I had to get one of my headlights replaced today. It was covered under warranty, but was quite surprised that after 13 months and 23K miles that this had to be done. I thought they were supposed to last for the life of the car.

greg

 

What happend to your old headlight? You meant HID? Both of them?

 

Just one HID bulb.

greg

 

It could have been defective. Things do break.

The life of the HID bulb ranges from 2,000 to 3,000 hours, depending on where you read it. If you hardly ever drive at night, like I do, it will probably last forever. If you are a night shift cab driver in your TL (not so preposterous; they use Mercedes for taxi cabs in Europe), then you might have to replace the bulb in 1-2 years.

Some people will say that turning on the lights excessively will shorten their life.

If you take the average consumption figures, like commuting to work for a couple of hours each day, and say you use your headlights about 10 hours a week, you might get 4-6 years life from the bulbs.

So it is all a matter of usage and individual habits, but yes, yours shouldn't have burned out from normal use in such a short period of time.

 

How you livin'? In my world very little to nothing is perfect. That's why we buy from people we trust and insist on warranties. It broke, they fixed it, end of story.
BTW, something else we probably break within the nex three years and 27K miles.

Sorry if I sound negative but what do you want?

 

He wasn't complaining, just asking a question. Since HID headlights are new to most of us, we have little experience in how long they will last, so we ask the question when it arises.

My reply above was not intended to be critical, just explanatory, as is this reply.

I am sure there are many others who wonder how long the HID bulbs will last, so we will probably see this question arise again as the cars age.

I have had my 87 Olds 98 for 18 years now, and I think I may have changed one halogen bulb in all that time, and HID's are supposed to last longer than halogens, so I shouldn't have to worry about changing an HID, unless of course it is one of those rare defective ones.

 

Sorry to hear that happened to you. Good thing the warranty replaced it and you are back and seeing at night.

When I worked at a Lexus dealer years ago we had a brand new car with 2 miles on it and the HID bulb had exploded inside the headlight. This car was brand new and there was no sign as to why.

 

what did it look like? could you tell it it blew up? or did it not just turn on? details man....

 

It literally had exploded inside the casing. It was in a million pieces of glass. The only thing still in the socket ws the socket itself.

There was a mark on the lense cover itself and the truck driver said it was a rough road up during a really bad rain and snowy week. There were several cars that had chips in them fron the drive.

Maybe it was the drive maybe it was from the trip overseas. Who knows, but weird. The cost at the time for a new bulb was $450 since it was the first year for HID and Lexus.

 

thats awsome!!!! so it exploded in the casing!!! not just within the bulb itself... too cool, no matter what im always a kid at heart

 

yep it did

 

Sorry. My point was that things do and will go wrong unexpectedly. The main thing is that it's taken care of for free with little or no drama. Basically, a non-event IMHO.

 

Just starting a new post for purposes of discussion. Yep, there will be things that go wrong with the vehicle. Very surprised that a headlight blew out after a year. I'm also curious about other people's headlight experience.

greg

 

That's the point I was trying to make also, but you expanded and mentioned the warranty, which is also a good point.

 

Interesting. I wonder if anyone has any real experience with how long HIDs last. Ron A cited 2000 to 3000 hours, and I've heard "the life of the vehicle", but I wonder what past HID owners have to say and whether they've ever had to replace a HID that burned out naturally...