Halogen to HID conversion

[twizz]

I finally embarked deep into the adventure of converting 4 headlight housings into 2 good housing with all mounting tabs, and HID's.

When I started this I had anticipated it being more of a plug and play situation, but clearly that is not the case. The HID's I purchased only had 3 good mounting tabs combined, so I opened the case up and examined further. These headlights came off of another 2000-2001 2.7t A6 so I did not expect to find leveling motors inside, I'm curious to know if all HID's came with them or if they had been replaced at some point from an allroad perhaps. Anyways, I started pulling out the harness inside the headlight and once removed I found that basically all of the wire coating was cracked and missing or cracking. Is this common? I had anticipated some level of obnoxious difficulty during this process but it seems that damaged wires is the only obstacle I need to resolve. I threw the headlights in the oven on a cookie sheet wrapped in foil for a few minutes and they pulled apart quite easily and there was no mess to clean up after either lol. Unfortunately now I'm sitting here with two factory HID projectors and two pretty rough harnesses until I decide what the best route to go from here is.

I've considered de-pining every wire and taping the living piss out of it, or there are replacement harnesses for $30/each. Anyone have any experience with this? Is this common? Does the dealer offer pigtails or harnesses?

Replacement Harness: http://www.ebay.com/itm/HID-Internal...9U46KU&vxp=mtr (only offer 4 pin leveling motor harness though)

[V1nny]

I saw very similar insulation cracking on allroad headlights purchased here, just coated them with vinyl glue. Replacing is better, but too much work for me.

[twizz]

I'm just trying to keep cost down, but in a responsible way that doesn't involve pulling these apart again sooner then I need too.

[twizz]

If anyone is interested in buying this project, I can reassemble the housings and ship them out as I no longer currently own a C5. If not I will keep them for some project or perhaps my future allroad

[LakeTahoeQuattr]

I already went thru my headlight conversion phase or I would take you up on that. I have converted 4 halogen units to xenon from junk yard headlights. Easier ways to do it than taking the lens off the housing.

[twizz]

you'll have to link me to explain how you got the harnesses out without total dissasembly (and back in lol)

[LakeTahoeQuattr]

Same as how you did it. You completely dissasembeled the light already. I did exactly as you did accept I did not remove the front lenses. Everything can come out no problem from the back. Just takes a little finesse. I swapped projectors from the back too. Hard to explain step by step, I just did it that way

[twizz]

I couldn't imagine the frustration of trying to re connect the harness to the turn signals without removing the lense. Goodness gracious

[LakeTahoeQuattr]

Yes that was quite difficult but not impossible by any means. If I recall I actually just removed the turn signal pins form the main connector plug the second time and re connected the pins on the new harness

[twizz]

Yes that was quite difficult but not impossible by any means. If I recall I actually just removed the turn signal pins form the main connector plug the second time and re connected the pins on the new harness

Aside from that, I was also clearing my corners and the damn reflector got wedged at the opposite corner. If the wires weren't all cracked to hell I would have considered de-pinning them at the connector. I feel like that would have been the easiest. However the top inner most projector mounting nut was annoyingly difficult to remove.

Luckily I don't think I have to re assemble these for any particular reason.

[LakeTahoeQuattr]

Yea mine did not have destroyed wires inside like those. Also, yea if doing clear corner mod, it is much easier to remove lense. You might as well as finish them up since you have gotten this far.

[twizz]

Yea mine did not have destroyed wires inside like those. Also, yea if doing clear corner mod, it is much easier to remove lense. You might as well as finish them up since you have gotten this far.

I had intended on doing so, but I sold the lenses, and the car. So now I just have parts laying around lol. perhaps I can make a retrofit at some point.