When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Hey everyone, so just wanted to update those with a 2016 GLE 350 with stock halogen bulbs, the morimoto HID kits with canbus do work. Ive tried it and a few others have as well with success. I can only attest for the products below as being functional.
Supplies: Morimoto 35w ballast x 2, H7 Canbus x 2, 5500k morimoto XB bulbs, 2 EURO adapter rings(www.theretrofitsource.com; make sure to specify you need the SQUARE bulb hole not circular; circular will not work).
Start with the drivers side first as you are easily able to see how the clip and bulb work together. On the bulb, there are two sockets, one has an orange gasket, which is where you'll have the opening to the adapter(see below) If you try to rotate the bulb and clip out of the orientation above ,you may not get an appropriate beam pattern which happened to me. I did it both way and the above picture is what worked for me. In most cases, orienting it this way resulted in the return wire being close to down; the original way resulted the wire definitely being at the 6oclock position but did not result in a smooth beam--I can't explain it, maybe someone else can.
For the wiring: I drilled holes into my plastic caps and it worked fine. You can actually use one size smaller than recommended (I think I used 7/8" spade bit, I just did it manually, its about 8$ at home depot) and it works just fine; theretrofitsource has a video and they tell you which size to use so use one smaller. For the clip that has one end to the ballast and the other with 2 spade-connectors that goes into the H7 electrical plug- this clip will not fit through said hole in the dust cover so I had to pull those two wires out of the grommet, thread it backwards through the dust cap, and then re-insert said wires through the rubber gasket (other ways to do it, I just didn't want to disconnect my connector from the bulb which was already installed). Make sure the spade connectors fit and are not loose in that socket before you do all this.
I did all this with my wheels on, but I definitely recommend taking them off for easier access. I only have 1 vehicle so had to do as little as possible to prevent it from being out of commission. They say it only takes an hour, but expect to take half or the whole day if this is your first time. This is mainly due to mounting the ballasts and wiring and getting the bulb to sit properly(the passenger size took forever), etc. Also, order an extra set of bulbs and euro brackets in case you scratch/break one-it'll come with the appropriate wires to attach to the ballast if you order from retrofitsource.
I keep them in auto mode, haven't had any errors or flickers. Definitely a worthwhile investment. Ill post another picture when I get home with the right HID And left halogen. You wouldn't even know the halogen is on, that's how atrocious it is. Surprisingly, the stock halogen projects aren't as bad as one would expect and I haven't gotten anyone "flashing" their lights at me because mine are too bright.
Nice write up! Thanks! Any chance of getting some pics of the ballast mounting and wire dressing? Just to give me some ideas of where I might put mine too. I swore I would never adapt a new Benz, at least not before it was out of warranty. But I was driving our new GLE 350 with halogens in a big rain storm at night recently. I personally thought the poor headlights were a hazard. I can't tell you how many cars with plain halogen lights passed me with far better illumination than our new Benz. Dam. Then when a nice car or SUV passed me with HID's they lit up the path for both of us. MB should be ashamed to put headlights like this on a new GLE. No excuse. I wanted the LED's, but they are rare for some reason. From my research probably 75% of the new GLE's come with halogens. The 2007 Mb ML350 we traded in with 146k miles on it had wonderful turning HID's with slow corner illuminating fog lights. We got so spoiled to being able to see like a hawk at night. Anyway, I am going to have to do the Morimoto HID's on my GLE 350 too. And I am not happy about it.
Nice write up! Thanks! Any chance of getting some pics of the ballast mounting and wire dressing? Just to give me some ideas of where I might put mine too. I swore I would never adapt a new Benz, at least not before it was out of warranty. But I was driving our new GLE 350 with halogens in a big rain storm at night recently. I personally thought the poor headlights were a hazard. I can't tell you how many cars with plain halogen lights passed me with far better illumination than our new Benz. Dam. Then when a nice car or SUV passed me with HID's they lit up the path for both of us. MB should be ashamed to put headlights like this on a new GLE. No excuse. I wanted the LED's, but they are rare for some reason. From my research probably 75% of the new GLE's come with halogens. The 2007 Mb ML350 we traded in with 146k miles on it had wonderful turning HID's with slow corner illuminating fog lights. We got so spoiled to being able to see like a hawk at night. Anyway, I am going to have to do the Morimoto HID's on my GLE 350 too. And I am not happy about it.
Ken
I'll try to get some pics tomorrow and post them. The standard lights are WORSE than my 2005 hyundai elantra, MB should be ashamed of themselves. In terms of warranty, purchase yourself some of the caps. That's the only thing you'll need to modify. I spoke with MB themselves. Warranty will NOT be void on anything except electrical related to what you did. So, if the headlight system dies, you can't take it into MB and have them warranty repair it; if the drive train goes bad then yes they have to cover it since it has nothing to do with the headlights. If you get the extra caps and use the euro adapters, if something happens you can remove the bulbs and ballasts and put in the old ones; what HIDs? In fact, I left the original adapter on the H7 plug and keep spare bulbs in my car for such an event.
I would suggest ordering from theretrofitsource(TRS), but that's only beacuse I used them (I don't get anything in return, I just know their parts). Morimoto h7. Get the CANBUS (you must have this, you don't need the harness and in fact you can't use it), I purchased the capacitor but found out the canbus takes care of that so didn't need it. I like 5500k bulbs but I actually ordered 5500k x 2 and then 4500k just as backup/spare. get 2 x 2 euro adapters (they are in the accessories section; someone on another thread mentioned the e93 BMW adapters, i tried them but couldn't get them to work). You probably won't need the second set, but when I Was installing them the bulb and metal housing make quite a bit of contact after installing/removing to get things oriented properly so I used a fresh one when I finally figured it out. just my $0.02.
/rant
Truth be told, I won't be purchasing another MB product and will most likely sell this and go for an audi SQ5 or X5 when I settle in a new place in a year or so. There's a lot of little problems with MB and these are things that still haven't gone bad on our 2000 E320 (the transmission jumping is absolute garbage on these new models). It most definitely is a hazard driving with the original lights, and in rain, may as well be blind; I've seen toyota carollas with better stock headlights . I don't know why the LED versino is so hard to find, but I did mine custom but the guy said it came with xenons which is what the 2015ml350's apparently came with; he was wrong as ****. On the flip side, I got a major discount well beyond the trouble of these lights for pre-ordering so I can't complain too much. Unfortunately now, you can't even price the headlights as an individual option, it requires a $6,000 package in order to have(maybe the dealer and add it separately, on the 2016 GLE it was definitely an option not part of a package). That's ridiculous when these are standard items on lower model and equal class vehicles(literally, every other luxury car and 90% of mid-range). Feels like MB is out for money as opposed to building a quality product.
Truth be told, I won't be purchasing another MB product and will most likely sell this and go for an audi SQ5 or X5 when I settle in a new place in a year or so. There's a lot of little problems with MB and these are things that still haven't gone bad on our 2000 E320 (the transmission jumping is absolute garbage on these new models). It most definitely is a hazard driving with the original lights, and in rain, may as well be blind; I've seen toyota carollas with better stock headlights . I don't know why the LED versino is so hard to find, but I did mine custom but the guy said it came with xenons which is what the 2015ml350's apparently came with; he was wrong as ****. On the flip side, I got a major discount well beyond the trouble of these lights for pre-ordering so I can't complain too much. Unfortunately now, you can't even price the headlights as an individual option, it requires a $6,000 package in order to have(maybe the dealer and add it separately, on the 2016 GLE it was definitely an option not part of a package). That's ridiculous when these are standard items on lower model and equal class vehicles(literally, every other luxury car and 90% of mid-range). Feels like MB is out for money as opposed to building a quality product.
Yea this is not my first rodeo with Benz. I started with a 1985 300d turbo diesel that I drove till I was sick of it and sold it for 5k less than I bought it for. I put 100k miles on it for 5k dollars and some minor maintenance. Then I bought a 91 560SEL beast. Went to nearly 200k miles on that beast. Wonderful car. It had headlight washers and wipers and great stock head lights. Long before HID's. I later bought the wife the 2007 350ml. It had great HID's I mentioned in my other post. And it had headlight washers too. I put my daughter into a used 2005 ml350 that had stock halogens. They were terrible. But I was able to buy OEM HID's head light assemblies and replaced the lights and had MB update the computer so I did not get a light out notice. They worked great. I also leased a 2008 E350 for 3 years. It had HID's and was a wonderful car. I now drive a 5 series BMW with stock halogens but they are fine. Now I buy this 2016 GLE for my wife and took a step back ward. Trust me I tried hard to get the LED's. But I wanted 4 matic even more than LED's. Well here in Texas they just don't order up many 4 matics. They used to all be 4 matics. I don't know when that changed! So wife is more about color. I want 4 matic and LED's. I was lucky to find 4 matic in color she liked. We didn't have time to order a car. At 146k miles I discovered the trade in value of the 2007 ML350 was under 5k. So if the tranny went before a car came in, I was going to lose big time. So I just assumed I could add the LED's later. Yea, something has changed at MB. I might stick with BMW for my next sedan. Or Audi. I was thinking about the new E class. Might need to rethink that.
I like MB but I'm just baffled why they would put such POOR quality standard headlights in a luxury SUV. There is a shortage of lighting package in GLS also. I wanted the lighting package but they didn't have one with the options I wanted. I did not want to wait to special order one. I will get another MB but I learned my lesson to make sure I get the lighting package. I too was misled by my sales person who said the lights in the GLS are HID standard and the lighting package gives you the LED headlights. Had my car not been a lease, I would have taken it back to the dealer and traded it for one with lighting package. the HID kit will do for a couple years I guess. Every time I think about paying over $80k for a vehicle with such SH**Y lights my BP goes up!
I like MB but I'm just baffled why they would put such POOR quality standard headlights in a luxury SUV. There is a shortage of lighting package in GLS also. I wanted the lighting package but they didn't have one with the options I wanted. I did not want to wait to special order one. I will get another MB but I learned my lesson to make sure I get the lighting package. I too was misled by my sales person who said the lights in the GLS are HID standard and the lighting package gives you the LED headlights. Had my car not been a lease, I would have taken it back to the dealer and traded it for one with lighting package. the HID kit will do for a couple years I guess. Every time I think about paying over $80k for a vehicle with such SH**Y lights my BP goes up!
Thats why you always wanted to do research yourself and not listening to sales man. My dealers all telling me HID is a standard option, which I didn't fall into that trap. I rather spent the extra for the lighting package (Premium 2), it's worth the money. None of the aftermarket can replicate this feel of refinement. see pic below
Thanks JOHNBEST2017,
Your GLE looks very nice. There is no excuse for MB to sell a high priced luxury suv with such poor and (in my opinion) unsafe standard headlights. If you look at other luxury SUV manufactures, Non of their 2017 models have halogen lights as standard. Even vehicles that are a lot cheaper and have halogen lights come with better quality projectors. Its not about the money. I would have gladly pain the $1300 for lighting package if they were upfront and honest about it and if they had it on more vehicles on the lot. I'd much rather have them include better lights than the illuminated star which was on almost all the GLS 450s I looked at. That's useless in my opnion. I have it and it looks cool but its useless.
Thats why you always wanted to do research yourself and not listening to sales man. My dealers all telling me HID is a standard option, which I didn't fall into that trap. I rather spent the extra for the lighting package (Premium 2), it's worth the money. None of the aftermarket can replicate this feel of refinement.
While I agree with you, HID should be standard at this price range, not halogen, regardless of what the dealer does and does not know. MB royally screwed up by putting these unsafe halogens in. You shouldn't have to pay for that in a $60k vehicle (audi, volvo, lexus, bmw, standard HID, upgrade are the fancy LED with motion detect/etc). In the end though, yes, my fault, but what's done is done.
this link may be helpful. It's basically the same process, the only difference is you aren't removing your headlight so a lot of the installing of the bulb is blind. When I did it, I plugged the wire into the bulb while I installed
Ps. Didn't have to remove wheels. Took about 1 hour due to DOA ballast. Hardest part was properly fitting the HID bulb & adapter back at headlamp.
The placement of the bulb and the adapter is extremely important. If its not 120% spot on, you'll lose brightness and the cutoff will be way off. I actually had to try mine three times until I finally got it right this past weekend. Now the cutoff and the brightness are excellent. Even if you're off by a few millimeters the light output and cutoff will be affected. I was going back and forth with lightwekz regarding the install. I had mine installed a few months ago but was disappointed with the cut off and the brightness. I even tried a 50W kit which didn't increase brightness at all. I sent them pics of the light output against my garage door and they said the bulbs weren't placed correctly. I re did it this weekend and they were absolutely correct. The light output and cutoff are excellent now. almost the same as the GL I had with lighting package. the install is easy but you need to take your time and be patient when placing the bulbs.
Yes, but when MB is bought used or certified pre-owned, that option is not available.
Pre-owned or not, a vehicle of this caliber should come with better lights as standard equipment. They should have HID's or "dumb" LEDs as standard with the option of an upgrade to the "smart" lighting system. The fact that they have SH@TY halogens as standard equipment is absurd and stupid.
Pre-owned or not, a vehicle of this caliber should come with better lights as standard equipment. They should have HID's or "dumb" LEDs as standard with the option of an upgrade to the "smart" lighting system. The fact that they have SH@TY halogens as standard equipment is absurd and stupid.
my guess is if they did that, a lot of people will opt out of the lighting package. I had the lighting system in my outgoing GL and I can tell you that the high beam assist is ok on the highway but useless in dark neighborhoods and steers where you're driving below 30 mph. I found myself switching out of auto all the time so I could use my high beams when going below 30 mph when I needed them the
most. The new LED system works the same and some people have complained about that. I wouldn't mind if MB made the lighting package standard and bumped up the MSRP rather than have their sales people lie and BS their customers into getting something completely and utterly different than what they described. There are a lot of GLEs and GLSs out there without lighting package at dealerships around the country. I guess they sold out on it at some point and a lot of GLEs and GLSs were built without. Once word gets out, they'll have a hard time selling them. I for one will never consider another MB without lighting package.
Sadly anything related to canbus can be void of warranty if problems in future
nice install
people need to opt in for lighting package
From what the MB service tech told me (I'd trust him over the dealer since he doesn't have much to gain), it will void your warranty on the lighting system say if the circuitry burnt out. That would not be covered. If your transmission goes out, that had to be covered. Plus, the way I did it allows me to easily remove the HID kit and reinstall the old lights. I agree, people need to opt in but it's also a slap in the face to have such basic items as "opt in on a $60k vehicle.
The placement of the bulb and the adapter is extremely important. If its not 120% spot on, you'll lose brightness and the cutoff will be way off. I actually had to try mine three times until I finally got it right this past weekend. Now the cutoff and the brightness are excellent. Even if you're off by a few millimeters the light output and cutoff will be affected. I was going back and forth with lightwekz regarding the install. I had mine installed a few months ago but was disappointed with the cut off and the brightness. I even tried a 50W kit which didn't increase brightness at all. I sent them pics of the light output against my garage door and they said the bulbs weren't placed correctly. I re did it this weekend and they were absolutely correct. The light output and cutoff are excellent now. almost the same as the GL I had with lighting package. the install is easy but you need to take your time and be patient when placing the bulbs.
This was a huge problem for me, lots of trial and error, lots of cuts on my hand. Funny you mention the GL. I drove next to a few MB with the LED headlights on my road trip this past weekend on pitch black highways...I actually liked the HID more :|
Sadly I had a DOA ballast but warranty replacement should arrive on Wednesday.
Picture shows my HID 5500K installed on driver's side and the stock halogen on the passenger.(Until Wednesday)
Ps. Didn't have to remove wheels. Took about 1 hour due to DOA ballast. Hardest part was properly fitting the HID bulb & adapter back at headlamp.
I did this and drove around for a while. If you go outside at night when it's pick black, drive into an open area and take a picture. The one HID drowns out the halogen to the point of nonexistence.
This was a huge problem for me, lots of trial and error, lots of cuts on my hand. Funny you mention the GL. I drove next to a few MB with the LED headlights on my road trip this past weekend on pitch black highways...I actually liked the HID more :
the quad LEDs on the S class, GLE and GLS are amazing looking. I would take that over HID any day
10-04-2016, 12:04 PM
In fact, I left the original adapter on the H7 plug and keep spare bulbs in my car for such an event.
Thanks
