simple one - i hope - my elegance on a 55 plate is fitteds with the bi-xenon headlights. in order to pass the bfg (military test in germany - like a tuv/mot) - it needs to have continental lights - no longer 'flat beam' - will the regular spec lights from the lower models fit straight in or do i need to prepare myself for a big outlay - 1000 euros is my best price thus far?

thanks

phil

Not quite sure what the 'flat beam' is, but Superb's have a small leaver inside the headlight to make them suitable for driving on the left or right.

They are a tw@ to get to in situ tho', so i would recommend removing the front bumper (do a search on here - it's a 10 min easy job) and then taking the headlights out.

Once you have done it the first time and you know what to do you may be able to adjust them in situ next time.

The "tourist levers" to change the dip pattern are indeed difficult to reach, but if you remove the hatch for the main beam access, the levers can be moved with a bent screwdriver.

Unfortunately, doing this just removes the assymetric "kick up" in the dip beam pattern so it definitely won't meet bfg requirements. Have you nocticed the large number of MOD vehicles which don't get their lights changed back when they return to the UK?

rotodiesel.

thanks folks - appreciate the suggestions. there is a good online tutorial to sort the headlights and access the levers. sadly the bfg will not be met, as you noted rotodiesel.

ironically, on a new car, lhd xenons which kick to flat beam the other way will pass our mot so hence that is why i guess so many mod owners are not bothering to change now. in fact they are ordering new spec cars from the uk with lhd lights!

my main question though was whether headlights from an entry model (ie non xenons) - can't use 'bottom of the range' will actually go into my car without dramas.

cheers

phil

my main question though was whether headlights from an entry model (ie non xenons) - can't use 'bottom of the range' will actually go into my car without dramas.

I see no reason why not, although it'll be a bit of a faff as they'll be a fair amount of wiring/ballast/etc to remove.

The only real problem I can see is the manual adjustment retrofitting.

You'll easily make some money back on the sale of your OE Xeons though,I can think of a few people who'd buy them

thanks all - i am trawling most of ebay's european sites as we speak - learning the word for headlights in a multitude of languages thanks to the online tranlator in the google toolbar. may well pay off as germany, poland and france all presenting me with superb xenons at good prices

I now appreciate this is little use to you philkef, but maybe of use to other Superb owners going abroad.

This is the 'tourist lever' (on a drivers side RHD car) it is behind the dip beam bulb cover, the leaver is situated nearest to the indicator bulb.

They 'simply' lift either up (or down, depending on the original position they are set at) by about 20mm. The hardest part of doing this is you can't see what you are doing, so at least now you know where the levers are situated.

Click on the thumbnail for the full size photo.

Edited 25 November, 200817 yr by Gizmo68
cus sum1 carnt spel

The "tourist levers" to change the dip pattern are indeed difficult to reach, but if you remove the hatch for the main beam access, the levers can be moved with a bent screwdriver.

Unfortunately, doing this just removes the assymetric "kick up" in the dip beam pattern so it definitely won't meet bfg requirements. Have you nocticed the large number of MOD vehicles which don't get their lights changed back when they return to the UK?

rotodiesel.

I don't understand what you mean by 'bfg requirements'? What is the spec for this test?

thanks all - i am trawling most of ebay's european sites as we speak - learning the word for headlights in a multitude of languages thanks to the online tranlator in the google toolbar. may well pay off as germany, poland and france all presenting me with superb xenons at good prices

I used to work for the company that designed and manufactured these lamps and being a Designer myself I know all about these lamps.......

I have retro-fitted a pair of OEM Xenon's to my Comfort spec Superb with no issues, however I have no automatic headlamp levelling or washer system which is illegal.........

The tourist lever is a great piece of kit and IMHO people just don't know they have it or what to do with it........

As you've left He**a, I have to say that their tourist levers are an inaccessible bodge. Putting the levers where nobody can easily access them is stupid. Their effect is a bodge too - converts assymetric dip to vertical dip. If they had designed the thing properly there would have been no need for RH and LH dip lamps. I suspect type approval might have been a problem.

The Superb lights are not very good. With standard life Philips or Osram H7s (I never use cheap bulbs) the performance is nowhere near as good as the equivalent size of lamp from Valeo.

I suspect that a lowish voltage regulator setting (14.2V on my car) and the absence of headlamp relays together with stupidly thin wiring (thanks, VAG) are responsible. I'll check the voltage at the lamp pins sometime.

At least in a Superb you can drive with the foglights on with the dipped beam and nobody will pull you up.

rotodiesel.

Rotodiesel, there's nothing wrong with Superb's wiring harness. It can comfortably start retrofit HIDs under any condition (30A+), and by the looks of it is 15A continuous. There is a thin wire inside the lamp housing, though, which might give a problem. Check it out- you won't believe how thin it is, it is 10in silicone insulated wire of less than 0.5mm internal diameter. For the sake of the designers of this unit, I am convincing myself that this is a deliberate current limiter to increase bulb longevity . Otherwise it is sabotage to make Skoda look worse than VW Passat :P

The rest of your comments are spot on.

Anyway, this doesn't help with the test, and if you learn of any modern car that has tourist lever on the outside and full left/right beam conversion, I just might consider buying it in future for the night road lighting...

You can't judge the car wiring by looking at it - only a voltage drop test will confirm any problems. The Superb is a big car (long wires) with a column dip switch which does about 100 jobs. There are also fuses in each dip and main supply.

I'll check it but I would not be surprised to see more than 500 mV dropped between alternator B+ and the lamp pins. HIDs are specified to strike down to a system voltage of 10V so the wiring doesn't generally matter very much. The running current is, of course, lower than the H7s anyway.

rotodiesel.

The running current is much lower, but the starting current is another story.

Examples are 15A at 50ms, 8A at 2 seconds, and these are by a single HID lamp.

Even a poor headlamp circuit will maintain 10V at 15A load - especially at first start up when all the wiring and components are cold. With a self-regulating HID ballast that's all that is needed.

Remember the start up current for a cold incandescent lamp (eg H7) can be 12x the running current. Remember also the relationship between incandescent lamp voltage and light output - it's a very steep curve.

I'll measure the lamp voltage at the pins when I have time.

rotodiesel.

You can't judge the car wiring by looking at it - only a voltage drop test will confirm any problems. The Superb is a big car (long wires) with a column dip switch which does about 100 jobs. There are also fuses in each dip and main supply.

*reaches for his Golf II uprated wiring loom*

:rubchin:

Even a poor headlamp circuit will maintain 10V at 15A load - especially at first start up when all the wiring and components are cold. With a self-regulating HID ballast that's all that is needed.

Remember the start up current for a cold incandescent lamp (eg H7) can be 12x the running current. Remember also the relationship between incandescent lamp voltage and light output - it's a very steep curve.

I'll measure the lamp voltage at the pins when I have time.

rotodiesel.

All true, but I still had to put 2x 15A splices in parallel to make HIDs start up reliably (Phillips Gen IV ballasts). Single splice was burning out too quickly and after a year the light would only start up after 1-2 mins from starting the engine, when the voltage recovered. Twin splices fixed the problem for good.

Anyway, If you want to make halogens to work at their best, there's no escape from the relay, and for these headlights you really do want to splice the new power in right next to bulb housing (beacuse of the thin wire I mentioned). This means making a hole in the access hole cover to run the wiring. It's about as much hassle as retro-fitting HID, so I'd go the HID route instead and just make sure to use Phillips and not Ebayon :P components.

Edit: It still does not help with the BFG, sorry

http://www.acesales.co.uk/documents/Veh_Headlights.pdf

As you've left He**a, I have to say that their tourist levers are an inaccessible bodge. Putting the levers where nobody can easily access them is stupid. Their effect is a bodge too - converts assymetric dip to vertical dip. If they had designed the thing properly there would have been no need for RH and LH dip lamps. I suspect type approval might have been a problem.

The Superb lights are not very good. With standard life Philips or Osram H7s (I never use cheap bulbs) the performance is nowhere near as good as the equivalent size of lamp from Valeo.

I suspect that a lowish voltage regulator setting (14.2V on my car) and the absence of headlamp relays together with stupidly thin wiring (thanks, VAG) are responsible. I'll check the voltage at the lamp pins sometime.

At least in a Superb you can drive with the foglights on with the dipped beam and nobody will pull you up.

rotodiesel.

You always seem quick to jump on the 'design' failure route in many discussion areas roto.........

It is worth bearing in mind that mose solutions are provided to the customer and the customer decides on what is best for them, when designing lamps, package space is always a premium and 'we' struggle to get any access or package space for internal components.....

The Tourist Lever may be seen as a 'bodge' in your eyes but I would be interested to see how you could have come up with a solution in the design stage of the lamp if the customer is driving you down an avenue that is not feasible......ofcourse there are better solutions on the market but as always cost is a factor as in reality how many road users know they have tourist lever in their lamps or could be bothered to use them?

as in reality how many road users know they have tourist lever in their lamps or could be bothered to use them?

You are right, but this is precisely because of what rotodiesel pointed out, the tourist levers are so inaccessible that very few people bother to use them or know about them.

The adjustment should be taken outside headlight (I know, extra lever, extra seal, cost etc.), best on top rear part which is well accessible. Then over the years (and if more cars have this done that way), people will get to use it. Of course, it spoils the "headlamp converters" business

A short piece of bicycle brake cable is good enough for transferring the slide motion required to the outside of headlight without cluttering the inside Add a rubber grommet, a mount for the cable armour to work against, and a small plastic push/pull handle, and you've got a professional looking external tourist lever. Now if only it fully switched the beam instead of flat beam...

Shimano brake cable set for the entire bicycle is under stlg9.99, here you need 1/10th of the material and labour.

In the Octavia, I used an even lower tech solution of running fishing line through 2 tiny holes. I did not bother for the Superb, since 80% of the time it needs flat beam.

Of course, it spoils the "headlamp converters" business

On balance, I think we'd cope

It can't exactly be called "good design" if the lamp manufacturer makes the levers inaccessible and the vehicle builder does not detail their presence in the owner's book.

As I have shown the tourist levers to be (just) accessible through the access hatch for main beam, it wouldn't have been beyond the wit of the lamp designer to make the levers longer and with a bend in them so they could easily be accessed. A longer bent lever would just do what I do with my bent screwdriver.

Of course most owners don't know about these or use them - with a design like that and no literature it's hardly surprising.

rotodiesel.

It can't exactly be called "good design" if the lamp manufacturer makes the levers inaccessible and the vehicle builder does not detail their presence in the owner's book.

He is right about the lack of documentation, Baker... although in the designers defence if the customer (VAG) didn't specify it in the brief, why should they include it?

bfg requirement is the british military testing standard applicable to all military personnel owned cars in germany. it is an amalgamation of the mot and the deutsche 'tuv'

a recentchange in bfg military law sees that all uk cars - rhd- in germany have to be fitted with lights that kick to the left - and not flat beam as trhe tourist levers do. thus my pursuit of lhd bi-xenons from across europe. once the car is bfg'd it can be german insured, registered on the military system and .....wait for it .... i can buy my diesel and petrol for approx 40 cents per litre!!!! so worth doing!

sorry - i meant to say that they kick to the right ... as opposed to into the eyes of oncoming drivers!!!

Rotodiesel, there's nothing wrong with Superb's wiring harness. It can comfortably start retrofit HIDs under any condition (30A+), and by the looks of it is 15A continuous. There is a thin wire inside the lamp housing, though, which might give a problem. Check it out- you won't believe how thin it is, it is 10in silicone insulated wire of less than 0.5mm internal diameter. For the sake of the designers of this unit, I am convincing myself that this is a deliberate current limiter to increase bulb longevity . Otherwise it is sabotage to make Skoda look worse than VW Passat.

Right - nothing like a few measurements.

Superb AWX manual, headlights on full beam at hot idle.

Battery voltage = 13.93V

HB lamp voltage = 12.40V - measured at lamp terminals, LHS.

"Nothing wrong with Superb's wiring harness"?

It's crap with more than 1.5V lost in the switching, fusing, lamp failure detection and wiring. Even worse than I guessed.

rotodiesel.

So it's HID's all the way then