water in headlight blues and feedback
I too had water in the passenger side headlight and it got so bad the condensation and fog was lowering light output. I tried all the obvious stuff and later found people on you tube claiming it as a sure fire fix. they obviously just did it and saw the moisture gone and posted the video and didn't wait till next day, where they would have found the moisture back again! I'm talking about the hair dryer/ hot air gun and vacuum cleaner (suck) methods. they seems to leave the inside real dry and clean, but I think the moisture just evaporates and collects at the top of the headlight in amongst the parking light reflectors and later condenses and runs back in again. It's a complete waste of many hours and doesn't work on the complex (2006) X model forester headlight.. I ended up taking out the headlight and that's not a breeze either as you have 5 x 10mm hexhead screws to remove- one on top, two at the side next to the grill ( remove that) and two underneath which you have to remove the bumper to get access to the far right one. The bumper is held in by plastic push in clip/ fastners and these usually just come apart easily but the these must have had dirt and mud and crap caked on them and would not release , so had to pry them up a little and hacksaw off. The clear cover is held together with lock in clips and the sealant looks to be a sticky non setting butyl type rubber , not silicon and pulled all the old dirty stuff out and wiped out the residue with white spirits. Looking to now source some water based butyl/ acrylic sealant rather than silicon which can be awful messy and hard to clean up . These modern ideas are a pain as although the polycarb/ plastic headlight is half the weight of a glass one and about 250 times tougher they create other problems like they scratch easily, can go yellow if the uv coating is damaged, they limit you to less than 60W bulbs ( heat) and the seal is a common area of failure.
Plastic radiators also a compromise problem and when they fail they can cost you an engine, just like timing belts and the sealed bearings they run.
But good to see Subaru has gone back to chain timing and full frame doors ( the pillar less doors often have wind noise due to this design) Be good to see return of glass headlights and hydraulic valve adjusters as this would decrease problems and increase reliability, and time spent on maintenance. I bought a forester as I thought they were better than the mass produced, made to a price cars, but alas, they too have some poor engineering ideas. Not a perfect world, seems the bean counters have influence everywhere. Bit sick of made to a price and compromised engineering.
