CLOSED - The Retrofit Source GB

Already turned it back the quarter turn. I have the tabs of the bulb lined up in the slots where they came into the connector, but it will not slide off. I even pulled the other ballast out to look at the inside of the connector, and am positive they are lined up with the slots. No matter how much I pull back on it, it will not come off.

I am thinking it has to do with the outside spring contacts (the one that mates with the outside ring contact of the bulb), inside the connector. There is a slight lip on the bulb where I believe the spring contacts are getting caught. That is the only thing I can think of.

Really frustrating, as I was going to put a little dielectric grease on before seating it for the final install. Also, it concerns me I may never be able to get it back off in the case of a bulb failure, and this is with the housing off, imagine if it was installed…

Anyway, other than that, the housings are baked back together, and ready to install. I need to hopefully find a couple hours where I can install all the wiring, etc… But I think I may try and do a test fire by just loosely installing everything.

 

Strange... I've never had a problem. I've connected and disconnected both of my ballast/burner combos 4 times.

 

Jiggle jiggle and it wont come loose? Strange indeed. But nice looking end product there

 

Did you put them together right ? I put mine on one time without the lock ring and it did the same thing

 

Did anyone else get the FX-R Stage IV Kit. I've read the denso balllest arn't water proof? wondering where you guys mounted to protect from the elements

 

I did bulb, split ring, silly cone washer bevel side towards front of bulb, then lock ring. I've wiggled the heck out of it, no budging. I'll try it later, I guess. At this point, I will probably leave it alone as long as it works.

Really impressed with the quality of the electronics packaging. Really solid looking, and waterproof. I think I'm going to mount all mine with the 3m lock tape, and see how that goes. My only gripe with the relay harness is length of wire. Getting to the far headlight is gonna be tight with a clean looking install. Would it hurt to add a foot of wire there? Can't imagine this reaching on a Tundra.

Regarding the Denso ballasts, I've read that you either need to put them in a sheltered location, or waterproof them. This is what I did to my housings after baking them with the window weld: GE Silicone II clear sealant.



Not pretty, but no one will see this from the outside, and if water ever gets inside, I'd be really surprised...

 

Thank you! I went for try number 15 or so, and this time just used light pressure backwards, and wiggled back and forth for about 20 seconds and off it popped, finally.

Cleaned the bulb and reinstalled it, now just waiting for it to cool down outside, and I can get started on the install on the truck.

One other thing I noticed. The automotive connectors are nice, however, for the projector solenoid, they used a fairly small gauge of wire, maybe 22 or 24 AWG. I'm sure the current to drive it is pretty low, but these particular automotive connectors were designed for quite a bit thicker wire, so the plugs that are supposed to make the connection waterproof between the wires and connector, are sized too big, and do not seal against the wire. I can look in the backs and see the metal of the pins.

I'm sure they will be fine, but in the long run, not sure. I'm going to goop the backs with more of that silly cone stuff. Lol.

 

Question. Is this little rubbery thing supposed to be removed from the D2S connector prior to being installed? Reason I ask, is because it came off and stayed on the bulb when I finally got the connector off. Or is this some kind of waterproofing seal?

 

Ya, it's tight. Honestly, just splice in a couple of feet, and while you're at it, cut the ring lugs off of the ground wires, solder black wire onto them, and run them back to the body lug next to the battery.

I had problems with my passenger side light not sparking up, even though I could measure +12 on the +/- on the ballast connector. The ground on the radiator support was the culprit. I moved the lug to one of the screws for the smog pump and that took care of the problem.

Ya... silicone dielectric grease will protect them.

I left it in. I don't know if it's purpose is to provide some pressure on the mechanical connector, or if it is an additional insulator.

 

Well I placed my order finally. What's the official count up to Andrew?

 

I guess that's my question how do I go about ''Waterprofing'' them?

 

Lol, oh, sorry, I thought I mentioned that. Only thing I've read so far is basically coating all the seams, etc, with silicone sealant.

 

Scratch that, apparently, that is not a good method of sealing, because there is no real way to seal up the cable going in, so by sealing the outside of the case, you actually trap moisture that builds up over time, and creates a giant mess and possibly a failure.

This thread is huge, and in the first post, there is a link to another How To thread. Good info for those wanting to use Denso's. The other thing I read, is that TRS will waterproof them for you for $25, not sure when that was posted, or if its still an option or not.

http://www.hidplanet.com/forums/sho...lim-Ballasts&highlight=Sealing+Denso+ballasts

 

Thanks, Rich! I would normally probably tackle extending the wires, but for now, if I can find a route that will work, I'll just leave them, would be a lot of work to extend them, since I don't have the wire on hand.

Hoping that I can fine a suitable ground on that side, I don't have a smog pump, that I know of, so hopefully I'll be able to find something else besides the radiator support nearby.

I guess I'll leave the plug in on the D2S, especially since I don't see anywhere where it says to remove them.

 

Hey guys, i placed another order.
So that should put us at 10... or probably more than 10 lol

 

The 4 cylinder ('08) has a smog pump (blower) on the flat area just behind the passenger headlight.
If you have a V6, then it won't be there, but the threaded hole should still be there and you should be able to get an acceptable ground there.

Mine was tight as well. Not so much left to right... I started on the right and ran the wiring under the cover over the radiator support, but then on the left side it was a mess. The left side plugged in just fine, but things were tight getting around the battery and into the fuse box. I ended up running the hot lead under the fuse box and the fuse is down there as well.

One of these days, I'm going to have to get off my ass and fix my sticking high beam fence, and when I do that I'll extend and reroute the harness so it's a lot cleaner, as well as remount the ballasts.

At first, I used 3M HD velcro to mount the ballasts to that shelf behind the housings. I started having problems with the right light cutting out from time to time, and it seemed to be worse after a rain.
Turns out that when I swapped ballasts to the other side my reliability came back up, but while I had the ballasts out, I opened them up and one (that wasn't giving me problems) had some condensation inside. The velcro was soaked, so rather than sticking them back on the fender shelves, I zip-tied them to the top rail of the radiator support, with the cable exits hanging down so any moisture that got in could drain out the same way.
Other than a sticky high beam fence on the right side, I haven't had a problem with either of them since. I installed them last October or November, and use them for the 45 mile trip to work every morning, and for the trip home between November and March when we're not on DST.

I've got the Morimoto 35 ballasts, and the Philips burners (same burners as OEM, 4300k).

 

Where is the hole in relation to the windshield washer tank? That's what is directly behind my passenger side headlight. I'll see if I can spot it, meanwhile.

How did you run it under the radiator cover? I already have that removed, but don't see a good place to attach the wires, except way up close to the grill, but then I loose length by doing that. Did you drill mounting holes in the plastic cover for zip ties? Don't know if you had a picture, that would be awesome.

Regarding the hot connection. Did you actually run it to a fuse in the fuse box, or just to the hot bus inside? I was just going to attach it to the battery post, but that may be the more proper way to do it.

Wonder what caused the sticky high beam fence. I cycled mine about 20 times each, to make sure, as I didn't want to remove and rebake the housings...that would really suck.

Weird, I was going to mount mine to the same shelf on the side of the housings, but I was going to point the wires down. I looked at the name, and the stuff I bought is 3M Dual Lock. It's that weird plastic velcro kinda stuff, doesn't look like material, but little plastic mushrooms. It's supposed to be commercial/pro stuff, so hope it will work well. Otherwise, I'll see if I have enough length to zip tie them like you were talking about doing.

Sounds like we have similar setups, I also got the 3fives and the phillips 4300k bulbs. I was hoping to get them mounted today, but it just didn't happen. I may go tool around in the garage and at least see if I can get the relay harness mounted, and maybe test a housing out, before calling it a night.

 

The V6 might be different due to the different airbox, but yes, my reservoir is against the fender behind the housing. The pump is toward the engine behind the turn signal.

There were already a few holes in the top of the support. I ran the zip-ties through those.

I ran the lug directly to the main lug where the battery cable connects to the fuse box.

Mine didn't show up for a few months, but it was a known issue with the solenoids last year and has been (hopefully) fixed.

Ultimately, I'm going to mount them with steel strap so they aren't just hanging. The current mounting, I literally did in the parking lot at work and since it's always been fine, I have't taken the time to "fix" it.

 

Ah, thanks Rich, I found another retrofit you commented on, and saw he had pictures of where his ballasts and relays were mounted, and the holes used for going under the radiator cover. Thanks, that should help quite a bit. I think using the bracket would be better, so I may opt for that route, if there is a good location near by, and the harness will reach.

 

I'm going to try and use the area between the housings and the radiator, but the passenger side will be tight because of the AC lines passing through.