Viper98912

Bought the car 3 months ago, and besides being awesome (except for a rear tire leak and occasional vibration), my first real fix has already dawned on me.

Common problems from what I've read here on the forums:
1) Trans seal leak (fixed by the first owner)
2) Seat heaters (replaced by the first owner)
3) Command loses programming (no nav)
4) A/C turns itself off randomly, and auto mode blows way too hard (living with this one for now)
5) Xenon ballasts blow (today)

This morning I turned on the headlights and noticed the driver side took a second longer to ignite. Upon warming up, I noticed a different burning than usual (I've done many headlight retrofits in the past, so I know my way around HID's). I knew it wasn't right, so I switched it off (for precaution), and upon re-igniting, the driver side didn't. Hint 1.

Didn't turn on the rest of the way to work and the car minder in the dash let me know.

Came home, and jumped for joy that there's A LOT of space in the engine bay for removing the HID bulb without needing to take out the headlight. I was really shocked, I already pictured myself tearing the front end apart (as with other cars). I tried my Lexus ballast with the MB bulb, and it lit just fine. I tried my Lexus bulb with the MB ballast and no go. I checked the fuses, and they were good.

I think my friend might have one or two MB ballasts lying around, so he's gonna mail them to me and HOPEFULLY they are the same ones/size/connector/still work. If they're not the same, looks like I'll be trolling the classifieds and ebay for a while....

Just thought I'd share.....

JonMBZ

you can probably find them on eBay easy. For every smashed up MB there are control units going up on ebay for them.

e1000

fuses? lol, what fuses. None of the exterior lights are on fuses.

yeah I'd say there's a good chance it's the ballast.

Viper98912

what are #62 and 63 in the engine bay fuse box?

02C32guy

If you have problems finding them, PM me. I have a couple laying around that should work for you.

e1000

62: Data link connector, Light switch module, Stop light switch
63: Light switch module

These are not directly wired to your exterior lights. They are the fuses to the MODULES.

benz_addict

My friend's CLS63 ballast also went out... My ballast also went out last week still haven't replaced them. Ballasts going out seem to be common on these cars.
I was watching the CL65 top gear review and the ballast was also gone out on the review car.

TemjinX2

i think the c55 uses hella ballasts. if you have those it should bolt right up. There's a diy on oem ignitor replacement. Just look at that thread, i think it'll show you what kind of ballasts they are.

Viper98912

That's fine, I'm going by what the fuse box paper list said as "low beam".

Viper98912

Got it changed out today. There's nothing like disassembling about $10k of the front end of your car, and trying to delicately take out a $1k headlight. Slightly nerve wrecking.

Only took me a couple hours, with no prior experience on this specific car, but I did have lots of headlight work experience from others. It's kinda odd to see that MB designed the headlight ballast to mount and seal the connector by screwing it to the headlight, instead of having the connector be independently clicked into the ballast socket (and then mounted).

It then took me an hour to find a bolt that I lost from the grill. That really pissed me off, because it was on the other side of where I was doing the fix (I wanted to give the bumper a little more flex).

Regardless, it all works now. PS - if you want to adjust your lights, the hex socket plastic screw that is open is your up/down adjustment. The one hidden behind a big PITA plastic piece is your left/right I believe. I figured this out after strugging for 15 mins with the plastic piece, only to see it wasn't the up/down.