mishar

Can you turn that socket for 90°? Does the lens move?

That white alan key like plastic in the top right corner looks like it is adjusting that mount. I will peek there tomorrow.

mishar

No luck. Too much to disassemble in order to see anything.

FlyTyinFool

I know this sound very well.

Anyway, I was just in there the other day and can confirm for you that the ball is supposed to be in the white plastic clippy thing.

p.s. I was changing an HID bulb, but also took the time to remove the LED city lamp bulbs I installed a little over a year ago. I went back to yucky yellow-orange incandescent 194s (or 198s, I don't remember). I'm done with the quirky Lamp Out error messages at the dash. The LEDs were still operable, and usually didn't throw errors, but they sure looked horrible when they cam out. All burned up.


Carry on...

awdinut

I acquired Bi-Xenon headlights from from a guy in Germany for my previous A8 which was a D2. The guy neglected to tell me that the car had been in an accident and the impact had broken one of those white sockets for the leveling mechanism. Therefore, I had to dis-assemble the headlight and scavenge from the US lights that came out of my car.

So, yes, that ball goes into the socket. How it got out is a mystery...is that white socket cracked ? The black ball piece may not travel where it needs to be to go in the socket without some dis-assembly.

As to the metal piece...when I completely tore appart the projector unit in my US D2 lights (just to see whats in them, since I was discarding the US lights) I found a metal part similar to the one in your photo. The bare metal look , the hole placement, and the odd shape to one edge. Is that piece about as long as the projector lense is wide by any chance ?

The piece I took out of my lights had a different edge shape than yours, but its purpose was to form the proper cut-off pattern for the headlight's beam. And I cant think of any other reason for such a piece. And if that is the scrim for the projector beam, then I would say there is no way that part could be lying loose in the housing without some one having had things torn appart.

K9COP

Gentlemen all, Mishar, FlyTyin, Awdinut. Thnak you thank you thank you.

Ok, so here's the latest. Essentially, car is back together and all working. Now I've given you the 'happy ending', I'll explain. Firstly, the range adjustment. I had tried to take the motor out last night in the dark and sub-zero temperatures, and for once, had the good sense to walk away. Today I took the motor out again, as, with it in, the ball and socket simply cannot be brought back together. The motor itself has a little ball and socket of it's own, and once you release the two torx screws holding the motor in, if you lift/tilt the rear of the little motor, it disengages from the mechanism with the ball that actually goes into the white 'C' shaped socket. Once that's done, you can just slide the now free black ball thingy forwards and engage it into the white socket on the bottom left corner of the black plastic xenon tube carrier. The top left of that carrier is a fixed ball joint, the top right is the side to side adjustment cam/ball joint. So that is all back together.

That was the easy part! In order to establish where the 'spare part' went, I had to remove the passenger side headlamp low beam rear cover again. With some careful use of mirror on a stick and LED light, I could see the projection of the passenger side 'shim' sticking up. Looking at the one that was loose in the drivers side, and flipping it's position horizontally relative to the passenger side, the screw holes in the 'spare' and the other cleaning/dirt marks for the other (spare) holes in the carrier allowed me to position it correctly. Probably... HOWEVER, in order to do that I had to be on my back with the GF stood over me, holding the headlamp with lens towards the ceiling, openings (on the headlamp) facing me, using gravity to allow the 'spare' to rest on the (now) top surface of the xenon carrier to allow me to align it and get the screws in. She's been like that before, just never with a head light involved....

Interestingly (or not), the part number has to be upside down relative to the headlamp/car. VERY counter intuitive to me, but a) I couldn't see the front of the other 'shim' for reference, and b) with the previous marks from fitment/holes etc, it had to go that way. You'll see in the pic the end of the tab on the shim, and the very top edge of that tab slopes towards the centre of the car, the same, but reversed if you like, as the passenger side. Not the first time in life I've thought I don't have enough fingers...

Only problem now is the drivers side low beam faces wayyy too low, but I think that is just a product of having the adjuster apart. I'm happy enough it all works and I'll deal with aim later. (how is that done?)



Motor out (that is not the ball that engages with the white 'C' shaped socket):



Ball/socket engaged:



Job done! Note: I'm not sure what you're supposed to do, but the light came out only with loosening front most fender attachment bolt, no other disassembly required. Thanks guys!

Sorry for the long reply, but just wanted to let you guys have the full story...

K9COP

I've searched on here band found what I think is a process to change the low beam range through VagCom, but can I manually change the range of just the drivers light? After taking the light apart, the two beams are now at different heights, drivers is way low. Can I change it?

K9

K9COP

Yep. F'ing, son of a F'ing bitch stupid F'ing, complicated F'ing complicated F'ing backwards F'ing electronic F'ing nightmare....

Right! So Both low beam headlights are now working, BUT. The driver's light is aimed wayyyy too low, and I can't find a process that works to adjust it. I've found a process that's supposed to alter both through VAGCOM, which of course had no effect, and I even tried the 'light left' channel in VagCom, which gave me a 'controller cannot be reached' message of both sides...

WHY CAN'T I HAVE A TWISTY THING THAT MOVES THE BEAM UP!!!

Oh yeah, and I've got a headlight range error message on the dash now. Perfect.

And the icing on the cake, having replaced both bulbs, the passenger light is blue, and the drivers is white (which was why I swapped them in the first place. Igniter?



K9

mishar

This is top view. 1 and 2 adjust low beam.

By the way it is a high beam too. It just lifts a shutter.

K9COP

.. I'm such an idiot! Attached is a picture of my light. I actually established last night that the left of the two items (viewed from above) you indicated moves the beam left to right. I looked at, and dismissed (!) the other one, which I assume moves the beam up and down. I'll check the thing tomorrow, and hopefully get the beam right. I'm assuming it's the same as the other round item, but with a black plastic blank pushed into the hex socket used to adjust it. Will manually moving the beam clear the error message on the dashboard, or will VagCom clear it when the aim is correct? So complex... and I've still got two different looking lights...

K9.

K9COP

Right, here's the latest.

I've removed the rubber bung from the 'up and down' manual movement screw for the left low beam. Using an allen key, I moved the beam up to match the passenger side light level. So far so good.

Did that extinguish the dash warning for 'headlight aim defective'. No, of course not.

Ok, to VagCom to clear the DTC's, and it immediately comes back. Here's the headlight codes:

Address 55: Xenon Range Labels: None
Part No SW: 4E0 910 357 HW: 4E0 907 357
Component: Pre-AFS H01 0040
Revision: 00000001 Serial number:
Coding: 0000001
Shop #: WSC 02311 785 00200
VCID: E2C11BEB3D54103

1 Fault Found:
01539 - Headlights Not Adjusted
005 - No or Incorrect Basic Setting / Adaptation - MIL ON
Freeze Frame:
Fault Status: 11100101
Fault Priority: 2
Fault Frequency: 1
Reset counter: 21
Mileage: 230072 km
Time Indication: 0
Date: 2012.03.13
Time: 18:57:01

I guess I need to recode or check something. This came back repeatedly after clearing the DTC's on address 55.

Apart from all this, I STILL have a 'brighter' or 'bluer' passenger low beam than the drivers side, which was the whole issue that made me change the bulbs in the first place...

Any suggestions as to what I could do next please guys? At least I resolved the reason why I can't turn off the TMPS, the controller can't be reached!!

K9