Headlight Condensation
Discussion
Something of interest, a couple of weeks ago, my mate impressed me, he is a bit lazy and decided to fit a AM Upgrade venting kit to his DB9 WITHOUT removing the front wheels and by my surprise he did it, fitted no problem apart from a slight squeeze for his arm. He also said how pleased he is with the system, even in spring time, when he went for a drive, the lights would be clear but on returning back to the car, they would be misty, this is the first time in three years of ownership he has clear lights. He wishes he got the wife to buy it for his Christmas present (he is quite tight too). Merry Christmas all.
I fit mine without removing the front wheels on my Vantage, its no more difficult than changing a headlight bulb. Just turn the wheel to full lock to gain access. Its a bit fiddly, but but if you have changed a bulb before no different to that. I guess many owners have not changed bulbs previously because HID lights became standard over 10 years ago. In my first 2006 Vantage it had halogen bulbs and I changed a few over 9 years.
I have the venting kit for my V12 but also am still under warranty. Debating fitting the kit, which will likely invalidate the warranty on the lights at least, but of course will make them far less likely to fail. Hmmm.
Will be fitting the other kit we have to my son's V8 next weekend, we ARE the warranty for that car, its good to know that everyone has had such good experiences with it.
Will be fitting the other kit we have to my son's V8 next weekend, we ARE the warranty for that car, its good to know that everyone has had such good experiences with it.
Fitted mine to the V8 at the weekend.
Very easy and if you don’t mastic up the wheel well vent you could remove it in 5 minutes in the event of warranty issues.
Quiet and effective.
Will fit it to the V12 too this weekend.
Photos on my readers cars thread about the 4.3 V8 (note the headlight was removed on one side to fix the mountings it isn’t needed to fit the new rear cover).
Very easy and if you don’t mastic up the wheel well vent you could remove it in 5 minutes in the event of warranty issues.
Quiet and effective.
Will fit it to the V12 too this weekend.
Photos on my readers cars thread about the 4.3 V8 (note the headlight was removed on one side to fix the mountings it isn’t needed to fit the new rear cover).
ReformedPistonhead said:
Fitted mine to the V8 at the weekend. Very easy and if you don’t mastic up the wheel well vent ……..
Not even got mine yet but have read the instructions and watched the video and wonder if smearing silicone around the hatch is really necessary. Anyone omitted this step?
Omitting the silicone sealing step does invalidate AM Upgrades warranty.
When fitting my kit about 18 month ago I did silicone seal the hatch and did wonder why. I would imagine if the vehicle is regularly taken to the continent then sealing would be an inconvenience.
Recently I had reason to remove one of the front wheel arch liners and noticed that the silicone around the light hatch was not as neat as I would have liked, so I decided to redo. Removing the old silicone was a breeze as only the edges of the hatch had been sealed, might be a bit different if the sponge rubber seal had been affixed.
Having cleaned everything up I decided that as my car is not a daily driver the ingress of water into the light assembly was highly unlikely so I have one sealed and one unsealed hatch. I did experiment with Duct Tape as a seal, not at all satisfactory, would not adhere (other brands may), even after cleaning all the mating surfaces with solvent.
The best £ per mile mod on the car.
When fitting my kit about 18 month ago I did silicone seal the hatch and did wonder why. I would imagine if the vehicle is regularly taken to the continent then sealing would be an inconvenience.
Recently I had reason to remove one of the front wheel arch liners and noticed that the silicone around the light hatch was not as neat as I would have liked, so I decided to redo. Removing the old silicone was a breeze as only the edges of the hatch had been sealed, might be a bit different if the sponge rubber seal had been affixed.
Having cleaned everything up I decided that as my car is not a daily driver the ingress of water into the light assembly was highly unlikely so I have one sealed and one unsealed hatch. I did experiment with Duct Tape as a seal, not at all satisfactory, would not adhere (other brands may), even after cleaning all the mating surfaces with solvent.
The best £ per mile mod on the car.
This was posted in one of the AM Facebook groups on Sunday. I think it’s safe to assume that the problems aren’t just limited to the Gaydon era cars. I’m not sure (Ninja, you’ll probably know) but I think the lights on the latest gen cars may have inbuilt vents? If that’s not the case are there any after market options available? BRM.
Hope you all had a good festive break, my wife and I bought our son a venting kit for his 2006 Vantage (Christmas present), I helped to fit, completed in less than an hour (Left the wheels on, just turned them inwards), he has had the car for a year, constant misting, he was impressed with mine as I had fitted a kit several months ago, he is even more impressed now as he doesn’t have misting in his lights anymore, a happy chap.
Happy New Year All.
Happy New Year All.
Minglar said:
This was posted in one of the AM Facebook groups on Sunday. I think it’s safe to assume that the problems aren’t just limited to the Gaydon era cars. I’m not sure (Ninja, you’ll probably know) but I think the lights on the latest gen cars may have inbuilt vents? If that’s not the case are there any after market options available? BRM.
I actually replied to this post on the FB groups, but yes they are vented from factory. The DB11 and DBS have both been given revised vent designs due to issues, interestingly not the Vantage.I am aware of a couple of Vantages with severe issues, reality is the new lights front and rear, are designed to allow airflow unlike the VH cars which attempt to be entirely sealed hence causing more of an issue (although the venting kit as seen works, and was a silly design decision in my book).
I think unlike the VH cars there is far less of an issue in general regarding condensation (note condensation as opposed to a mini swimming pool in them), but when they do appear they tend to be very bad.
The only advise fundamentally that can be provided is to drive and monitor it, if there is physical droplets in there or a LOT of condensation say over 3/4 and not disappearing then it has an actual "issue".
In the 13.5k driving mine I can only recall one incident where both headlights had condensation, but within a few minutes it had resolved itself. I might be an exception really as mine pretty much lives in the garage all insulated, flooring down and a dehumidifer in there and rarely is out overnight.
What has happened to the weather, mild and heavy rain, weird. I read about this on the FB Forum which someone Posted and it sounded interesting, so I purchased one for my own Christmas present, a custom controller from amupgrades, it is only for the V8 Vantage venting kits but it allows you to control how long you want the fans to run, you can also switch them on/off just by turning the control knob (with or without the engine on), found it very helpful with this awkward weather/climate we now have, its worth checking out, their email address is amupgrades@gmail.com
Oh yes, Happy New Year all.
Oh yes, Happy New Year all.
I’ll be honest, the venting kits look good and I’ve only heard good reviews. With that said, since I’ve fitted the silica gel packs (official Aston fix) I’ve not had any condensation. It cost me less than £8 on Amazon and took about 15 mins to do both sides. Absolutely no need to take the wheel off either.
John
John
I had condensation with several of my past Astons, a fault which should have been sorted by the headlight manufacturer. I use my DB9 most days, love driving it, it also had heavy condensation on rainy days, several years ago I tried silica gel bags, lasted a couple of months and then the condensation came back, I dried them out several times, waste of time and then I fitted a venting kit, had one on my Vantage too, nice clear headlights, problem solved, several friends have done the same, all with excellent results, it’s well worth the upgrade plus helps to sell the car.
Sorry, I forgot to say Happy New Year.
Sorry, I forgot to say Happy New Year.
I have a (fortunately, small) issue with this on one of my front headlights, nothing on rear. The car is Gen II Vanquish.
Tried to find a link to the kit which is mentioned here, but did not see anything on the pages I went through- does anybody have one?
Can someone shed some more light on the silica gel packets fix, e.g. how it works, where you had it done, is it permanent etc?
Supplying AM dealer went down the route of 'they all do that sir' and as the car was otherwise perfect, priced well, and exactly spec I was looking with full PPF and dealer throwing in a new battery+charger for me for I did not query it further since it really was minor compared to what I have seen pictures of.
Tried to find a link to the kit which is mentioned here, but did not see anything on the pages I went through- does anybody have one?
Can someone shed some more light on the silica gel packets fix, e.g. how it works, where you had it done, is it permanent etc?
Supplying AM dealer went down the route of 'they all do that sir' and as the car was otherwise perfect, priced well, and exactly spec I was looking with full PPF and dealer throwing in a new battery+charger for me for I did not query it further since it really was minor compared to what I have seen pictures of.
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