Headlights and General Visibility Upgrades?

B

bearded_ed

Member
So. I've just had quite a challenging drive back home (only 30 mins), in the rain, in the dark on single carriageway - no street lamps.

Visibility was absolutely abysmal. 45mph in a 60 felt challenging.

Lenses on my lights do need refurbishment, which is fine. But the bulbs, how can I get more output?

New wipers also being picked up tomorrow and will coat glass in something too.
 
Turn the headlights adjusters one complete turn, on the vertical plane. Anti- clockwise raises them. If not enough, quarter of a turn at a time. Remember how many turns so you can put back for MOT .


Polish the headlights to make the ones as nw.

:thumbsup:
 
1000rr said:
Turn the headlights adjusters one complete turn, on the vertical plane. Anti- clockwise raises them. If not enough, quarter of a turn at a time. Remember how many turns so you can put back for MOT .


Polish the headlights to make the ones as nw.

:thumbsup:
Click to expand...

This

Brighter bulbs on their own make little difference, you need to adjust the lights up a couple of turns.
 
1000rr said:
Turn the headlights adjusters one complete turn, on the vertical plane. Anti- clockwise raises them. If not enough, quarter of a turn at a time. Remember how many turns so you can put back for MOT .


Polish the headlights to make the ones as nw.

:thumbsup:
Click to expand...

OK, so this is on the actual headlights themselves? As in open the bonnet and it'll be a on the back of the lamp?
 
1000rr said:
Yup... you’ll see a white adjuster either side of the headlights at the top..

Use an Allen key. :thumbsup:
Click to expand...

Do complete turns and make a note so come MOT you can turn them back.

I was never flashed with mine raised 2 complete turns. this was from a known original centre position as BMW had to align mine at it's first MOT.
 
I can confirm this is great advice. I turned mine one full turn to raise them and the difference was night and day, if you'll excuse the pun.
 
Adjusting the level up does wonders. I raised mine one brick level (parked up facing my house) and night time driving is so much easier now.

Other things you can do is combine this with upgraded headlight bulbs and clean the inside of the headlight projector, which goes cloudy over time. It almost looks like the projector has glaucoma, which clearly affects the output of the headlight bulbs.
 
Thank you all!
I'll definitely do a proper refurb on my headlights on my next day off. Followed by winding them up a bit plus new "brighter" bulbs.

Basically I have come from a pretty basic but modern car (2015 Corsa SE) which had lights that to me were really good.

Then driving the Zed the other night was challenging!
 
If you have headlight washers you can fit an HID kit. The new MOT test won’t check for auto-levelling device but does check headlight washer and correct lens type (which all Z4s have).
 
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