HOTRODS2000

Ok guys I'm trying to help a fellow S2Ker. He has a 2002 S2000. We noticed excessive condensation in his head light assemblies during a routine oilchange. A week later boths of his HID's went out. After alot of checking and swapping parts we removed his inverters and water actually ran out of the HID compartment of the headlight assemblies. We opened the the inverters and found plenty of water inside the cases. We have dried them out and gotten one of them to work again.

I am wondering if anyone has come up with a way to eliminate the formation of condensation. I am also interested to know if anyone has converted HID's to less expensive halogen bulbs. The inverter prices so far are $275.00 each plus shipping from Hardtopguy.com and $385.00 each plus tax at the local stealership.

At these prices it seems Honda should have used something alot less expensive for lighting in our cars. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Stratocaster

You have found where the water entered the headlights? Where they opened?

HOTRODS2000

The unexplained condensation is the main part of the problem. The headlight assemblies have not been tampered with since the car was purchased new in early 2002. No bulb replacements and no accident damage.

Amer

Maybe they weren't sealed properly, I'm assuming they were previously cleared?

Stratocaster

OK, I would have to agree. What you can do is strip them down (no bulbs, ballast, ect) Put them in the oven for 15-20 min at 225. Then instead of opening them, sqeeze them closed. You will see the sealant start to come out from the edges. You can then, cover them with a towel of two, and tie them up with rope, like a mummy and let them cool. That should take care of the seals. When you reinstall them, use some grease on the seals. Also, I have seen a few sets of headlights that did not have the square seals between the ballasts and headlights. If they are missing, buy a set and install them as well. At this point, they should be better than new.

HOTRODS2000

Thanks for the tip Stratocaster. We were actually thinking about pulling them out and sending them to W1ngman to be cleared and re-sealed. He cleared mine three years ago and I've had no trouble at all.

Have you noticed the vents/drains on the rubber boot behind the high beam bulbs? I was wondering if the assemblies weren't actually sealed watertight because of those.

Stratocaster

No, that is not the problem. There is also a few vents on the back of the headlights as well. So they are not really sealed. but if the lens is not sealed, water will enter the housings.

There was a case where the housing were cleared professional, and when they were installed, the shop was A/C'ed and when the car drove out, they fogged right up. Now it was a suny day in FL and not a drop of rain in sight and they fogged. All it took for these, was the owner took them off and let them dry out overnight. He reinstalled them and never had a problem again.

But by all means, send them to Dave, he will fix them up to look like new. Or better then new.

w1ngman

I spoke with Jonathan last week over the phone. First off ...real big thanks goes to you hotrod for helping this nice fella out! The work the two of you have done so far definitely sounds like its helping reduce the potential damage.

Good point what Jeff offers below...
Can you remember if the ballasts were missing their rubber gaskets that fit up into the bottom of the headlamp assemblies? During conversions, I've run into cases where those gaskets are missing as well. However, I will *add* that every time I've run across missing gaskets the car had been involved in a front-end fender bender . Other replaced/unpainted parts, 10mm aluminum & brass bolts not in their factory-correct positions, etc. tended to spell W-R-E-C-K-E-D. And in some cases...the 'owner' was not aware of the previous history of the car (i.e. purchased 2nd+ owner & history of car not divulged. Regardless, faced with the situation as it was during the middle of such customer conversions, I've solved the problem by running a full bead of silicon sealant into the groove where the rubber seal is suppose to sit. Then set the ballast into place, and draw down the four 10mm ballast retaining bolts.

Of course, you may reply that the seals were there ...then I have little more to offer . I know Jon mentioned he'd participated in a group drive [somewhat recent to the timeline for the condensation] where the group wound up driving through some hard rains ... It takes a mighty tough hit of water and at just the right angle to seriously invade our headlamps. But its about the only possibility I can come up with.

As for Honda doing something less expensive than HIDs, well, there's little about our cars that's not expensive (certainly not my tires that I run through ). But Jonathan has, I believe, unfortunately experienced something quite rare. It doesn't make it any less painful for sure. But surely you'll agree that this just doesn't get posted about on the site (can't say "ever" cuz obviously, it does happen). It is a rare scenario I think.

- Dave