LampF and HIDs

teamwimp

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I fitted a HID kit on dipped beam a little while ago and sometimes on startup I get Lampf! and no dip beam. If I swithch off and restart it normally goes away and all lights work ok (very occasionally I'll have to do it twice) never have a problem whilst running.

Doesn't appear to be a poor connector.

Ideas?

Canbus issue?
 
It your ballasts. Do you have the slim ones? Mine also does this. Find the best thing is to turn the ignition on, let it do all the checks then hopefully success. Mine even got to the stage that it would work on start up then after a few seconds of idling would go out. Fits and starts it appears but it is not a loose connection or faulty bulb...............
 
MGJ said:
They did on my RT !!
Click to expand...

RT is the one exception with HiD.

On the 1200 it could be ballast, HID50 we get them set for the Canbus, so very little problems the Chinese ones can be good and bad the cheaper the more prone they are, look out for the cheap red/black wire kits.

All ours have money back guarantee, even if we sold to RT user's
 
HID lights cutting out.

There are no fuses on the caanbus system, just overload monitoring which cuts out the circuit if it detects what it perceives to be too high a current.
On initial startup, many HID systems draw a heavy current for the first second or so, & this trips BMW's super sensitive protection.
It is not a bad connection. It is initial current inrush.
Check my posts on HID & Canbus for further details
Myke
 
Mine do the same occasionally.

They were fitted at a BMW dealer...Cannons.

When mine do it a flash of the main beam clears it....but don't ask me why?? :augie
 
Les Wassall said:
RT is the one exception with HiD.

On the 1200 it could be ballast, HID50 we get them set for the Canbus, so very little problems the Chinese ones can be good and bad the cheaper the more prone they are, look out for the cheap red/black wire kits.

All ours have money back guarantee, even if we sold to RT user's
Click to expand...

Les - you have a PM
 
The biggest problem is the battery, if you do short trips or use the bike at weekends then it needs to be optimated, after 12 months the BMW battery seems to loose it's edge and with the Canbus sends all the power to the starter, this starves the HiDs a litttle on the inital warm up thats why second go they will fire up.
Switch all the extras of at start, make sure the battery is in peak condition, the more stop starts on one journey the battery has to get the charge back.
 
battery?

Les Wassall said:
The biggest problem is the battery, if you do short trips or use the bike at weekends then it needs to be optimated, after 12 months the BMW battery seems to loose it's edge and with the Canbus sends all the power to the starter, this starves the HiDs a litttle on the inital warm up thats why second go they will fire up.
Switch all the extras of at start, make sure the battery is in peak condition, the more stop starts on one journey the battery has to get the charge back.
Click to expand...

Garbage.
 
littleredrooster said:
The kits from Les Wassall or Zerocool of this parish don't do that.......
Click to expand...


Errr yes they do - To be fair though it is usually because I have left the heated grips on so when I turn the ignition on it seems to upset something although it has happened without the grips on now and again
 
Ok so Ive been running a set of slim VVME HID high and low beams now for 2 years and here is where I'm at. During the summer months they work great. During the winter months not so great. To get the low beam to light I have to turn off the spot lights and grip heaters and hold the clutch in and even then its 50/50. Battery right. That was my first thought to so one new heavy duty braille battery later and its not fixed. I see after scouring Google that many HID users are having to use a 6 ohm 50 watt resistor to get the lights to work with a canbus system. I also see where people wire a 194 light bulb wired in at the BMW oem headlight plug. Has anyone else found a cure for the cold lampf failure?
 
dutch97501 said:
Ok so Ive been running a set of slim VVME HID high and low beams now for 2 years and here is where I'm at. During the summer months they work great. During the winter months not so great. To get the low beam to light I have to turn off the spot lights and grip heaters and hold the clutch in and even then its 50/50. Battery right. That was my first thought to so one new heavy duty braille battery later and its not fixed. I see after scouring Google that many HID users are having to use a 6 ohm 50 watt resistor to get the lights to work with a canbus system. I also see where people wire a 194 light bulb wired in at the BMW oem headlight plug. Has anyone else found a cure for the cold lampf failure?
Click to expand...

Sort of similar to me, had mine fitted now since Nov 2010 (not long after buying the bike), and both main and dipped have started to be somewhat intermittent at times. Oddly enough, the 35W spot HID's have always fired up first time every time, but the 50W HID's, when they play up, they strobe for about 1/2 a second, then stop with the fabled LAMPF. Ignition off & on sorts out the dipped beam about 80% of the time, but the full beam, can take about 5 to 10 goes to get that fired up again.

Already had one 50W balast replaced last year, so guess may need to look at replacing the two 50W ones together now when I can afford. Les did mention last time I saw him, that he has different bulbs available now, so might try those too, see how I get on!

And it's not like I do short journeys, as I'm covering 80 miles a day (40 mile commute each way to work) and have recently had a new battery fitted too which made bugger all difference...
 
This is a bit of an old thread now and tech has moved on. You can now get Canbus hid kits that have electronics in them to fool the system into thinking everything is ok. They don't cost much more than the normal ballasts. The other alternative is to get cancellers that plug in line to the stock ballast. I looked at how these fired up using an ameter and it seems they draw much more constant power on cold start. The standard ballasts all seem to start with a high current draw and slowly lower down to their running current. Its this that I think the system sees as a fault and shuts it all down.
 
I should also add that yes there is some total crap out there on eBay but there is also some very good stuff on there as well with 2 year guarantee plus an initial if it doesn't work for you get your money back. I got a pair of Canbus compatible ones for £60 the lot including the new any glare bulbs and ceramic holders recently and they work great. There is of course Les as well.
 
Les Wassall said:
RT is the one exception with HiD.

On the 1200 it could be ballast, HID50 we get them set for the Canbus, so very little problems the Chinese ones can be good and bad the cheaper the more prone they are, look out for the cheap red/black wire kits.

All ours have money back guarantee, even if we sold to RT user's
Click to expand...

My 1200GS is another exception. I have 50w main and dip and 35w spots all from Les and I sometimes get the Lampf issue mentioned above on dip. Probably once every couple of weeks on dip so not a big issue (I only worry it will happen during MOT!). It is more a problem on the spots as one of them fails to light about half the time and needs turning off and on again (normally works second time). Having swapped things around it seems to be the bulb that's the problem, not the ballast or wiring.

In defence of Les I never pursued a fix on this, but when I had a complete failure of a ballast he replaced immediately.

darren
 
Nippy Normans supply Touratech, Wunderlich, Desert Fox and many other makes of accessories.
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