2018 Headlight Fogging Inside (1 Viewer)

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Joined
Jul 21, 2018
Threads
6
Messages
32
Location
Los Alamos, NM
My 2018 w/ LED headlights has developed interior fogging over the past 2 years (slowly increasing, not dependent on weather and I haven't replaced parking light bulbs). This fogging is definitely on the inside and in both headlights as I have used an exterior polishing kit recently (Cerakote ceramic headlight restoration kit) and could see an effect on the outside surface with no effect on the fogging. My LC lives outside in the NM sun, so there is no shortage of UV, but I would find it odd that UV damaged the interior and not exterior. Has anyone experienced similar interior fogging? On my 5th Gen 4Runner I would experience condensation if the bulb cover seal failed and we had high humidity conditions (pretty rare here). I tried pulling the parking light bulb and blowing compressed air into the assembly with no improvement. I am contemplating removing the headlights and trying to inject an alcohol solution in and swishing it around the interior lens surface before drying out again. At night, with the headlights on, I have light diffraction from the fogging which irritates me, but probably doesn't diminish illumination effectiveness too much. I bought this as a Toyota certified used vehicle in 2020, and headlights are explicitly listed as not covered under the warranty. A couple pics:

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Do you by chance have any very small cracks in the headlights? Lots of intermittent loose flying gravel on I-25 that gets kicked up.
 
Perfect excuse to send it to the headlight guys and have the chrome blacked out like the heritage model. About 500. Maybe once they clean and reseal your problem will be fixed.
 
Mine are doing the same. Mine is 2020 i wonder if they are under warranty
 
Does it seem like it is actually water vapor? If the lenses get warm in the sun does it dissipate?

I’m wondering if something else got in there and vaporized then coated the insides of the lenses. Often actual water vapor will tend to be very responsive to warm/cool parts of the headlight bucket and form larger and smaller droplets, vs a super even ultra thin coating as in the pictures.
 
The outside of my headlights are in pretty good shape. We do have alot of rocks on NM roads, as evidenced by the chip in my front camera, but my headlights are intact. The vaporization comment from bloc is interesting. The fogging looks like condensation, but not typical water condensation (and does not go away in direct sunlight). This remined me that when I purchased my Land Cruiser, the dealership used some awful detailing product in the engine bay. It left all the surfaces coated in a slimy layer that took me quite some time to clean. I wonder if it got into the headlight housing and has been drying and attracting dust on the inside surface.
 
The outside of my headlights are in pretty good shape. We do have alot of rocks on NM roads, as evidenced by the chip in my front camera, but my headlights are intact. The vaporization comment from bloc is interesting. The fogging looks like condensation, but not typical water condensation (and does not go away in direct sunlight). This remined me that when I purchased my Land Cruiser, the dealership used some awful detailing product in the engine bay. It left all the surfaces coated in a slimy layer that took me quite some time to clean. I wonder if it got into the headlight housing and has been drying and attracting dust on the inside surface.
I’m not sure what would get in or how. Your LED lights don’t even need consumer level access to the interior.. so are there even ports to get inside? I’d assume there will be some kind of pressure relief port but I would expect this to be heavily protected from water/mud ingress, and that should handle most other things too.

I don’t have much experience with 16+ headlights though to know the nuances.
 
In the 2016+ the low and high beams are LED with no access. However, the turn signal light is still an incandescent bulb. The access for this bulb goes directly into the body of the headlight.
 
Good point, forgot that detail in your post. Seems odd they’d have those open during detailing or really for any other reason, but weirder things have happened I guess.

If it is something other than water I wouldn’t know where to start to identify and clean it. Alcohol probably is a safe bet.. even if it doesn’t work it shouldn’t hurt anything.

Or as someone mentioned have the lights opened and converted.

If it is water removing the buckets and baking them at low temperature should vaporize any water. Bumper skin isn’t super hard to get out of the way..
 
My 2018 w/ LED headlights has developed interior fogging over the past 2 years (slowly increasing, not dependent on weather and I haven't replaced parking light bulbs). This fogging is definitely on the inside and in both headlights as I have used an exterior polishing kit recently (Cerakote ceramic headlight restoration kit) and could see an effect on the outside surface with no effect on the fogging. My LC lives outside in the NM sun, so there is no shortage of UV, but I would find it odd that UV damaged the interior and not exterior. Has anyone experienced similar interior fogging? On my 5th Gen 4Runner I would experience condensation if the bulb cover seal failed and we had high humidity conditions (pretty rare here). I tried pulling the parking light bulb and blowing compressed air into the assembly with no improvement. I am contemplating removing the headlights and trying to inject an alcohol solution in and swishing it around the interior lens surface before drying out again. At night, with the headlights on, I have light diffraction from the fogging which irritates me, but probably doesn't diminish illumination effectiveness too much. I bought this as a Toyota certified used vehicle in 2020, and headlights are explicitly listed as not covered under the warranty. A couple pics:

View attachment 2926376

View attachment 2926377

View attachment 2926378

Mine are doing the same. Mine is 2020 i wonder if they are under warranty

Both driver and passenger headlights at the same time? And has been doing it during entire ownership since new? That's a pretty astounding coincidence if it was due to rock-cracked headlights or some other type of physical damage. Makes me think that it is a manufacturing defect, like maybe some cleaning process failed during assembly, or maybe some sort of tooling / chemical / environment leak during assembly that trapped it inside.
 
I have a 2016 LC I purchased in 2021, shortly after I noticed it start to fog slightly. It got really bad after a trip to Wyoming and then South Florida, may have been due to the temperature and humidity along with the occasional washing along the way. I Just ordered a new passenger side headlight due to major water inside the housing. I did attempt to dry the interior and it lasted about a day. The plastic screw hole and clip that holds the lense has cracked, probably due to an impact of some kind.

I have also started to have issues with both headlights flickering or strobing during acceleration from a stop. Not sure if this is a battery / alternator or due to the condensation in the headlight.

You can remove the headlight leveler to access the main cavity, the whole thing twists of like the turn signals. I ran a hair dryer (heat off) through the hole in my attempt to dry it, like I said it did not last long. There is a black rubber washer on the leveler so be sure you don't lose it.

Imports - 1 of 1.jpeg



Leveler on the back of headlight.
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We do have alot of rocks on NM roads, as evidenced by the chip in my front camera, but my headlights are intact.
The Fitbit screen protector over the front cam is one of the best hacks I’ve ever discovered in the 200 forum.
 
I drilled a tiny hole at the bottom of what looks like a triangular liquid-collection-point - a nice puddle grew as loads of water dripped out, but that did not make any noticeable difference to my problem (the rest of the moisture stays stuck to the inside of the enclosure, and never runs down to where I drilled the hole)
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I ended up with so much water in my headlight that my lights would flicker occasionally as the water slapped around. It would appear to other drivers like I was flashing my lights intentionally at them and I knew eventually this would cause me some trouble. Because of the cost of these units I decided I would try replacing it myself. I decided halfway through the repair to start videoing what I was doing, so apologies it's not very complete. However, watching the reassembly will hopefully give you confidence that you can easily tackle this job.

 

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