My 2002 has the regular type of headlight and one of them has been going on and off. I was thinking it was a loose connection. When I looked at the headlight from the front of the car, I found something curious. It is obviously that the bottom half of the reflector has come away from a couple of little plastic (?) clips, so is slanted at a sharper angle then the "good" headlight on the other side. Now this may have nothing to do with my headlight coming on and off, but I think it would be a good idea to fix it.

It looks like I cannot get to the reflectors when the hood it up -- the way it would be to simply change the bulb. It actually looks like I would have to do some major thing under the hood to get the headlight part out in order to fix it.

OR is there somewhat that I can get to the reflector from the outside of the hood? Can I remove the chrome trim and get to it that way? Would that be hard to do and silly for me to try?

Thanks for any suggestions or experience with this reflector problem

 

bad news


the headlight unit is a sealed component with holes for the bulbs to plug into.


it is not cheap ....


there ARE some threads kicking around from folks who have opened the unit up to perform some work on the inside - the 'buzz word' is Joey Mod ...


basically you take the unit out and heat it up to soften the bond 'tween the clear lens and the dark backing .. then pry the two apart.


a SEARCH on Joey Mod and a little looking finds this ... there are MANY posts . . .


https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...tructions.html

 

Looks like you have the older halogen headlight light, non xenon ( non projector ) ? Those have to be baked to separate and then see what is broken and if it can be fixed.

You could upgrade to the 7/2004+ style headlights with the projector. Has a good beam pattern nice US cutoff. Swap out the old and install the new.

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...ight-help.html




thanks