How much to change headlights on Ford Focus?

Conor_3

hewhoisnotintheknow wrote: »

£20 to change two bulbs? !!!!!!

Half an hours labour, perfectly reasonable. If the owner can't be bothered to read the manual or learn extremely basic maintenance of their vehicle, they should be prepared to put their hand in their pocket and pay the bill. Just because it's a simple 10 minute job like swapping a couple of headlight bulbs over doesn't alter the fact that when you take a car to a garage, the whole idea of being a garage is to charge labour for doing jobs on vehicles that the owners either can't do or can't be bothered to do. And to those who are thinking about it, don't go the whole "well it's customer relations, innit?" route because this time of year, it's quite feasible to end up with a mechanic spending a week changing bulbs over and that mechanic needs to be paid.

maniac886

If I pull out the units will it affect the alignment?

goldspanners

it is very simple to change the bulbs on the focus,ive changed the headlight bulbs a few times now and i will admit it isnt the biggest space to work in but it is possible to get the covers off both sides and change the bulb.
have a practice with the side you can change,do it without looking and then memorise it and do the same at the side with the battery,its on a little spring clip holding the bulb in.

the light will be out of alignment if you take the unit out, but they say even if you change the bulb the lights should be realigned.

i used the nightbreakers on my focus,didnt last as long as the ring bulbs i had last time,ive fitted it with the philips power to night bulbs and they seem to be lasting ok so far.

get your fingers in there!

mcjordi

unlikely although there is a slight possibility, but it is simple to replace headlamp bulbs on modeo focus fiesta its not rocket science

maniac886

goldspanners wrote: »

it is very simple to change the bulbs on the focus,ive changed the headlight bulbs a few times now and i will admit it isnt the biggest space to work in but it is possible to get the covers off both sides and change the bulb.
have a practice with the side you can change,do it without looking and then memorise it and do the same at the side with the battery,its on a little spring clip holding the bulb in.

the light will be out of alignment if you take the unit out, but they say even if you change the bulb the lights should be realigned.

i used the nightbreakers on my focus,didnt last as long as the ring bulbs i had last time,ive fitted it with the philips power to night bulbs and they seem to be lasting ok so far.

get your fingers in there!

I bought the nightbreakers off a mate for £5 which isn't bad. I will try and replace them at the weekend, I will let you know how I get on. Thanks for all your advice!:money:

continualdiamond

I must say i agree about getting the manual for your car.

My OH is a semi qualified mechanic and though he doesn't currently work as one, its a dream having him know about cars. However obviously no one can possibly work on every model and he never worked on a saab 9-5 which is our current car.

But from his experience etc he will give anything a go when it comes to doing work on our car. So when one of our light bulbs went on the front, he just bought the bulb from a part supplier, as opposed to retail outlets and had our light bulb changed over in 5mins.

He swears by the manuals and has always purchased one along side every car we've had and then just sold them on when we've changed cars.

goldspanners

maniac886 wrote: »

I bought the nightbreakers off a mate for £5 which isn't bad. I will try and replace them at the weekend, I will let you know how I get on. Thanks for all your advice!:money:

keep us posted,once you've done them and your putting plasters on your cut hands you will say that was easy.no pain no gain!

maniac886

Right,

Well the good news is I now know how to change the bulbs and the bad news is I bought the wrong ones(bought fogs instead of dipped ones) and my hands are cut to shreds.

Using a mirror was an absolute godsend. I practiced opening and closing the clip a few times using the dead bulb and then replaced fogs on both for practice.

The drivers side was fairly easy but the passenger side was a PITA. You have to remove the battery cover so you can remove the weather proof casing and then after using a few choice words manged to replace the fog lights on the passenger side.

Going to have to do it again when I get the correct bulbs but it shouldn't be too difficult. There is definately no need to remove the entire headlight!

Thanks all for your advice!

MORPH3US

Not read the thread so might have been mentioned...

Get yourself a haynes manual. Cost you £15 but will save you loads on stuff like this in future.

fatdeeman

Well I'm glad I'm not the only one who finds it a pain in the !!!!!!

The driver side is pretty easy but as has been said the space on the passenger side is really tight and taking the battery cover off is a must.

Funnily enough the time I did the passenger side was in the halfords car park, glad I didn't bother asking now!

The spring mechanism that holds the bulb in is simple enough, it's just getting the cover aligned properly again afterwards that's a nightmare!

I see they're selling bulbs in lidl at the moment, no idea if they are good or not though.