My passenger headlight doesn't turn on everytime. To get it to turn on (when passenger light doesn't light up) I have to turn off my headlights then turn them on again.

Sometimes when my headlights are on and I start my vehicle, the passenger headlight turns off.

I have replaced the ballast for the passenger side and both HID lights.

The problem still persists.

What could be causing this?

 

Bad ignitor that sits on the back of the bulb

 

I replaced the ignitor and I am still having this issue.

What else could be causing this?

 

There's a ballast AND an ignitor. Which did you replace? First you said ballast now you say ignitor. Ignitor plugs into the bulb and the ballast sits under the headlight powering the ignitor.

Swap the remaining old parts to zero in on the problem

 

I replaced the passenger ballast, ignitor and HID bulb at the same time.

I forgot to mention ignitor in my original post and was not able to edit it to insert it.

I am still having this problem and unable to locate the cause of this.

 

I don't have a solution for you, just an anecdote.

After I changed out the passenger-side HID bulb, it did the same thing as you are experiencing- the bulb would turn on every other time the headlight switch was used.
After about a month of this, the intermittency went away and both headlights have worked normally since.

I didn't change the ballast or the ignitor.

 

How well can you replicate the symptoms? Like randomly every full moon or every 5 times you use headlights?

Couple ideas:

Both headlights are feed through the same relay, but separate fuses. They share the same ground. If only one headlight has the problem, you can switch everything side-to-side (bulb, ballast, igniter - well everything). Let's assume new ballast might be faulty. It's unlikely but I've been screwed over couple times by bad parts.

Otherwise if fault happens, check if both fuses are getting power. Easier than reaching for the plug to the ballast. It should be under-hood #1 (15A) and #6 (15A). Try to move them around. Bad connections happen more often on boats, but won't hurt to try.

Other thing that I have in mind is that maybe faulty headlight circuit has more resistance. Fuse or simply corroded wire. If ballast tries to turn on, voltage drops below certain threshold and ballast turns off. However I have no idea if it would try to turn on again or not. That would make sense with headlight turning OFF when starting car, but no idea if that explains the thing happening randomly.

You can load the headlight circuit, with for example 55W bulb, and see if both sides have around same voltage at the bulb.

 

I replaced the passenger fuse (passenger fuse was fine) with a spare fuse, cleaned the spare fuse connector with 91% rubbing alcohol and I blew compressed air into the fuse outlet to clean out any debris that may have been lodged in there (none noticed).

 

And the problem still persists? Then if you are sure that it's not a ballast/ignitor/bulb problem I would load test the circuit at the connector with 55W bulb.

 

I'm not sure if the problem persists, It does not happen every time, I have to wait and see.

Could you please elaborate on this?

 

So my theory is that circuit for some reason has additional resistance. That causes voltage drop when ballast tries to turn on (as HID requires some additional power at startup) but resistance causes bigger voltage drop, and that makes the voltage too low for it to run. Then ballast faults out and doesn't try to ignite again.

Like I wrote, that is just a theory. No idea if ballast will not try to ignite again, and no idea what is the threshold of it cutting off. But considering that both headlights run basically at the same circuit and only one faults out, and everything "after" the ballast connector is brand new, then there's not much left. And you need to start somewhere.

So if you connect the 55W light bulb at the end of ballast plug (for example by back-probing the plug), and turn on the headlights, it will make the bulb draw some power from the circuit.
Then you measure the voltage between ground right at the bulb and negative battery terminal. AND voltage between bulb positive lead and battery positive terminal.
You want to see readings close to 0V. If one side has some excess value then you need to figure out if that makes sense.
If positive side has like >1V, then measure between fuse and positive terminal. If this is fine, then between fuse and bulb positive.

If you don't want to measure anything, cut power feed to ballast and wire it to some relay. Relay gets power right from the battery, through 15A fuse, and sends it to ballast connector.
I can write more if you want to go this route.

Otherwise I have no idea. And I would still encourage you to swap igniter/ballast/bulb side to side.

 

Could you please explain this. Thanks.

 

Taking a easy way out, huh?

Assuming problem is with resistance on positive line, wiring a relay like:

Cut positive wire going to the ballast leaving enough wire on both sides to connect something to it, preferably with solder (good connection. I don't trust those clamp things).
Then 85 to ground
Wire that you cut, coming "from the car" to 86.
Wire that you cut, going "to the ballast" to 87.
30, through the in-line 15A fuse, to battery positive, one of



That will use cars factory wiring as trigger. You can also use other headlight's positive wire for the ballast as trigger (86). That will make sure that relay will be triggered.

That is a last resort option. Better than replacing whole fusebox, but worse than for example finding bent pin, corroded wire, bad ground, etc. And if positive lines resistance is not the problem, then this will most likely not fix it, so I would test it first.

 

where did you get your ballast/igniter/bulbs?

 

I don't remember. It was OEM new.

 

Yes just happened (cleaned/changed fuses as you advised.)

The passenger HID turns bluer than the driver's headlight when turned on and stays that way longer than the driver's headlight (this has always been the case).

 

It could be caused by corrosion, loose connection, bad ground, etc.

Check the voltage drop across

1. RED/GRN to BLK
2. BLK to battery ground
3. RED/GRN to battery positive

You'll need to determine if you lose battery positive or lose ground to the headlight. The headlights have separate grounds so check G201 if you lose ground at the headlight.

 

I remember now, I got it from E-Bay for $60. It said OEM new and showed hundreds of purchases. OEM costs $300 from the dealer. So this might be defective, fake.

I found the ground by the intake, it was all gunked up, I cleaned it, it did not help.

Where is the relay for this?

My driver side just went out. I just ordered this from Amazon because they stated it had 6 year warranty, contacted Amazon if they went out of business and they said they would honor the warranty.

 

The ebay ballast/ignitor was something like this:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-ACURA-2...temCondition=3

This video makes me suspicious:

 

I ordered 2 ballasts and ignitors, thought I would replace both while my bumper is sitting on my front windshield . I'm guessing the OEM Ebay ballast is a knock-off.

 

You bought a counterfeit eBay ballast, then you posted an Amazon link for another counterfeit ballast. Maybe just buy a real one this time

 

That would be around $600 bucks. My car has ~$210,000 miles, and is worth $2,844 dollars.

This ballast has 6 year warranty.

Where is the headlight relay? I can't find it, its a 2005 TL. Is it replaceable or is it built into the fuse box?




 

https://acurazine.com/forums/3g-tl-p...-power-975452/

 

I saw that I don't get it. Could you please point it out on my picture.

 

Relay Control Module is built into the fuse box, not replaceable as such:

https://acurazine.com/forums/3g-tl-p...t-work-773260/

 

Thanks.

I just bought 2 new HID bulbs.


When I prior changed my bulbs I bought 2 new Phillips D2S for $12.00. It had the original box, and original markings on the bulb. I guess now they might have also been fake

 

I checked the solenoid via the following method and it was fine:

 

The two grounds were behind the air intake. One was clean other was covered with gunk. I cleaned it off didn't make a difference.

I have a multimeter how do I check if the ground is bad? I don't understand how you explained it.

 

Wait... You got "Philips" bulbs for $12 and now you ordered some bulbs for $19? And here "we" are paying around $150 for a pair.

High / low beam doesn't matter. It uses same projector, same balast, same bulb. Just a small metal cover moves around inside the projector.

To measure the v drop, you put one multimeter lead on the good ground (center of battery terminal) and other on the thing that you measure ground for (back probe the connector). You want to see reading as close to 0V as possible.

 

Amazon has been notorious for selling counterfeit bulbs/parts/etc.

Buy from https://www.theretrofitsource.com/hi...bulbs-d-series if you want to ensure you're getting a legit part.

 

I don't understand this part. I put one lead on the center of the negative battery terminal the other lead where do I put it?

 

You put it in the back of the plug that goes to the ballast, negative side. You will see 0V with headlight OFF, and probably something more with headlights ON.

 

I just tested it.

I put the black lead on the negative battery terminal and the red lead on the negative side of the ballast connector, I had the ballast disconnected when I did this and I tested it on the metal part of the connector (on the inside of connector).

I had my multimeter set on Vdc.

With my headlights off I got 0v. With my headlights on I got 0.024v.

 

Success for the driver's side (ballast, ignitor and bulb were replaced). $50 total from Amazon for driver's side.

Now for passenger side.

 

Correction:

For both sides when I tested the ground with headlights off I received a reading of 0.001v.
With headlights on I received a reading of 0.013 - 0.015v.

Thanks for your time and help.

 

With headlights ON and ballast connected and lights being actually ON, right? Voltage drop need to be tested under load.

Just wonder how long $50 setup will work. I hate doubting the new parts, and that happens a lot with aftermarket electronics.

 

They were disconnected when I tested them with and without headlights on. Wasn't able to get prong in there as you showed in the picture.

 

I just finished changing both ballasts, ignitors and bulbs. My battery died along the way I don't know how, It was an interstate with 5 year warranty, I got a replacement for $78. I just finished putting everything back together, and both headlights work fine, no issues as of yet.

 

For my original problem with my passenger headlight going out the following were the listed new "OEM Ballast and Ignitor" I got of Ebay for ~$50 that the seller had 99.9% positive reviews and hundreds of purchases for it (I realized they weren't OEM when I received them). Also shown is the $12 Phillips HID bulbs (for 2). I got them of a website (I forgot which) They still look like genuine to me, due to the low cost of them I changed them incase they are perfectly replicated fakes.

 

Did the problem come back? My 05 TL have been doing this for years. I have to turn the headlight on and off (sometimes multiple times) to get the passenger side headlights to turn on. Would really like to solve this mystery. It's not the ballast, ignitor or bulb because those have been changed multiple times.