete chips, and that is also problematic in term of optics. The beam generally suffers from "dark spots". Quality of light colour is also at stake, as most LEDs still employs non continuous spectrum emission: it's a mix of blue, green and red, and even with a filter like in COBLeds, the CRI is Iow (

[@bobsoft]

What aftermarket setup did you go with (Morimoto)?

[@dayumboydayum8461]

Hey man, cool video, I have an Audi A3 2012 and had a question. My hid bulb is a d3s bulb, and I just wanted to know about the 2 pins in the middle of the Bulb. Should they connect? Or should it just look like short stubs. Also one side of the ark seems cloudy but the other is clear. I’ve just bough the bulb and want to make sure it works as it looks slightly used

[@markmarkofkane8167]

I never heard of those. Interesting.

[@AaronBilger]

i did a HID headlight conversion i bought a xion kit and yes i did have to lower my headlight assemblies so it would show more light for me yes very bright and i only have the 35 watt it costed me 54$ USD it was on my 1990 ford f150 I think they run much cooler than the halogen bulbs i don't feel any heat not even in the slightest on the lens but with the old bulbs yes they was very warm i did debate on led or hid at first but i seen people saying led's are not bright enough and or no better than the old bulbs HID have a gas to warm up and I have noticed that first turn on is very bright then they start to get brighter I seen stock cars new have the same thing so i don't think any of it I have the pure white 4300K color still look kinda blue for some reason I wanted the 3100k or the 3200k stock color but those are non existence in hid's i've looked

[@coyote_den]

CCFL backlights also go pink when they reach EOL, but they'll also do it when they are simply too cold. I don't think it's from air ingress, just low efficiency because of age or temperature.

[@12voltvids]

Ccfl go pink when they get old due to loss of mercury. So do CFL bulbs. I have one that lights up pink now when it is cold and gradualy changes as it warms. Mercury gets absorbed into the glass and phospher. This wasn't an issue with older fluorescents that had lots of mercury but new ones have very little and once it gets used up you just see the argon and neon gas. Most modern fluorescent lamps use a mixture or argon and neon as neon provides more heat than argon to heat the mercury and produce more vapours. Of course neon glows red, and argon blue. The result is pink. The lack of mercury which produces the uv light to make the phospher glow. If you want a ccfl monitor to last as long as possible turn it on and leave it on. It is the heating and cooling cycle that drives the mercury into the glass.

[@zx8401ztv]

Dam that good one was bright, and they last a good time. Led lights start out ok but they don't seem as good as hid for lasting.

[@12voltvids]

It is probably down to 50-60% of the new ones now.

[@RynaxAlien]

So they start becoming colder and eventually UV or they blow up?

[@AThreeDogNight]

OK interesting to see how all that worked. I just bought 2 replacement headlights for my 96 S-10 at $11,00 a piece. Of coarse they are not that bright, as I would like to have them.

[@gavincurtis]

Make a great bicycle headlight too.

[@12voltvids]

Sure does.

[@Dr_Mario2007]

Side note; Xenon HID bulbs are actually metal halide bulbs just like your normal metal halide bulbs in street lamps, only designed specifically for the cars with the Xenon gas fill rather than the usual Argon, so for 35 Watts version, the arc voltage is around 90 Volts AC. I should know that as I have been using the 35 - 39 Watts ceramic metal halide bulbs with the 35 Watts HID inverter ballast (Hylux A2088) in my modified Halogen spotlight no problem.

[@12voltvids]

The difference is the length of the arc and the hi voltage strike so they can be hot struck.

[@Dr_Mario2007]

@@12voltvids Arc length between electrodes in the car Xenon metal halide bulbs are the same with 35 - 39 Watts ceramic metal halide bulbs, as far as I can see (I looked at them both closely as I wanted to make sure the HID ballast can actually operate the ceramic metal halide bulb correctly which it actually works fine). As for ignition, correct, the HID inverter ballasts have higher ignition voltage compared to the other HID lamps (20kV in car headlights vs. 4kV for commercial metal halide bulbs). The obvious advantage with much higher voltage is that I can actually do hot restrike of certain ceramic metal halide bulbs like Osram Powerball bulb, they instantly relight back up, of course I am careful about the hot restrike of the CMH bulbs.

[@Dr_Mario2007]

@@Choukai_Kai Some ceramic metal halide bulbs have Xenon gas, interestingly enough. The one with Argon fill tend to warm up a bit slowly even with the high performance inverter ballast forcing it (ceramic arc tube shape and geometry also have something to do with it too in term of thermal performance). 39 Watts Osram Powerball CMH bulb warms up the fastest compared to the other CMH bulbs I tried in my modified Halogen spotlight, so I am thinking Xenon - Argon mixture, unless I am wrong. As for the arc voltage, you're correct - I kinda find Mercury-free bulbs to be a little bit weird, being effectively half that of typical Mercury arc voltage. I went with regular Mercury-filled CMH bulbs as it's a bit easier on the ballast, because 80 - 90 Volts AC power is somewhat standard for most 35 Watts HID headlights.

[@12voltvids]

@@Choukai_Kai Yes I have a couple of mh here. A 400 magnetic and a ceramic mh with electronic balast as well as a 100 in the back yard.

[@12voltvids]

@@Dr_Mario2007 uhp mercury used in projectors are also short arc high strike voltage 20kv.

[@juansaid3100]

My car keep burning the low beam , how can I test on bench?

[@CJ-fh5xq]

I think that may be my issue. I hear a loud spark, similar to this. Then the bulb would not stay on.

[@111chicane]

I have a 2012 Audi A8 Matrix LED headlight without the back housing, taken apart to a module level. If someone wants to play with it and even more, if it's someone local (NYC), I'm giving it away, yes, for free. Everything is in a box 24x16x13 inches, weight is about 25 pounds. No drivers or any modules come with it.

[@MrEntTv]

The bulb is bad but, the ballast will also go bad with ignition of bulb.

[@12voltvids]

Not necessarily

[@squareroot99999999]

Not expensive, only 20 bucks each.. Headlights used to be like 5 bucks. Bring back the good old days.

[@12voltvids]

I had to replace the tail light on my Ford Escape, and a 2 pack of incandescent bulbs was 22.95. I had an old car with sealed beam halogen bulbs and they were 25.00 each. I have never seen a headlight for 5 bucks, and I have been driving for 40 years.

[@squareroot99999999]

@@12voltvids I used to work at service station back in the 70's' and a sealed beam headlight went for 5 bucks. Then they came out with halogen and the price jumped to 10 bucks now they are 20+ yet you can still get a bulb for your house for a buck at the dollar store. I think the manufacturers of auto head lamps are reaping a huge profit.

[@12voltvids]

@@squareroot99999999 Taillight for a ford escape, 23 for 2 bulbs

[@AThreeDogNight]

@@12voltvids, Good grief, only two bulbs. That's a lot of doe for just bulbs.

[@AThreeDogNight]

squareroot, Yes I remember that & those style lights, I just bought two for my 96 S-10 & they were just $11.00 bucks a piece. Good times back then compared to now.

[@111chicane]

Not sure about Canada but in US any modifications on any lights on the exterior of a car are illegal. If you're selling a car with any such modifications you may go to jail. I can't stand people driving cars with halogen headlights/fog lights who just swapped their halogen bulbs with HIDs or LEDs. I also can't stand those Acura Diamond LED headlights for the reason they aren't self-leveling at all and blind everyone in the oncoming traffic on the slightest bump or uphill. And don't tell me this is a safety improvement. If it is for you, it is terrible safety issue for everyone else around you! If it's properly done adding projectors and light beam correction, that's a whole different story but with a very few exceptions nobody does that since it's expensive.

[@joshhuoabski3278]

This guy is flipping that switch like an out of control toddler and says, "the ballast is pulsing the lamp....." "These lamps are instant firing" How so? When you turn on an HID it takes forever to come to operating temperature. You can tell by the dramatic color and output change over 30-45 secs. Even more so when cold. How did I get here

[@12voltvids]

I wasn't flipping a switch on and off. That was the ballast that was trying to fire the lamp. This is an hid from a car headlight. They fire at around 30k volts then drop down to about 40 once the lamp fires. That ticking was the igniter trying to fire the dead lamp. Just shows your ignorance to the technology.