4thGenReady2Go

Ok, I need help:

Has anyone installed JDM headlights in their 4th gens? I'm trying it with my brother, and I've hit a stonewall:

we've removed the bumper, corners and USDM lights, but I can't install the JDM headlights because there's a difference in plugs and bulbs --

The USDM has:

outside bulbs - low beams
inside bulbs - high beams

the JDM has:

outside bulbs - high/low beams (dual fillament)
inside bulbs - driving lights (can't be high beam or headlight, bulb is too small)

Right, now the connecters from the USDM bulbs will not fit the JDM connecters, and vice versa, furthermore, even if I could connect them, the inside USDM bulbs (high beam) will not even fit into the small hole for the inside JDM bulbs. Also, I don't have the JDM "wiring harness" , all I have are the plugs that go into the JDM bulbs, and an inch or wire leading out. How can I do this? Obviously I have to keep the JDM bulbs because my USDM ones won't fit into the hole on the insides. But, since the JDM outer bulb is meant to be low and high, and on the USDM car, the insides are high, when I hit higm beams (assuming i've soldered wires from the USDM harness onto the JDM plugs), the inside driving lights (JDM bulbs) will come on, not high beams, and when I turn the headlights on, will the JDM outer bulbs be on high, or low, and how can I select one or the other? Please help, I have a helluva lot of studying to do today, and my car is in the garage, with bumper on floor, with headlights out. Thanks.

ludeboom

ok so there are 4 wires on the JDM high/low bulb harness
even if there are 3 its still ok

and there are 2 sets of 2 for each headlight on your USDM, so find out which 2 of the 4 wires on your USDM harness's are grounds, and wire it up proper.

then wire your corner/running lights, into the inside bulb, thats all

its pretty simple if you think about it

~boomer

4thGenReady2Go

unfortunately, it's not like that at all, there's only 2 wires coming from the high/low bulb, a ground and a power (I'm assuming one's a ground), funny thing is, on the inside JDM bulbs, both wires are red, but one is red and blue and the other is red and yellow, not sure which is ground. Either way, there should either be at least another wire coming from the JDM high/low, or something else is the matter. We put the old USDMs back in and replaced the bumper (which is now hanging a tad bit off, but no matter, will come off next weekend when I try this again), but still, even without the urgency, I'd like to know how other people did this, it's not simple at all.

k.a.y

It's not that complicated at all, I promise......The problem you're having is that you don't think the inner JDM bulbs will be bright enough to suffice as high beams, when in reality, they work perfect. what the hell else would they be used for? Just cut off your usdm harness, and splice in the JDM one. only the low beam filament is used in the dual filament bulb. I'm not sure why they disigned it like that, but they did. only 2 wires are coming out of the JDM harness anyway, right? if you wanted to hook up the dual filament bulb to function as both, you'd have to use relays & shit, and that would be WAY more confusing than doing it correctly.

4thGenReady2Go

Well, after brainstorming with my brother, and more importantly, getting some tips from ludeboom, I now know what must be done. First, those inner bulbs on the JDM light can't be used as high beams, they're just not powerful enough, they are actually meant to be "city lights", which would normally come on in the "standby" position where normally our corners just come on. What I must do is splice the corner lamp wire and lead a wire from the corner lamp power wire to the inside JDM bulb, so that when I turn my standbys on, the inner light and the corner light will both come on. As for the outer bulbs only having 2 wires out of the socket, I figured out that the person who sold me the lights, or someone before that, must've tampered with the housing, because there should've been at least 3 wires coming from the outer bulb plug. How do I know? Well, after my trip to South Africa to visit family, my uncle who imports cars from japan gave me one JDM headlight (yes, pretty useless, but I can always try and get another one to make a pair) which a customer who banged up one side of his prelude never came to get. What I SHOULD'VE done before I took the bumper off, was figure out how I was going to wire these things up. Sure enough, there are three wires coming from the outer jDM bulb on the headlight that I brough from SA, which my uncle had shipped to him from his connection in Japan. Of those three wires, one is a ground, one is low beam, and one is high beam, in a matter of speaking. To wire it to a USDM harness, I just need to take the wire that normally goes to the inside of the USDM light and solder it to one of the positive wires coming out of the outer JDM bulb. Then take the low beam wire that normally fit in the outer bulb on the USDM housing, and solder that onto the other positive wire in the outer JDM bulb. So now, what happens is when I turn the headlights on, the dual-filament will come on low, and when I select high beams, twice the amount of power is being sent into that bulb, triggering the extra filament, and now I have highbeams.
I was hoping that I could wire it up so when I just used regular lows, only the outer light would come on, but seeing how low beams is one step after standby, both the outer and inners will be on at that point.
One thing I'm not so sure about is the power-load that the corner lamp wire can carry. Before, that wire was only powering the small bulb in the corner lamp, but now it'll be powering the corner and the inner bulb, which is slightly larger than it, using at least twice as much power. If the wire can handle it, that's fine but what I'd like to avoid is an electrical fire Never thought someone could write so much about a seemingly simply headlight conversion, huh?

k.a.y

if you say so, but I've had my jdms wired exactly like my usdms were for over a year and they're fine. my car's in the shop right now, so I can't look @ the power rating of the bulb, but I know that the single filament bulb that's on the inside is the same wattage rating as the high beam wattage rating of the dual filament bulb.

rrh22

i have put the jdm headlights in my 94, the headlight bulbs for the the jdm are civic bulbs and i used the jdm headlight connecters and works great.

nextgenholmes

i think someone should post some pictures for us to draw on to help you. i cant find any

oscarhmoyano

Hi, at my 4th page i got some pics ... i hope can help a little, but isn't hard at all, i was sooo scared .. it was easy as 1-2-3
Oscar

http://www.cardomain.com/memberpage/526433/4

93accordEX

ok the outer bulbs are h4 and are low beams, the inner bulbs are h1 and are high beams. definetly only one of the filaments of the h4 is used. the h1's are very bright... yes the actual bulb size is small. I guarantee you they are brighter then the h4's. i hope you realize you will be blinding everyone if you set it up so the inner light is on with corner lights. the headlight your uncle gave you was the one that was tampered with.