az3579
12-20-2017, 06:55 PM
Overview
Like many BMW owners, my headlights have poorly insulated wires. By poorly insulated, I of course am referring to the inferior insulation material on the internal wiring of the headlights. Over time, the insulation hardens to the point where the jacketing of the wire starts to crack and flake off.
Seeing this as a safety issue, I decided something needed to be done. Since BMW does not sell an internal wiring harness for these headlights, I decided to rebuild the internal harnesses on mine. Rebuilding the harness in a headlight is no small feat, as this requires complete disassembly of an otherwise $800+ headlight assembly, multiplied by two if you do both headlights. In my case, both headlights need rebuilding.
To accomplish an OE look, the plan was to order all new wiring with the correct color code, connectors, and terminals. I found myself having to alter the plan, however, as I found it very difficult to find information online about the types of connectors used on the headlight assembly. This makes it quite difficult to determine what to order, terminal-to-connector compatibility, and how to de-pin the existing connectors. After two days, I gave up researching the types of connectors used and changed my plan to the current plan.
The plan at the moment is a bit simpler and not quite as OCD as I’d like. First, I’m going to cut the wires about two inches from where they crimp to the connectors and slide the old insulation off the cut end. After the replacement wiring arrives, I will solder the new wire to the old wire and use heat-shrink tubing to insulate the wire from the terminal to which it is crimped to the solder joint. After the solder joint is covered, the rest of the new wire will already have insulation. The other end of the new wire will also be soldered to whichever connector it needs to be attached and covered with heat-shrink tubing to cover from the joint to the crimped terminal.
Parts list
The only component needed in the current plan is wiring. I measured the wiring in the stock harness with a wire stripper and compiled the following list of needed wiring.
Note: My vehicle is a ZHP sedan with Xenon headlights that were made by ZKW. They were retrofitted with FX-R projectors, so the shutter mechanism doesn’t use the factory harness connector. As a result, the wiring colors used and housing pictures may differ from yours. I have every reason to believe the colors will be the same for ZKW Xenon-equipped sedans as the shutter wiring was spliced into internal wiring.
18-gauge wiring needed:
Brown
Yellow
****** ^ These wires go from the housing 9006 connector to the 9006 connector that plugs into the ballast.
20-gauge wiring needed:
Green
****** ^ This wire was tapped to the brown wire from the 9006 connector on the housing and goes to the shutter on my projector
Red
****** ^ This wire goes from the 3-pin small connector below the 9005 connector on the housing to the shutter on my projector
White
Medium Grey
****** ^ These wires go from the 3-pin small connector below the 9005 connector on the housing to a connector that plugs into the ballast
Will insert a picture here of the new wiring when received
The wire colors noted above are the colors needed to repair all internal wiring except:
High beam wiring (H7), light grey and black wires
Autoleveling wiring connecting the autolevel motor to the housing connector
These harnesses did not need to be rebuilt on my headlights. The high beam wiring for the H7 bulb use a 10-gauge jacketing that feels like a rubber material, which appears to be much more durable than the other plastic-coated wires. The autoleveling wires are also plastic coated, but for some reason they do not need rebuilding on my headlights, despite every other bit of plastic-coated wiring needing to be repaired.
To be continued... Next section: Disassembly Notes
Like many BMW owners, my headlights have poorly insulated wires. By poorly insulated, I of course am referring to the inferior insulation material on the internal wiring of the headlights. Over time, the insulation hardens to the point where the jacketing of the wire starts to crack and flake off.
Seeing this as a safety issue, I decided something needed to be done. Since BMW does not sell an internal wiring harness for these headlights, I decided to rebuild the internal harnesses on mine. Rebuilding the harness in a headlight is no small feat, as this requires complete disassembly of an otherwise $800+ headlight assembly, multiplied by two if you do both headlights. In my case, both headlights need rebuilding.
To accomplish an OE look, the plan was to order all new wiring with the correct color code, connectors, and terminals. I found myself having to alter the plan, however, as I found it very difficult to find information online about the types of connectors used on the headlight assembly. This makes it quite difficult to determine what to order, terminal-to-connector compatibility, and how to de-pin the existing connectors. After two days, I gave up researching the types of connectors used and changed my plan to the current plan.
The plan at the moment is a bit simpler and not quite as OCD as I’d like. First, I’m going to cut the wires about two inches from where they crimp to the connectors and slide the old insulation off the cut end. After the replacement wiring arrives, I will solder the new wire to the old wire and use heat-shrink tubing to insulate the wire from the terminal to which it is crimped to the solder joint. After the solder joint is covered, the rest of the new wire will already have insulation. The other end of the new wire will also be soldered to whichever connector it needs to be attached and covered with heat-shrink tubing to cover from the joint to the crimped terminal.
Parts list
The only component needed in the current plan is wiring. I measured the wiring in the stock harness with a wire stripper and compiled the following list of needed wiring.
Note: My vehicle is a ZHP sedan with Xenon headlights that were made by ZKW. They were retrofitted with FX-R projectors, so the shutter mechanism doesn’t use the factory harness connector. As a result, the wiring colors used and housing pictures may differ from yours. I have every reason to believe the colors will be the same for ZKW Xenon-equipped sedans as the shutter wiring was spliced into internal wiring.
18-gauge wiring needed:
Brown
Yellow
****** ^ These wires go from the housing 9006 connector to the 9006 connector that plugs into the ballast.
20-gauge wiring needed:
Green
****** ^ This wire was tapped to the brown wire from the 9006 connector on the housing and goes to the shutter on my projector
Red
****** ^ This wire goes from the 3-pin small connector below the 9005 connector on the housing to the shutter on my projector
White
Medium Grey
****** ^ These wires go from the 3-pin small connector below the 9005 connector on the housing to a connector that plugs into the ballast
Will insert a picture here of the new wiring when received
The wire colors noted above are the colors needed to repair all internal wiring except:
High beam wiring (H7), light grey and black wires
Autoleveling wiring connecting the autolevel motor to the housing connector
These harnesses did not need to be rebuilt on my headlights. The high beam wiring for the H7 bulb use a 10-gauge jacketing that feels like a rubber material, which appears to be much more durable than the other plastic-coated wires. The autoleveling wires are also plastic coated, but for some reason they do not need rebuilding on my headlights, despite every other bit of plastic-coated wiring needing to be repaired.
To be continued... Next section: Disassembly Notes