How To Change Headlight Harness On 2011 Sonata

car taillights

Working headlights are essential for driving whatever automobile safely, merely they occasionally get out. Knowing how to change a headlight and what to look for when the forepart of your machine goes dark can help you apace remedy the problem.

Bank check if the headlight bulb is out

Determining the crusade of a headlight effect begins simply past observing. Starting time, put your headlights on to see if it's just one low-cal that'due south out. If one is out, xc% of the time the light volition go back on past only replacing the bulb, says Emilio Zullo, owner and technician at Eastward & Fifty Automotive, in Ossining, N.Y. One quick test, if you lot don't have a bulb handy or if you lot are out on the road when you detect the headlight upshot, is to pull over and tap the light with your fist, which sometimes will brand it become on, he says.

"If it goes on, that means the filament is burnt out," Zullo says. "When you lot hit information technology, you're shaking the filament and, if this makes contact, it actually lights up." This tin can at least enable you to make information technology to an area where you tin accept the lite repaired, he adds.

How to change a headlight seedling in v steps

Cheque your owner's transmission for details on how to change the headlight in your specific vehicle, as well as what headlight bulb to purchase.

Step i. Power your machine downwardly

To ensure condom, turn off your automobile and have the keys out of the ignition.

Footstep 2. Open engine compartment

Pop your car'south hood and locate the headlight holder, near the forepart of the machine.

Step 3. Disconnect the headlight bulb power wires

There are usually iii wires fastened to the base of the lightbulb. Push downwards the clip or cap holding them in identify.

Step 4. Unscrew the old headlight

Every car is different, Zullo cautions. "Some cars you tin can get correct to the bulb, but with some cars you can't," he says. Sometimes the battery or the air filter housing is in the way and sometimes you have to accept the inner fender out and get behind it.

However, if you can open the headlight, it'south then but a matter of changing the halogen bulb. This ways seeing how the bulb is locked in and carefully unlocking it. If you suspension the clips that are used here, though, you lot'll need to take out the whole headlight, Zullo warns. "So yous have to meet how it'south hooked up, gently accept information technology apart and so yous take to opposite the procedure going back together without putting your fingers on the glass of the seedling," he says.

Pace 5. Spiral in the new headlight seedling

Gently screw in the new bulb without touching the glass of the bulb; oil and dirt on your hands can crusade the bulb to burst one time it heats up. Close the hood of your motorcar. With the new bulb in place, your headlights should once again exist as good as new, and you tin once again bask driving your car 24-hour interval or nighttime.

Most times, changing a headlight is straightforward and doesn't require taking your car to a mechanic. Bank check out other DIY motorcar maintenance projects anyone can do.

If your replacement headlight bulb doesn't work

Ultimately, if you lot replace a bulb and that doesn't piece of work, then you have to test the fuses and the wiring. "If you have power going to the fuses and no power going to your light, you lot're having a wiring trouble," Zullo says. "Information technology could be that a wire broke somewhere, got pinched or something like that."

Another thing to consider if you recently changed a halogen bulb is whether the replacement bulb was appropriate for your plug. Zullo points out that halogen bulbs today run very hot, and some car parts stores sell brighter or colored replacements over the counter that are touted as better for visibility but that run even hotter. "So what happens with a stock OEM plug that the motorcar came with from the factory is that it can't handle this extra wattage," he says. "Information technology starts to melt, and then it makes a bad connexion and your light goes out." At that point y'all can't even put a new bulb in, you take to change the whole light socket, Zullo says.

What causes car headlights to get out?

1. Erstwhile historic period

The about mutual culprit for a burned-out calorie-free is age, says Zullo. "Y'all could exist driving and not detect that one of your headlights is out, and and then, since the other one is the same age, within weeks that one might merely go bad, besides," he says. All of a sudden the trouble becomes scarily credible.

2. Farthermost common cold and heat

Also age, extreme cold or heat tin can likewise cause headlights to burn out. The changes in temperature can bear upon the lightbulb filament, which is very delicate.

iii. Oxidation

With newer halogen bulbs, another cause of dimming lights tin can be oxidation of the plastic housing, causing information technology to appear white or yellowish, Zullo says. This diminishes the beam of light that helps drivers to run across the dark road ahead, he says. "In that case, y'all would have to replace the whole headlight associates," he adds.

iv. Cracks in bulb housing

In add-on, any cracks in the housing can crusade halogen bulbs to fire out considering these tin can't take whatever moisture. "And then yous could put a new bulb in there and within a 24-hour interval or two information technology will blow out because of the humidity and the wetness," Zullo says. "Also, these bulbs cannot be touched past your fingers; if you're installing it, you lot have to use safe gloves because if you put your finger on the bulb the table salt from your sweat will burn that bulb right out."

Have a safety plan in case your headlight burns out while driving. Make sure to practice safe driving when you're on the road.