I recently got the dreaded CHECK DIPPED BEAM and HEADLIGHT SYSTEM FAILURE in my 957. Upon removing and opening my headlights, I noticed the plastic insulation around the wires was flaking off. The wires to the connectors, directional light, hi-beam, and actuator were all exposed and shorting out. For some reason, the brown wires were most affected and almost bare. Black wires had minimal damage and the other colors were completely unaffected. Passenger side was able to be emergency patched up with electrical tape, however the other side is destroyed and unusable (unless it can be disassembled completely rewired). As much as I love the HID Xenons, I can't justify the cost of 2 headlight assemblies, bulbs, at least 1 ballast, and leveling/adjusting on my 2009 Cayenne Base.

My questions, how can I replace the Xenon headlight units with Halogen units? Is there any modification of the wiring harness needed? Are there any after-market lights available for the 957, I've seen several for the 955 and newer models.
Thanks in advance for any advice!

 

Yes it is possible, I have done it on my 957 Turbo.
No wiring changes are necessary as the standard halogens will plug straight in.
You will have to get your gateway control unit recoded to "code out" the Xenons otherwise you will have a permanent "headlight failure" message.
You will also lose the self leveling function. So your headlight level will be fixed, unless you also replace the headlight switch with one with the manual headlight level control

 

THANK YOU FOR THE GREAT NEWS, DLF! I knew the connectors were the same, but have been told in the past that a swap would not work. The wiring has deteriorated so much in my Xenons that both of my lights are garbage. I hobbled together a fix with electrical tape and liquid plastic to finally get the dip beam and hi-beam working, however the leveling and directional light are beyond help. Unfortunately, with the depreciation of the Cayenne, it does not justify spending several thousand dollars replacing the Xenons and at least one ballast. Thank you again for the good news!

 

Hello - just curious how this worked out for you. I have an 09 Cayenne S with the same issue and would like to swap out with lower cost halogen units.

 

Hello - Thanks for this information. Is this change literally take the old one out and plug in the new halogen assembly back in it's place? That would be awesome. Could you expand the code out explanation? Is this a trip to the dealer to code out? Any idea on where to find a maul headlight level control? Thanks

09 Cayenne S.