Headlight Adjustment. Help!!!

[Rowdy Dalton]

So, my 2500 received new headlights, a couple of years ago, when it was pretty much parked all the time. I only used it once every 3-4 months, for about a 4 year period. The original headlights were so faded, and micro cracked, that they couldn't be repaired, and just looked ugly. I put some OEM ones back on, and now that I drive it daily, I've noticed the right light is aimed to the left, too far. All the videos I've seen talk about adjusting only up and down.
Is there a way to adjust right and left?? Or, am I going to have to shim it with washers to make that adjustment?

 

[BigPapa]

AllData says no horizontal adjustment. I would verify the assembly is seated properly. I put headlamps in my ‘98 and didn’t have it seated like it should.

 

[Rowdy Dalton]

I will look to see if everything is tightened down like it is supposed to be.

 

[petersonj]

I agree with @BigPapa , there is no horizontal adjustment and it is possible you did not get the headlight assembly seated properly. Also, has the front passenger side of the vehicle ever been involved in an accident? If so, this could be the cause.

I have a recall notice for my 2014 Volkswagen Passat. They want to permanently cap the horizontal adjustment on each headlight. Not going to happen.

- John

 

[petersonj]

I will look to see if everything is tightened down like it is supposed to be.

I wouldn't tighten any fasteners at first. If a tab is misaligned or didn't go into a proper slot, you may break something if you tighten the fasteners any further. It would probably be better to to remove the fasteners and slide the assembly part way out and then check for proper alignment while guiding it back in.

- John

 

[Ozymandias]

Check the seating of the bulb and the bulb itself.

 

[Rowdy Dalton]

I loosened the two front screws, and fully tightened the back one, that you access behind the fender-well. The back one was not fully tight, and i had to turn it a couple of full turns. I needed a deep socket 10mm to do it, but I didn't have one. Lucky I have some ratcheting wrenches, and was able to use it by pulling back the fender liner. I then tightened the two front screws. Hopefully that did the trick. I will find out at night. But, before I did anything, I lined the beams against the garage, and the right one was about 6 inches lower. I adjusted that too.

 

[slowmover]

Reference for aiming. Get it right.

http://www.danielsternlighting.com/tech/aim/aim.html

 

[Crunch]

I got the Depot brand from Geno's, and I believe those do have a horizontal adjustment though I only used the vertical adjustment and eyeballed it. Now that I've read the article @slowmover referenced, I'm going to try and do it the right way when the weather is better. The headlights on the '03s are notorious for not providing good distance, so it may be something that was neglected at the assembly plant and never checked.

 

[BigPapa]

Maybe I’m wrong, but I only see the one adjustment screw on the Depo pics I’ve found. I can’t imagine a aftermarket light would have an adjustment if the OE assembly doesn’t have it.

 

[Crunch]

I'm out of town now, but when I get back I'll check again. I didn't actually see it, but am thinking that I saw the instructions for adjusting it when I was installing the replacement lights. If I remember correctly it was toward the outer part of the light assembly.

 

[Ozymandias]

Maybe I’m wrong, but I only see the one adjustment screw on the Depo pics I’ve found. I can’t imagine a aftermarket light would have an adjustment if the OE assembly doesn’t have it.

TYCs have it, it is at the bottom of the assembly towards the front.
Pretty useless on a symmetrical beam though.

 

[Rowdy Dalton]

Update:
Re-adjusting the way the headlight was seated helped some. Adjusting the lights to point higher helped a lot. Now, I need to adjust them down, just a little.
It is a night and day difference, when these are adjusted higher, because halogen bulbs need all the help they can get.

 

[BigPapa]

Glad you got it better.

It’s not the “halogen bulbs”, it’s several things. My Accord has MUCH better headlights than my ‘98 with the Sport headlights, but it uses halogen bulbs. My ‘98 had better headlights than my ‘86 C10 that had sealed beams. I thought my ‘98 Sport headlights were great until I drove the Accord. The Sports were much better than the originals. BETTER is always relative to what you’ve experienced.

 

[Ozymandias]

Glad you got it better.

It’s not the “halogen bulbs”, it’s several things. My Accord has MUCH better headlights than my ‘98 with the Sport headlights, but it uses halogen bulbs. My ‘98 had better headlights than my ‘86 C10 that had sealed beams. I thought my ‘98 Sport headlights were great until I drove the Accord. The Sports were much better than the originals. BETTER is always relative to what you’ve experienced.

Yes, it brings you to the point that you can't drive a vehicle at night without Xenons or LEDs. Halogens are like diving through a mud puddle at night compared to modern lighting systems, it feels bad and gives an insecure feeling.

 

[petersonj]

@BigPapa is right on. There have been excellent lighting systems (many with halogen bulbs) on various automobiles and trucks for the last 60 years, but somehow vehicle manufacturers only randomly seem to retain those features as they moved forward building cars and trucks. So, since good lighting has already been engineered so long ago, why are vehicles still being manufactured with poor lighting?

I will cite two examples of poor lighting (when it could have been excellent) with two vehicles that I currently own. Of course, one of the vehicles is my 2002 Dodge truck.

2002 Dodge Truck Headlights -

* Two halogen bulb system - not a negative
* Far undersized wiring for long distance runs (unbelievable for a 2002 year headlight system). Only 10.8 volts at headlight (headlight activated and truck running with 14 volts at the battery). That equates to about 50% of rated illumination!
* 9004 bulb low beam and high beam - only 45 watts for the low beam! (55 watts is the national standard).
* poor reflectors - very little view for the shoulder of the road or side roads.

These headlights should have never been designed and applied in this manner. Of course, I relayed the original headlight system within a month of purchasing the truck new. Much better (voltage at the headlight bumped up to 13.4 volts), but still had limited viewing of the road shoulder and was still using the 9004 (45 watt) bulb.

Later, I installed the Sport Headlight system for even better forward lighting, especially for low beam illumination of the shoulder of the road and high beam illumination for distance down the road.

In summation, the poor lighting was not caused by using halogen bulbs.

2014 Volkswagen Passat Headlights -

* four halogen bulb system - not a negative
* relays present
* H7 bulbs (low beam and high beam)
* regulated voltage to headlights (computer controlled with a default setting for bulb longevity) Voltage with engine running (battery voltage at 14.0) at headlight low beam - 11.2 volts, high beam - 10.0 volts! And this is with relayed lights! What is going on? I could not believe what I found - much thanks to the Volkswagen TDI fourms.

It seems that the engineers at Volkswagen placed more importance on the longevity of the bulb than importance of ability to light up the roadway ahead. After much research and recommendations from the forums, I purchased proprietary diagnostic software (for about $250) to change the voltage settings available to the headlight bulbs. The voltage setting could be set from 12.0 volts to 12.8 volts in .1 volt increments. Or, the voltage control could be disabled.

I first set the voltage control to the highest (12.8 volts), but due to voltage drop through wiring, the voltage at the headlights went from the previously mentioned low beam 11.2 volts to just above 12 volts. (European documentation states that in order to achieve 100% illumination for a given bulb, there must must be 13.2 volts present at the bulb when illuminated).

I disabled the headlight voltage control which bumped the voltage to 13.3 volts at the headlight while on low beam. What a difference!!.

Again, in summation, the poor lighting was not caused by the halogen bulbs.

At the time, I talked to service managers at two Volkswagen dealerships and the owner of a reputable European car repair shop about adjusting the voltage to the headlights. None of the people knew what I was talking about.

- John

 

[Rowdy Dalton]

@BigPapa is right on. There have been excellent lighting systems (many with halogen bulbs) on various automobiles and trucks for the last 60 years, but somehow vehicle manufacturers only randomly seem to retain those features as they moved forward building cars and trucks. So, since good lighting has already been engineered so long ago, why are vehicles still being manufactured with poor lighting?

I will cite two examples of poor lighting (when it could have been excellent) with two vehicles that I currently own. Of course, one of the vehicles is my 2002 Dodge truck.

2002 Dodge Truck Headlights -

* Two halogen bulb system - not a negative
* Far undersized wiring for long distance runs (unbelievable for a 2002 year headlight system). Only 10.8 volts at headlight (headlight activated and truck running with 14 volts at the battery). That equates to about 50% of rated illumination!
* 9004 bulb low beam and high beam - only 45 watts for the low beam! (55 watts is the national standard).
* poor reflectors - very little view for the shoulder of the road or side roads.

These headlights should have never been designed and applied in this manner. Of course, I relayed the original headlight system within a month of purchasing the truck new. Much better (voltage at the headlight bumped up to 13.4 volts), but still had limited viewing of the road shoulder and was still using the 9004 (45 watt) bulb.

Later, I installed the Sport Headlight system for even better forward lighting, especially for low beam illumination of the shoulder of the road and high beam illumination for distance down the road.

In summation, the poor lighting was not caused by using halogen bulbs.

2014 Volkswagen Passat Headlights -

* four halogen bulb system - not a negative
* relays present
* H7 bulbs (low beam and high beam)
* regulated voltage to headlights (computer controlled with a default setting for bulb longevity) Voltage with engine running (battery voltage at 14.0) at headlight low beam - 11.2 volts, high beam - 10.0 volts! And this is with relayed lights! What is going on? I could not believe what I found - much thanks to the Volkswagen TDI fourms.

It seems that the engineers at Volkswagen placed more importance on the longevity of the bulb than importance of ability to light up the roadway ahead. After much research and recommendations from the forums, I purchased proprietary diagnostic software (for about $250) to change the voltage settings available to the headlight bulbs. The voltage setting could be set from 12.0 volts to 12.8 volts in .1 volt increments. Or, the voltage control could be disabled.

I first set the voltage control to the highest (12.8 volts), but due to voltage drop through wiring, the voltage at the headlights went from the previously mentioned low beam 11.2 volts to just above 12 volts. (European documentation states that in order to achieve 100% illumination for a given bulb, there must must be 13.2 volts present at the bulb when illuminated).

I disabled the headlight voltage control which bumped the voltage to 13.3 volts at the headlight while on low beam. What a difference!!.

Again, in summation, the poor lighting was not caused by the halogen bulbs.

At the time, I talked to service managers at two Volkswagen dealerships and the owner of a reputable European car repair shop about adjusting the voltage to the headlights. None of the people knew what I was talking about.

- John

Whatever the Root Cause is for my 06 having poor Halogen lights, it does have sucky halogen lighting. . But, the Philips X-treme Vision Halogens I have, are much better than the stock halogens. I will be going LED bulbs, when these start to peter out.

 

[BigPapa]

Have you put your headlights on relays? Are your lenses yellowed?

 

[Rowdy Dalton]

Have you put your headlights on relays? Are your lenses yellowed?

Brand new housings. Well, 2 years old, but the truck had been under a car cover for 4 years. So, they are new looking. All is factory, and only 186,000 miles. No to the relay. It wouldn't have been an issue, but since my daughter started driving my Wrangler, i started driving the truck again, daily.
I will say, the Philips bulbs are much brighter than the stock bulbs were, when I bought the truck new.
I also bought a 2018 Wrangler, with Halogen bulbs. They were also horrible, until the bulbs were replaced with the Philips X-Treme Vision bulbs, shortly after buying new.
I purchased a 2019 Toyota Highlander with Halogens, and rep!aced the bulbs with the Philips X-Treme Vision bulbs. All was great, but the new generation of LED replacement bulbs are like comparing modern 800 lumin LED flashlights to the old 4-5 D-Cell Maglights, of 30 years ago.

 

[seafish]

^^^

I also have found that Phillips Xtreme Vision bulbs were a definite upgrade for 3rd gen headlights.

In fact, after putting them in my truck and seeing how good they are, with ZERO downsides, I started running them in ALL of my families vehicles !!

Of course retrofitting either DIY or aftermarket PROJECTOR grade headlights into the 3rd gen housings will work much better then the simple bulb upgrade !!!