Adaptor from HID to non-HID? OR..?

[OldNick]

EDIT: D'OH. I of course HAVE two sockets that fit the car....the ones from the old headlights. Basic trailer wiring. Please ignore this stuff until I post a result.

 

Is this actually an HID / non-HID issue or a USA Australia (Legacy/Liberty) issue? My car's main socket is completely different from the ones on the new headlight units I bought.

 

I have bought replacement headlight units for my Subaru Liberty 2012. Trouble is, I bought them "cheap" from the US at a massive freight cost.

 

I realised quite soon into my attempted replacement that the new units were non-HID (no wiring but the casing is there still for the driver) ...... and hence cheaper than others.

 

I can live with non-HID low beam, but the plug and socket from the new lights is very different from the one on the car.

 

Is there an adaptor? (preferred for time reasons). I am happy to do thew wiring, especially if I can work on the headlight side and leave the car alone. But I am concerned that in Australia, we may not have the non-HID Liberty GT and therefore there will be no correct sockets. Do the same sockets fit other cars and maybe I can try wreckers?

 

Could I wire in the HID driver unit to the new headlight unit, using the old bulb socket and wiring?

 

Thanks for any help.

 

Nick

Edited December 20, 2020 by OldNick

[OldNick]

OK. After several interruptions I have revisited the situation.

 

Has anyone done a conversion from HID to Incandescent? I have come up against significant trouble.

 

The biggest trouble seems to be that there may be other circuitry under the bonnet, in addition to the ignitor in the headlight unit. fdw

 

There are 3 wires going to the igniter unit.I assumed that the wires to the igniter unit would still have voltage going to the bulb, along with voltage to the ignitor. I was sort of right. One pair produced 12v with low beam on, the other pair 9.8. So I assumed that the 12v pair woud be OK for the newer, tungsten bulb, I can see a current problem though.

 

However, when I switched off the low beam, both (12v + 9.8V) of those pairings of the 3 wires remain energised for maybe 40-60 secs. This indicates that there is circuitry inside the bonnet that "slow cool" the HID. My wife has said the HID globes stay on for a few seconds after she shuts down.

 

If it is normally only a few seconds, then a load is making it faster. But the volts stay dead flat: this is not just a capacitor. I will probably blow a circuit by asking it to supply a 65w globe when it is designed fro an 18 w HID.

 

Anyway my question is "Has anyone done this conversion?"

 

Thanks for any info

 

Nick

[DrD123]

Are the connectors that are different just the ones for the bulbs themselves? Could you get bulbs that are made for an HID retrofit, then use the ballasts that are already in the car to drive them?

[OldNick]

hmmm....certainly worth a thought. The drivers for the globes are actually in the headlight unit. I need to see if the new ones have room for them. They look enough like the old ones to fool me regarding what type of globe they had.

 

Not going to be easy, because of the special wiring for the HID. Also, is the inside of the low beam globe enclosure able to handle the heat of the HID? The reason for all of this is that even the originals were destroyed by the heat.

[OldNick]

Actually you have led me to think (and no this is not going to be a pun ).

 

I will look hard at simply swapping the whole loom and using HID globes again. I was sort of on an "adapt" path and swapping he whole loom may be a simpler way.

 

Thanks for the nudge.

 

Nick