Retrofitting Bi-xenon Headlights on '02 and up 996's

[specialist]

Retrofitting Bi-xenon Headlights on '02 and up 996's

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:renntech: First, I'd like to say that I've really enjoyed the website and the community although I've only been a member for about a month or two. It appears that there is significant interest in retrofitting the non-HID 911's with HID systems. The vehicles before 2002 appear to have the option to buy a kit from Porsche to retrofit their cars. Those of us with a '02 or newer 996 were out of luck. Retrofitting the stock assemblies is actually quite easy. I purchased a set of used B

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• Author
  specialist
• Category
  Carrera (996) - Mods
• Submitted
  03/26/2006 05:09 PM

 

Edited February 20, 2010 by specialist

[delirium]

any update as to how this install went/completed?

[specialist]

any update as to how this install went/completed?

The install went well. Unfortunately my digital camera was stolen, but has recently been replaced. The hardest part about the whole install was attempting to discover the proper pinouts for the existing headlights, and the new HID units.

Specialist

[FlashingBlade]

Thanks to Specialist's posting I was able to perform the bi-xenon conversion on

a USA 02 996 C2. Here are a couple additional tips:

o Before you start, mark the spots on some wall where your current low beams shine. I just

used the wall of my garage.

o You don't need to buy a new set of connectors, nor do you need a pin removal tool.

You'll need two pins with the following part number:

999 652 744 20

available at your dealer. I bought a handfull in case I screw up. The pin looks like (see pic):

o Once you remove the headlights, you will see the connector in the back.

The connector can be removed by depressing two yellow clips in the rear.

Use a mirror to locate the clips and then use a needle nosed plier to depress

the clips by rotating the pliers aft. The connectors slides downwards and then out.

o Locate the 3rd hole at the bottom and pry out the rubber plug from the rear

using something like a dentist tool.

o Crimp a 14AWG wire to the pin. I soldered as well and used some heat shrink tubing for insulation.

o Push the pin into the empty slot with a needle nosed plier. Make sure it lined up right.

This takes a fair amount of force. I found that rotating the pin 180 degrees sometimes

works better. Make sure you don't bend the pin.

o Splice this wire to the wire that comes out of the second slot. It is best to solder. Insulate.

o I added some silicone caulking to rear of the new pin to prevent water build up.

o Slide the connector back in, install the light and you are done.

o Adjust the lights so that they shine more or less in the same spots that you marked previously

The benefit of this modification is that both halogen and bi-xenon lights will

work interchangably and costs only an additional 2US$ (in addition to the lights).

It took me about an hour, but that included trying to figure all this out.

Caveat: If you don't add this pin, the low beams will work, but your fog and highbeams won't.

Hope this helps.

Edited July 3, 2006 by FlashingBlade

[delirium]

I have an '04 and my harness has pins 1,2 and 3 already being used. see attached picture.

What do I do?

1 = black/white

2 = gray/black

3 = yellow/white

[Loren]

I have an '04 and my harness has pins 1,2 and 3 already being used. see attached picture.

What do I do?

1 = black/white

2 = gray/black

3 = yellow/white

US or RoW car?

[delirium]

this is a US car.

[Loren]

this is a US car.

Hmm... did you buy the car new? Perhaps it is already wired for bi-xenon?

Look under the front hood and see if option 601 is on the sticker. If 601 is there, then someone removed the bi-xenon headlights and put Halogen in.

[mc_sahib32]

I got a weire problem after the retrofit. It used to work normally with the new HID light, but now I cannot turn on the HID head light when I turn the dial to "on" position, only the parking light is on when I turn the dial. I have to pull the dial to turn on the fog light then push it back to shut off the fog light then the HID head light will turn on by itself. so now my switch on head light sequences are: turn the dial full right, pull it out and push it back to turn on head light. anyone 've this same problem or any idea why?

[Westcoaster]

Would these pins be the same as used in the headlight connector for a my06 987?

o

You don't need to buy a new set of connectors, nor do you need a pin removal tool.

You'll need two pins with the following part number:

999 652 744 20

available at your dealer. I bought a handfull in case I screw up. The pin looks like (see pic):

thanks

[specialist]

I got a weire problem after the retrofit. It used to work normally with the new HID light, but now I cannot turn on the HID head light when I turn the dial to "on" position, only the parking light is on when I turn the dial. I have to pull the dial to turn on the fog light then push it back to shut off the fog light then the HID head light will turn on by itself. so now my switch on head light sequences are: turn the dial full right, pull it out and push it back to turn on head light. anyone 've this same problem or any idea why?

From what you said, it sounds like the HID problem has developed recently. Depending on how the system is wired up, you may not be able to get enough inital current to the iginiter. Check the fuse in your panel for your headlights. I the HID equipped cars there was a 30 amp fuse in the block. Cars newer than 2001 or 2002 came with a 30 amp fuse by default, but I think that earlier 996's had a 15 amp fuse. I'm not sure what would cause the problem to develop over time, however.

Hope this helps,

Specialist

[signal]

I did a facelift on my '00 car, and used those wiring harnesses and bought Bi-Xenons. Everything works as far as the headlights, including hi-beam, I had to move no pins. Is this odd? My car did not have Litronics before, just regular halogens.

However, what IS broken, is my trunk light. The ground for the trunk light which goes into the headlight harness plugs into an empty hole on the trunk harness! So I am gonig to obviously have to fix this somehow, does anyone have any information on this? Has anyone else added Bi-Xenons to a 00-01 car, using the above wiring harnesses and had their trunik light stop working as well? (I would assume all 00-01 would have the same effect).

Brian

[desidon]

I have successfully upgraded to Bi-xenons. It was not easy and the wire splicing was a little bit above my skill level. Finally put it together and it works!!

I followed the instructions on the 996 DIY section of Renntech

http://www.renntech.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=8612

The trickiest piece was getting the plastic connector off. I broke several small pieces of it because of my clumsiness. I did not break those connectors too bad as I was able to plug the lights back in.

Thanks to Doug Donsbach from Rennlist and Specialist and Flashingblade from Renntech. This would not have happened if not for all their replies to my queries.

DD

[steve germany]

It really hlps to solder the pins - the extra strength makes them easy to incert.

A flat blade watch screwdriver works to get the silicon plug out of the pin 3 hole.

I broke some of the plug holder pins off too. Any better instructions on removing the plug without damage?

[aero0t2]

Is there a part number on the plug for the headlights? A bosch part number maybe? I am upgrading my 2000 Boxster S to the 02+ 996 front end, and really don't want to have to buy the entire wiring harness. I have litronics from stock, so I'm hoping the auto-leveling will carry forward.

[aero0t2]

For anyone looking to use the above headlight pinout as a reference, the numbering doesn't match the numbering used by Porsche on the headlight... its backwards. I just did this on my 2000 Boxster S, and if you look at the connector on the back of the 02+ headlight, the numbering is correct as show in the picture, but the wiring is reversed. Conversely, if you look at the face of the connector, the wiring layout is right, but the numbering is wrong. Just a bit of trial and error with a multimeter to figure that out.

Looking at the back of the headlight, the connector is as follows.

|------------------------------------------|

| # 7 | # 8 | # 9 | #10 | #11 | #12 |

| # 6 | # 5 | # 4 | # 3 | # 2 | # 1 |

|------------------------------------------|

#1 Turn signal

#2 Side marker light

#3 Fog light

#4 High beams

#5 Not connected

#6 Common ground for above lights

#11 Xenon low beams

#12 Ground for low beams

#7-10 are for the self leveling, on my Turbo headlights, there is a HELLA leveling motor, and the internal wire coloring is #7 = Blue, #8 = Orange, #9 = Yellow, #10 = Pink. My old headlights (01- litronics) had a Bosch leveling motor which looks exactly the same, but the wires are different colors. It would seem that the wiring color converts as follows:

HELLA vs Bosch:

Blue = Green

Orange = Red

Yellow = Black

Pink = Blue

The 01- headlights have the self leveling wiring on a separate 4-wire connector, and the coloring is from top to bottom Blue/Black/Red/Green (I have to check on the numbering order 1-4 or 4-1). I haven't actually tested the self leveling yet, but I assume (hope) that the Bosch and Hella motors are interchangeable.

I couldn't find a used set of wiring harnesses, so I made up an adapter cable with 0.110" insulated spade connectors and 14 awg wire. 14 awg was totally overkill for most of the wiring, but it was easiest to just do them all the same for me. If I can find a used harness I'll switch over to proper connectors.

Hope this helps someone...

Edited September 14, 2008 by aero0t2

[aero0t2]

BTW, why do they call them bi-Xenons? They only have a xenon low beam. I know it aims up when the highbeams go on but the older xenons (01- 996 and boxster) did this too. Does this mean I already had bixenons in my 2000 Boxster S?

Edited September 15, 2008 by aero0t2

[awmeng]

Thanks for the awesome write-up all! Just got mine converted from Halogens to Turbo Bi-Xenon. Took about 2 hours and I took my time too.

Does anyone have suggestions for the headlight washers to work?