hflier

Recently, we had issues with headlights on the 2006 Tribeca. One problem was solved by replacing a bad wire going to the + voltage for the passenger high beam headlight. Then, we found that we had + 12 volts on each of all of the light bulbs at the correct time. The high beam lights were great. The low beam light bulbs were nice and bright but did virtually nothing to light up the road in front of the vehicle. Simply, there was very little light projection from the light bulbs. We ended up disabling the day light driving bulbs (low beam headlights running at 1/2 power) by pulling the blue and yellow wire from the connector going to the DRL module that is well buried up under the dash of the vehicle. So, now that we had the DRL lights disabled, we decided to put HID light bulbs and ballasts in for use as the low beam head lights that simply did not light up the road with conventional light bulbs. We added isolation relays fed by heavy wire and fuses directly from the battery. The coil of each relay was activated by simply connecting the vehicle low beam light bulb wires to the relay coil wires. Then, the solid 12 volts was connected to each light bulb from each relay through the relay set of contacts. When we turned on the lights, NOW we had light to light up the road. No question, this 2006 Tribeca low beam lights really are many times better by the use of the Hid light bulbs and ballasts. By disabling the DRL lights, the HID lights will never see low voltage and thus, the bulbs should have much longer life, than if being driving by partial power. If you have such a vehicle and don't like the low light level of the low beam lights, try the HID solutions. It works. Roger

Kurt, The 2006 subaru tribeca driving light are the low beam headlights. Check your lights, both high and low beam. If they work the light bulbs are all right. Then, turn off your headlights, but turn on your ignition. With the headlight switch off, and the ignitions switch on - the low beam head lights should be turned on to about 1/2 brightness. If you don't have the drl lights working, then check fuse 18 under the dash. Also, check the DRL relay that is under the dash. If that isn't the problem, then try a new DRL module that is under the dash.

Cougar, I have the factory manual. I had both ends of the same wire. It was the red/green wire that started at the fuse block and ended at the light bulb light bulb assembly harness. It was not the connector, because I clipped the wire - 10 inches from each end. The wire runs from the fuse block inside a wire harness that contains 20 other wires, goes up to the radiator, down along the radiator, under the radiator, up the other side to the headlights. Somewhere in the wiring bundle - that was at least 10 inches from each end the red/green wire opened up. I had no desire to pull out the wiring harness, strip off the bundling and find the precise spot where the wire was defective. But, I certainly do agree, that if only a connector is bad, or a splice is bad, that it is much better to resolve the issue at the defect location. Be safe Roger

CYn, What vehicle are you speakin of - when you use the words - 02(gen2) Also, which light are you talking about when you use the words "near wash of light really sucks" ?? Roger

Do all of the tribeca model years have both the low and high beam headlights on at the same time? This does not include the daylight driving light. I am only speaking of looking at the headlights in the middle of the night. When the lights are in the high beam position, are the low beams on at the same time, and for what years is that the case? Thanks much Roger

Basically, the problem has been resolved. The problem was solved by finding the open wire that ran from the drivers side fuse block to the voltage supply side of the passenger high beam headlight in the front wiring harness. Since I did not want to replace the wiring harness, I cut the wire about 10 inches from the fuse block and 10 inches from the light bulb and spliced in a new wire to replace the wire that had apparently opened somewhere in the wiring harness. This put the correct voltage on the high beam light on the passenger side and eliminated the sneak paths for voltage that were causing the dim lighting of the low beams. In addition, from starting the job, until that time, the light bulb on the low beam drivers side had burned out. So, replaced both low beam headlight bulbs with a matched set of replacement bulbs. In addition, during the testing, it seemed that the general battery voltage was low. So, after completing the other work, took the vehicle over to the battery shop to have the battery load checked. Sure enough the 3 year old battery was in need of replacement. Since it was a NAPA battery, I then took the vehicle over to the NAPA store and found that there was still a good bit of warranty left on the battery and was able to get a new battery for $30. Finally, the job is complete and all of the lights are working again. At the end of the day: 1- wire - $1. 1- pair of high intensity H4 low beam light bulbs - $30 1- replacement auto battery replaced under warranty - $30 Total $61.

Finally fixed. After following all of the schematics and eliminating the reverse currents being back fed - the problem was an open wire that fed the high beam headlight on the passenger side. To fix it, I cut the wire about 10 inches from the fuse block, spliced in a replacement wire, and connected it to the headlight - about 10 inches from the headlight. Then, from the time that I started looking at the problem, until today, one more head light bulb - had burned out - which of course - changed the symptoms When doing the testing, I noticed a low battery voltage. As a result, I had the battery checked and found it defective. So, I put in a new battery and now the voltages read correctly. At the end of the day 1- wire $1. A pair of high intensity light bulbs: $30 A new battery - replaced under partial warranty for $30. Alls well that ends well. Roger

Fairtax4me, The vehicle is a 2006 Subaru Tribeca Thanks for your thoughts. Roger

Cougar, As I reported earlier, we have taken out the fuse panel, and have taken out the bulkhead connector that is used to combine headlight wires together to run to the switches. In the case of this car, everything appears to be pristine, with no damage or problem of any kind found in either of these areas. Roger

Cougar, It is too bad that there is not a nice illustrated Haynes or equivalent factory manual available for this car. Roger

Ivans, The DRL has been replaced with a new one, with no change. All headlight relays and fuses have been replaced with no change. I think you are right in that it is a voltage supply issue. Right now, it seems like I am having an issue with the front wiring harness. I have found one open wire, and they may be more. Roger

Fairtax, I am thinking at this time that it is a connection issue between the lamp sockets and junction block caused by an issue in the front wiring harness. More checking will determine the cause.

Posted Today, 06:17 PM My son was back from his business trip and we were able to spend some time on his vehicle. First, I finally sat down and got my head turned about a 1/4 turn to the right, after I finally realized that the color coding for the wires on this vehicle from the conventional american vehicles that I am used to working with. i.e. from a lighting situation, we effectively have a positive grounded vehicle in a manner of speaking. i.e. they color the ground wires with red colos and the color the voltage wires with browns and black. This had given me issues when doing my initial trouble shooting because I would just automatically look for ground on the brown and black wires and voltage on the red colored wires. However, the opposite is true. I went back to basics, as Cougar and others have suggested and just started from the beginning on the belief that I had missed something initially. Have correct voltage at the output of fuse 6 and 7 which are the headlight fuses. But I DON't have voltage at the bulkhead pin, where the voltage is supposed to leave the fuse block. So, it appears that there is an open circuit on the inside of the fuse block, between the output of pin 6 and the bulkhead connector of pin 6. Furthermore, when I check the front wiring harness from the fuse block bulkhead connector over to the main connector on the front frame for the headlights, I find another open in that wire as well. If this continues to check out, I am guessing that perhaps a wire got pinched or shorted out and burned open, and also did the same thing for the fuse block connector. The interesting thing about this situation is that it did not cause a fuse to fail. Since we did not have another fuse block on hand, I installed a temporary wire from the + 12 volt battery terminal to a fused 15 amp wire over to the high beam + wire on the high beam headlight. This fix temporarily took care of the lack of passenger side high beam light. It also took care of the very dim low beam lights that were lighting up due to sneak currents passing backward through the high beam light bulbs. However, there is still an issue on the low beams. I have no drivers side or left side low beam light. Also, the passengers side low beam light although much much brighter than what it was, but is still only about 1/2 brightness level. Unfortunately, my son had to pack up and leave for now, so was unable to do any more voltage checking. Since the fog, high beams on and off, I suspect that the light switch is all right but have another issue with the front wiring harness on the vehicle. When more time allows, will continue the testing and checking

My son was back from his business trip and we were able to spend some time on his vehicle. First, I finally sat down and got my head turned about a 1/4 turn to the right, after I finally realized that the color coding for the wires on this vehicle from the conventional american vehicles that I am used to working with. i.e. from a lighting situation, we effectively have a positive grounded vehicle in a manner of speaking. i.e. they color the ground wires with red colos and the color the voltage wires with browns and black. This had given me issues when doing my initial trouble shooting because I would just automatically look for ground on the brown and black wires and voltage on the red colored wires. However, the opposite is true. I went back to basics, as Cougar and others have suggested and just started from the beginning on the belief that I had missed something initially. Have correct voltage at the output of fuse 6 and 7 which are the headlight fuses. But I DON't have voltage at the bulkhead pin, where the voltage is supposed to leave the fuse block. So, it appears that there is an open circuit on the inside of the fuse block, between the output of pin 6 and the bulkhead connector of pin 6. Furthermore, when I check the front wiring harness from the fuse block bulkhead connector over to the main connector on the front frame for the headlights, I find another open in that wire as well. If this continues to check out, I am guessing that perhaps a wire got pinched or shorted out and burned open, and also did the same thing for the fuse block connector. The interesting thing about this situation is that it did not cause a fuse to fail. Since we did not have another fuse block on hand, I installed a temporary wire from the + 12 volt battery terminal to a fused 15 amp wire over to the high beam + wire on the high beam headlight. This fix temporarily took care of the lack of passenger side high beam light. It also took care of the very dim low beam lights that were lighting up due to sneak currents passing backward through the high beam light bulbs. However, there is still an issue on the low beams. I have no drivers side or left side low beam light. Also, the passengers side low beam light although much much brighter than what it was, but is still only about 1/2 brightness level. Unfortunately, my son had to pack up and leave for now, so was unable to do any more voltage checking. Since the fog, high beams on and off, I suspect that the light switch is all right but have another issue with the front wiring harness on the vehicle. When more time allows, will continue the testing and checking

Cougar, Since you seem to have a very good handle on the Subaru vehicles, do you have a source where one could obtain the factory manual?

Cougar, Excellent tip on the use of voltage checking on a wire that should be at ground potential but may not be there due to a bad ground. That idea had not crossed my mind, but such a simple but effective way to check. thanks again. hflier

Ivan, Thanks for your thoughts. All 4 head light bulbs are brand new bulbs, that each work when 12 volts is applied to one terminal and ground on the other terminal.

The next thing that we are going to do, is to remove the shorting block that is on top of headlight harness bulkhead F109 that is located directly below the fuse block. Pop up each corner of the fuse block and then lift the fuse block out of the way. The flat white square object below is the shorting block for F109. We will remove this and then use a shorting wire from each of the separate ground head light connections and will short each one in turn to the battery ground. If each headlight in turn works correctly, we will be able to give a clean bill olf health to the front wiring harness and then look at the headlight switch, which is about the only thing that we have not checked. We will also have to check the ground connection that is up behind the three doors under the dash which grounds out the drl module and light switch. If a wire or wires do not have a good ground at that point, it could be leading to the problem.

Cougar, Thanks for your thoughts. I do have the factory manual - I signed up for a 4 day service from the official Subaru factory on line service that is used by the subaru dealerships. But even these sources leave a lot to be desired with respect to actual location information. Yes, I have the detailed schematic. But, it is often very very difficult to find the items listed in the schematics. i.e. where is the drl relay? Where is the DRL module. Where is the actual ground connection for the head light switch? Sure it is on the schematic, but where is it in the car? Thanks again - still searching.

It is all fine and dandy to talk about grounding and checking grounding, but in the tribeca, that is a difficult thing to do. All headlights have the correct voltage on the supply side of each headlight bulb. Of course, in this vehicle - all switching for each headlight bulb happens on the ground side of the bulb. So, one can not short out the ground side of the bulb to ground, because of the circuitry that goes on past that point. If, I cut the ground wire to each light bulb, and ground out each light bulb at the light bulb, the bulb works just fine as expected; since the bulb is a new one for each location and each headlight relay and fuse was checked and found to be good, and the voltage on each light bulb was checked and found to be good. The issue is how to figure out where the problem is on the ground side of the bulb. There is a lot of wiring and switches between the ground side of the bulb and the actual vehicle ground. Drl wiring, drl connector, wiring harness across the vehicle, wiring harness going through the firewall under the dash, etc.

Is anyone having mysterious headlight issues on their vehicles that are hard to find? My son has low beam headlights that are both very dim. His passenger high beam headlight does not come on at all. He has one normal high beam headlight working. 1. All headlight bulbs have been replaced. 2. All headlight fuses and relays have been replaced. 3. The drl module has been replaced. 4. The bulkhead connector F109 below the fuse block has been checked and found to be free of corrosion, but has been coated with dielectric grease to prevent corrosion. Still has no low beams - just a slight glow in each bulb. Still has no passenger high beam. Each bulb has the expected 12 volts on the bulb. So, the problem is certainly on the ground switching side of the circuits. Just have not been able to find the problem. Any thoughts?

My son stopped over yesterday with a headlight issue on his vehicle. A 2006 Subaru B6 - head light problem. He has fog lights, parking lights, high beam and low beam headlights on his car. His car is also equipped with daylight running lights. He drove home the other night and everything was working perfectly. He drove out of the garage the other morning and noticed that his headlights were not working properly. Currently, his drivers high beam light works correctly. His passenger high beam does not work at all. When he switches to low beam, both low beams are very very dim. His parking lights work correctly. His fog lights work correctly. All head light bulbs have been replaced, are new and function perfectly if hooked to a separate battery. All head light relays and head light fuses are new and have been tested for correct operation. No sign of any grounding issues with the vehicle. In the wiring diagram, there are 16 wires that feed into the daylight running light module and right now is the primary area of suspicion for his difficulty. But if any one has a Subaru head light issues and has had a satisfactory solution; I would appreciate any information. On this particular car, one side of the head light bulbs have +12 volts on the bulbs any time that the key is turned on. The on and off of the bulbs happen as a result of the ground side of the bulbs being connected or not connected. However, with the way that wires are routed into the daylight driving module, it is impossible to know the exact switching patch for these ground control voltages. Tough to drive around with only one high beam headlight working. Thanks for sharing any thoughts or experiences with this sort of vehicle lighting system issue and resolution.