Anyone have a headlight bulb explode?

[bhvrdr]

Odd question but i had my entire headlight out of the car a week ago when I was putting in an intercooler heat exchanger. I was very careful with it and never took out or touched any of the bulbs or anything.

Anyways I put the fixture back in and I think I may have forgotten to hook up the wiring harness. So I believe the car may have been on when I hooked back up the wiring harness. Meaning power was going to the fixture when I hooked it back up.

None the less the headlight worked fine for the past week and all the sudden it went out. When I have taken out the bulb I noticed that it had completely exploded inside the fixture.

Does this happen often or do you guys think it was my mistake by plugging the fixture back in while power was going to it. I just want to make sure I'm not having some kind of voltage issue.

Thanks. Mike

[whiped]

The car will throw codes for voltage issues.

Can you post a pic of the bulb?

It shouldn't have provided a voltage spike to the bulb by plugging it in as the ballasts for the bulbs are built into the headlight housing and get power from the main connector.

My guess is the bulb just went out. If you overdrive them they explode like a grenade. If they get wet, they explode like a grenade.

If it died gracefully it likely was with from natural causes or because you shook the shit out of it or something removing the headlight.

[jlaudio]

did the quartz glass actually shatter? as geoff said that normally only happens when over-powered, wet, or with finger/oils on the bulb. i'd love to see a picture since i've never seen it happen.
ballasts step up the power from 12v to roughly 35,000v, so i doubt you had an actual power surge.

[bhvrdr]

Thanks fellas. I will admit I'm not very good with finesse when it comes to working on the car. I may have shaken it a slight bit. Or more than a slight bit. I'm just surprised that everything worked fine for a week and then it finally decided to explode. Here's a picture.

[whiped]

Yeah, Mike, that's a grenade

I'd order a new set, move your old one over to that side and use it there for a week. If no boom then you should be good to install the new one.

If boom, you probably damaged the ballasts and need to replace it.

I didn't realize it went thermo-nuclear on you!

Getting the glass out might be hard. If you are concerned about it I'd defuse the front lenses to get it all out.

[whiped]

Actually Mike,

I have my old OEM bulbs. Shoot me a PM or text and I can send them your way.

[bhvrdr]

Shoot thanks man its cool though. I got a pair of osram cbi but im going to do the old bulb in there first like you said. Good tip man. Thanks

[Illcomunikation]

Had my OEM bulb explode just before 50000 miles. Never touched anything in or near the housing. I'm guessing the filament over heated. The ceramic piece like in that pic was burnt. Definitely was a bitch to try to clean out the glass.

[bhvrdr]

Heres some pics of my four year old oem d3s philips bulb (left) versus a brand new osram cbi (right)

Low beam shutter...



High beam shutter...

[kelseysautobody]

Your original bulb looks pink. That's a sign its about to go out.

[bhvrdr]

thanks. yeah I looked at the bulb itself and it has some weird shadowing on the glass (kind of cloud like) with what looks like may be very very small stress cracks in there. This was in the other fixture so not related to anything traumatic to the bulb. Sounds like they are just 4 years old and getting ready to die. I only keep cars for around a year so never really thought about their service life.

Mike

[whiped]

Good news is the bulb blowing up is likely not your fault.

Still interesting that it detonated when it died.

[nitroracer15]

Definitely not your fault. I work at a dealer and seen a handful come through grenaded like that. No explanation why.

[SteveYem]

So is the glass from the broken bulb just rattling around in your headlight housing?

[JohnEnglish]

Yup, I had a bulb explode a few months ago. The dealer replaced it under warranty. I was just started up the car one day and the light was out and I got the "driver's side headlight burnt out" message. About a month later the passenger side light went out although it didn't explode.

[bhvrdr]

Thanks guys.

Yeah theres glass in the rear bottom of the housing. U cant see it looking from outside car looking in. Im probably going to ignore this fact until i forget about it

[SteveYem]

Thanks guys.

Yeah theres glass in the rear bottom of the housing. U cant see it looking from outside car looking in. Im probably going to ignore this fact until i forget about it

Good Call.

[sebgreen]

I had a ballast go, which took a bulb out with it. Don't thing either exploded though.


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[JohnEnglish]

Thanks guys.

Yeah theres glass in the rear bottom of the housing. U cant see it looking from outside car looking in. Im probably going to ignore this fact until i forget about it

When I took my car in, it took the dealer a while to clean out all the broken glass.

[bhvrdr]

yeah, sounds like something I dont want to do right now. I'm tempted to try and find a little fish tank gravel vacuum and see if I can get it in there.

mike