I recently (about a month ago) bought a 2003 Mini Cooper S and the headlights worked perfectly when I got the car. A couple of days ago the right headlight didn't turn on, so I turned off the headlights and turned them on again and it kicked on. Driving it tonight, it will no longer kick on. I looked up videos on how to replace the bulb (I was going to switch the bulbs to make sure the assembly was not bad). I found this video [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFcCOtp0E5Q]How to change headlight bulbs in your Mini Cooper - YouTube[/ame] my headlight assembly is very similar, but the bulb itself has a big black cover instead of a connector like in the video. I am assuming that the person who owned the car before me put aftermarket xenon bulbs in the car, because they are very white in color. I am not sure how to replace them and it is too dark to take pictures of the assembly right now. Does anyone have any idea what my problem is and/or how to replace the bulb itself? Any suggestions welcome. I am at a complete loss at this point. Thanks for the help!
Before we go too far, a couple of questions. Which bulb is burned out? Your highbeams or your low beams? Do you have daytime running lights on your highbeams? Those are H7 bulbs and are fairly easy to replace....just be careful lining up the mounting clip that holds the bulb in place. If it is crooked, your bulb will be loose or be misaligned. If it's your low beam that's burned out, do you have halogens or xenons? If you have xenons, you might have to check if it's your igniter that's failed. Since Xenon bulbs do not have filaments, they don't generally burn out unless there is a leak in the bulb where the gas has leaked out. In anycase, a failed xenon is expensive to fix. They are supposed to last a long time...even the life of the car. Big black cover suggests it's xenon.
It's my passenger side low beam that is not working. The high beams work perfectly fine. I do not have daytime running lights activated on my low beams or my high beams. How do I know for sure if I have halogens or xenons? The light produced from my low beams is white in color while the color produced from my high beams is "warm" white (slightly yellow/orange) in color. I can't figure out how to get the low beam bulb out of the headlight assembly because underneath the rubber cover there is a black plastic cover rather than the connector that is seen in the video. I figured my igniter could be bad and that's why I wanted to switch the two bulbs in my low beam headlights to see if it is the bulb or the assembly. Also, the fact that it turned on only sometimes before it entirely failed, seems to suggest that the igniter is bad. Can you direct me to a website where I can purchase replacement parts? What if I wanted to "downgrade" to halogen bulbs to save money? Is that possible? Thanks for your help
Okay, I did some checking around and I am 90% sure I have xenon low beams. I found an igniter that looks almost identical to [ame="http://www.ebay.com/itm/BOSCH-AL-Xenon-HID-Ballast-OEM-Audi-Mercedes-BMW-Unit-Controller-Igniter-ECU-D2S-/320828171056?pt=Motors_Car_Truck_Parts_Accessories&fits=Year%3A2003%7CModel%3ACooper&hash=item4ab2d96330&vxp=mtr"]Igniter[/ame] toward the front of my headlight assembly. I also found [ame="http://www.ebay.com/itm/OEM-02-04-Mini-Cooper-Xenon-IGNITER-IGNITOR-HID-Bulb-SOCKET-IGNITION-UNIT-PLUG-/350740722222?pt=Motors_Car_Truck_Parts_Accessories&fits=Year%3A2003%7CModel%3ACooper&hash=item51a9c6b22e&vxp=mtr"]Socket[/ame] which, the socket, looks just like the "big black cover" I was talking about earlier. I still can't figure out how to get my bulbs out, though.