Mustang Hid Light Installation Guide

One of the most popular options on new cars today is H.I.D lights (High Density Discharge). All of us have seen these on the road, but unfortunately only a few of us Mustang owners have experienced them since Ford has only recently supplied HID as an option on new Mustangs. I recently upgraded my vehicles headlights to HID. The installation was not difficult, the results are spectacular.

HID bulbs are a Xenon gas filled bulb that does not have a filament like standard halogen bulbs. The Xenon gas is ignited by high current voltage and causes the bulb to glow brighter than halogens. The high voltage is supplied by the ballast. Just like fluorescent lights in your home, HID bulbs produce three times the light output, only require about 2/3 the energy, and run cooler so there is no worry of melting your headlight housings.

The (K) Kelvin is the unit of color. Some may think that the higher the K the brighter. Wrong! The lower the K the brighter the output will be. 4000K is the brightest, most natural white light. 6000K is a bright diamond white with a small hint of blue. The 8000K and 10000K are even bluer. And anything higher will become purple. For this reason the most commonly sold are 4K, 6K, and 8K.

The installation described below was performed on a 2002 Mustang GT. My kit included the high / low beams plus the fog lamps. The installation was easy enough, it took around 2 hours to complete.

First I started by disconnecting my battery and removing the headlight housings. Next may be the hardest part of the installation and will vary from vehicle to vehicle. I had to find a good place to mount the ballasts so that they were secure, and I wanted them to be hidden and not too close to the hot engine. I removed the upper radiator cover and decided that behind the bumper was the cleanest, safest, coolest place to install the ballast. I fastened both ballasts to the headlight panel in front of the radiator core support. You can install them where ever you like. If you purchase the low beam kit only, then you are almost done here. Simply plug the factory headlight harness to the ballast and plug the bulbs in your headlight housings and the bulb also plugs into the ballast.

There is an extra harness to install if you purchase the High/Low HID kit like I did. Don't worry, this is still very easy to install. The harness included in the kit is simply 2 ground connections that I bolted to my radiator core support and power wire with fuse that connects to the battery. The blue connector attached to the factory headlight harness closest to the battery and the other 4 plugs will go right to both ballasts.

I simply routed all wiring under the radiator core support cover and with the zip ties supplied I was able to keep it safe, secure, and hidden. When done I was only able to see one single wire going to my battery, completely hiding the fact that I have HID's installed.

Installing the optional HID fog light bulbs was just as easy as doing a low beam only kit. I fastened the fog light ballasts to the back of the bumper using the supplied brackets and plugged in the factory fog light harness to the ballast.

After installing, reconnect the battery and turn on headlights to make sure everything is working. If you installed the high/low kit, try switching from high to low. Your fog lights should turn off like normal. Everything on mine work as it did from the factory, just much brighter.

You will want to make sure that your lights are properly adjusted so that you are not blinding anyone at night. I found that I was able to lower my headlights a little because the beam of light was much larger than before.

Upgrading my headlights to HID has improved my night driving vision and safety. I recommend HID upgrade for any vehicle!