Dipped beam lights - they CAN be improved!

[SeekingV70]

I thought I'd share my recent experience because I'm stunned that 1) my lights were so bad and 2) that they passed 2 MOTs carried out at Volvo dealers despite being a long way outside MOT tolerance limits.

I was prompted to sort them out myself because they were clearly too low and, after requesting a Volvo dealer to improve them when doing an MOT, the car was returned with the lights still too low, 'cross-eyed' and with a passed MOT. Yes really!

I was initially told by a dealer that only dealers could adjust them. Or they could sell me a very expensive tool. So I spent ages looking for a 6mm hexagonal tool long enough to use on the white nut things (about 25 cms needed). I then read on this forum that, if you take the headlamps out, as if you were changing bulbs, you can use normal hex keys on the black nuts instead.

I obtained the MOT specification from a .gov website I found on google. I then found a flat place with a 'wall' - a metal recycling container in a Sainsburys car park! I then used sticky page markers on the side of the container to mark out the car centre line and the headlamp heights and centres. I set the car back at a distance of 5 metres. I then marked the upper (0.5%) and lower (2%) limits according to the MOT specification. I found the following:

My headlamps were indeed 'cross eyed'.
They were set at about 6% down. Correct is 1.3%. No wonder I couldn't see.

So I corrected them using a 6mm hex key for left-right and a 8mm hex key for up and down. Correct is 1.3% down with the 15 degree 'kick-up triangle' (which lights up the hedge) starting between 0 and 2% left of each headlamp centre.

At 5 metres, this translates as horizontal heights of 57.5cm and the kick-ups starting in the middle of 0 and 10cm left of headlamp centres.

Quite frankly, it wasn't very difficult once I'd worked out what I needed to do. But I am dismayed that my car is 5 years old, and it's got this far without being correct in the first place!

[AndyMcc]

Good news.
Have you owned the car from new ? if headlamps are set from new then other than a break down in the reflective material or different bulb then surely the headlamp angles etc shouldn't change ?

Andy

[SeekingV70]

No - I had the car at 3 years old - from Selekt at a Volvo dealer.

The reflectors and bulbs etc are fine. The headlamps were simply not pointing in the right place. It's as if they were still set up on their minimum settings as they may have been when they were assembled in the factory. And unfortunately the dealer who I asked to improve them simply made them worse.

[AndyMcc]

Originally Posted by SeekingV70

No - I had the car at 3 years old - from Selekt at a Volvo dealer.

The reflectors and bulbs etc are fine. The headlamps were simply not pointing in the right place. It's as if they were still set up on their minimum settings as they may have been when they were assembled in the factory. And unfortunately the dealer who I asked to improve them simply made them worse.

Well in that case it's a good result for you. I've not been so precise though. Prior to my 2009 V50 I had a new 2005 Honda FR-V. Same problem which the dealer said was fine. Took it on an open stretch of road, re-adjusted to what I thought was right and was a massive improvement and it still didn't fail its MOT.

[Falmouthboy]

I would be feeding back to both the dealer and VOSA. You had the ability to sort this but it should never have happened this way. If we don't complain and make a fuss dealers will continue to give poor service simply because 'they can'.