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I’ve finally received and installed my new HID headlights.  They look great!  I ended up with the following config:

• DDM HID kit, ultra slim ballasts
• H11 bulbs, 5000K color
• Bulb out warning cancellers

Ordered them a while ago from one online vendor, and they shipped me the wrong bulbs.  After going back and forth with them a little bit, I became pretty disappointed that they wanted to go through a long RMA process because of their mistake.  And I had to pay shipping to return them!

So, I ordered them from Apexcone directly.  Their site is a little weird in that they have a separate Yahoo storefront they sell from called DDM Tuning. They arrived as expected, and the directions were pretty straightforward.

After reading various posts on c30world.com, I chose to put all of the pieces and parts inside of the headlight assembly, instead of drilling out the back and having the various parts mounted to the inside of the car.

It was quite a tight fit, and the jury is still out on whether this is the safest way due to heat and vibration.  I didn’t tie everything down yet since I am waiting to see if this is the way I want things.

One interesting note – the bulb out warning cancellers don’t have the standard postitive/negative fin inside of them to show you which way to plug in the power cable from the car electrical system side of things.  I had to use trial and error to figure this out.  Both headlights I guessed wrong the first time, and the light wouldn’t go on afterwards.

So far the lights have been awesome – slight blue tint to them (this from a color blind person, so beware) and way better visibility – no comparison to the halogens.  Of course, I am a bit used to these from my previous car, an Audi TT with Xenon lights as well.

These are quite a bit better than the stock Audi ones – they seem to have more depth to them, and throw a lot better.  I do need to adjust the headlights at this point since they are facing a bit higher than I’d like – don’t want to make those other drivers upset!

For the next few days I’ll be watching them, and this weekend I will examine how the components faired inside based on vibration, adjust the headlights angle, and generally test the heat side of things if I can.

I also plan on posting some before and after pictures, as well as some detail shots.

steve c30 5000K, apexcone, apexcone DDM, DDM, hid, hids, xenon

A few evenings ago I went to the boat to check on some things, and decided to test the new Boatsense unit by tripping the bilge sensor. After 5 minutes of waiting, nothing happened.

Then, I got a call from the guys at Boatsense. Bad news they said – the unit sent the message for the bilge alarm, but it also sent a battery low message, and then sent an “ominous” message that it was “on it’s last legs”. This was some new code they had added to the unit to detect when the unit was failing.

After discussing it for a few minutes, they decided to send me a new unit (unit #3!) and they wanted the dead unit back to do a post mortem.

Apparently I’m an early adopter of their technology – in the first 500 customers – and they have had some other issues in the field. They’ve been pretty aggressive about fixing them, and adding new code and checks into their units to prevent issues.

Regardless, it’s disappointing to see another unit fail. I was promised a new unit, but have still yet to see it – it’s been a week since the issue happened…

steve Electronics boatsense, boatsensesolutions, text message monitoring, vessel monitoring

I ordered the rubber floor mats and a few other things from myswedishparts.com a couple of weeks ago.  Unfortunately, they sent me the wrong floor mats, and it took another week to resolve the issue.  They were nice folks, they just didn’t understand that they had shipped me the wrong thing.

To make matters worse, they shipped the replacement mats to my home address, which is hit or miss because it’s a secure apartment building.  They made it, albeit a few days late.

Installed them this morning and they look great!  Much better than the normal ones.  I especially like the little details that Volvo thought of – the small extra part sticking out on the rear mats to cover everywhere water might get in, and the extra carpet-like strip on the drivers side for your heel to stick to, even if it’s wet.

steve c30 c30, floor mat, myswedishparts.com

Today while driving in rush hour to archery practice, it started getting really warm inside. I fooled with the dials and cranked the controls all the way as cold as they could go, but never got any cold air. Tried cycling the A/C on and off, and every other combination I could think of. It actually felt like the heater was on full blast the entire time.

There were no errors, warnings, or otherwise. It wasn’t that warm outside – maybe 50 degrees F – and I was driving moderately, with plenty of air going by the car.

I arrived at my destination, and turned the car off. Went inside to eat a quick bite, and when I came out about 15 minutes later, it worked fine. Will chalk it up to something not turning on when I started the car, but it has me a bit worried. With a lot of the other owners on the c30world.com forums talking about consistency and quality issues with some similar systems, I’ll keep an eye on it…

steve c30 c30 air conditioning