Continental Headlight Adjustment

[trickdick]

I'm off to France next week on my new Octavia Elegance 1.9 facelift.

The manual says that stick on headlight adjusters should not be used? How can i get the headlights adjusted? Is it an easy job? I don't want to be dismantling headlight units in the queue at Dover!

Any thoughts please?

[trickdick]

Thanks for such a quick response! Thats very helpful.

Is that REALLY the only way it can be done?! Perhaps I should change the cambelt while I'm at it! I'm not technically minded and the thought of breaking something on my week old car scares the life out of me!

I think a trip to the dealer is called for.......

[Makefish]

I travel on holiday to France nearly every year and for the past 10 years or so have not bothered with headlight adjusment, it really has not been worth the worry.

I feel it is only necessary if you intend to do a LOT of night time driving and even then why bother if most of your driving is on Autoroute/Motorway?

[mannyo]

Click Me!

Any use??

This is what I do, you dont need to wait until the queue at Dover either. Mine are left set permanently like this most of the year, I only set them back to normal for the MOT and then flat beam them again the next time I go abroad. It makes little difference to UK driving so set them at home a few days before you go. The change takes less than 5 mins to complete, it may look complicated but its really simple.

[briwy]

trick****

The instructions refer to pre facelift lights but the principle is the same on the new ones.

Instead of the large rectangular plastic cover it is now a round rubber boot and the method of removing the bulbs is different.

Do make sure that the bar is all the way across, sometimes they can be a bit sticky to push all the way.

Incidentally, it can be done quite easily without disconnecting the wiring.

Like mannyo, I just leave mine all the time set for continental driving.

[soapywalrus]

Another one for not bothering - I have driven on the continent half a dozen times in the last couple of years, in various British cars, and have never had a problem. I sometimes find just adjusting the lights down a touch (like you would with a boot full of bricks)is enough to slip below the radar.

[briwy]

If you get pulled in at a spot check at night by the gendarmes they WILL check the lights.

Why take the risk when its so easy to change them over?

[Gtandre]

I recently had the opposite problem a couple of weeks ago when i came to a weekend in Yorkshire with my LHD Octavia.

I think it's not a big problem if you don't mask your lights but i'm a "perfectionist"

Well, i got ripped off of 9,95 euros (8,5 £ ) by Halfords for the damn stickers, and i just discovered it's quite easy and painless with the good old system of "get in front of a wall".

If you just want to be 100% legal in half a minute without removing the headlights you just have to put the "round" part of the specific stickers, or just some duct tape on the section of the headlights i marked in blue in this picture (the red one are for LHD cars) and that's it

[gadgetman]

If you have xenons and maxidot, you can do it automatically on facelifted cars.

[Prof Yaffle]

I don't think anyone's really mentioned this, but, from what I've been told... (1) Never stick anything to xenons that you don't want to be fused there permanently, and (2) you can always use headlamp protectors and stick Duck tape or similar to those in the right places.

IMHO... I'm on the continent a lot, and can vouch for the automatic on the FL xenons - but I wouldn't risk not changing them, you're likely to get your car impounded as not roadworthy if anyone finds out. Like carrying a hi-viz jacket, whether you agree with it or not, it's the local law, you're a guest and it's just not worth it.

[mcgiver]

Thanks for such a quick response! Thats very helpful.

Is that REALLY the only way it can be done?! Perhaps I should change the cambelt while I'm at it! I'm not technically minded and the thought of breaking something on my week old car scares the life out of me!

I think a trip to the dealer is called for.......

A skoda dealer told me they can do it for 37 pounds and another skoda dealer that it is a question of a few minutes and show me how to do it if i need it again in the future.

But this was for an Octavia 2 .

[psycholist]

If the car has projector headlamps then all you need is a small screwdriver to convert the lights to a flat beam. I did this for a trip to France the week before last. It really does only take a couple of minutes once you know how. Converting back is even quicker...

To check whether you have projector headlamps look at the car from the front and if you can see a lens rather than a bulb for the dipped beams, you've got projectors.