02 Bugeye WRX JDM Headlights Help

[NoxiousWRX]

Hi, new to this forum!

Just recently purchased a the aforementioned WRX because it looked so BADA**. Anyway, I have a technical issue with the headlights.

As far as I can tell (because Ive searched and searched) they are JDM. Now my problem is, my headlights have no 'Dip' only full-time High-beam, when the switch is made there is no difference.

Can anybody help me out? Ive looked under the hood, but Im no mechanic by any means and all the wires are spliced and joined in random places and I cant see any connectors (except one which is wrapped in electrical tape), but I have no idea if its the wiring or if it might be something else.

Please help as I cant drive the car at night without getting every man and his dog flashing the beams at me, not to mention giving the police a reason to pull me over.

Thanks in advance!

[Tinywagon]

If I remember correctly the JDM headlights on a bug eye have two separate lamps. One for low beams one for high beams.

If you do indeed have "true" JDM lights I forsee two potential issues.

1. they are HID (High intensity discharge) bulbs and they have a ballast (heavy-ish box) that the wires are routed too before they return to your control switches.

You may have an issue with the ballast which would suck because there's usually no way to fix that short of buying a new ballast.

2. If i'm not mistaken HID bulbs are polarized which means that you should find the lamp that isn't switching on and try reversing the terminals. (you should of course have the car off, with your battery disconnected when you do this)

this may work, but i'm un sure if the headlights are wired off of one ballast in series or off of two ballasts.


Since however you admit to not being knowledgeable in this area my real advice is to take this to a mechanic with a wiring speciality, so that nothing bad happens if you try to fix it yourself.


happy hunting, and let us know how it turns out.

[T.J.]

I would search here and on nasioc.com for JDM headlight threads. There probably be hundreds of them. Look for tutorial style threads w/ pictures and then compare your hardware and wiring to the pictures. Or post in you local forum (where are you from anyway?) and find someone in the area that has a similar setup who can help you out.

Since this is a mix and match setup a mechanic isn't going to have a manual for what you have. It would probably be costly to have them fiddle w/ it, besides they might just jump on the web and do what I described anyway.

Sounds like you might want to pick up some connectors and wire strippers from Radioshack or the like.

And, welcome to the club!

Good luck, T.J.

[NoxiousWRX]

Okay, I took some pictures (Not the best though).









All these pics are on the left hand side (Passenger, I live in New Zealand by the way)
I only have assumed they're JDM because they were the only lights I could find on the net that look the same, it doesnt say JDM on them anywhere but in the pics above it has 'ICHIKOH' on the plastic casing, its also on the front of the headlight at the bottom I only noticed it when I was taking the pics.
The high-beam bulb is a Sylvania 9005 HB3 U, Ive searched but I still cant tell if its HID or Halogen, this is some confusing s*&^. And then theres the wiring, as you can see its a bit of a mess (Well I think it is) I cant even make out the colours of the wires really, there so many of them.

[brfatal]

Most certainly not HID. They are wired wrong.

[06ImprezaWRXSTI]

Yup, what she said. Those look to be halogen bulbs and maybe the previous owner had hid's and went back to halogen and just wired everything randomly. I would look at some stock wiring pics (or ask someone with a bugeye that can help you out) and disconnect that mess (battery disconnected too), then try solder the wires as they should be from factory.

[NoxiousWRX]

Cool, thanks guys, will give it a go.

So far Ive read that the polarity doesnt matter for halogens so I should be all good. Thanks again.