After some advice please I have factory fitted xenons on my mk1 and recently I had the ballast go which a very kind forum member helped me with. I have replaced the bulbs in then to 6k ones and man they are bright I love them. Now my only problem seems to be the "throw" (think that's the right term) there isn't much range of the light and I'm struggling to see up ahead when driving on dipped beams at night. Is there a leveling motor that raises the bulb if so how do I go about testing it or adjusting it etc. Last time I checked the fuse board when looking at why a bulb had gone before I found out it was the ballast they were all ok but I'm going to check tomorrow in the daylight. Any advice on this would be gratefully received.

Edited 5 January, 201511 yr by iwik76

Turn on the headlights before turning the ignition key; if the motor is working correctly you will see the dipped beam sweep down then up.

 

Broadly, as you move up the colour temperature, the amount of light emitted is reduced. While you might prefer the look of your replacement bulbs, they will not provide as much light as the standard 4300K bulbs (assuming the same wattage).

 

The dipped beam height can be adjusted; first you must disable the auto-levelling, then set them at the correct level, then re-enable the auto-levelling. I normally ask the garage to do this, and they use a local MOT bay to make sure the dipped beams are set at the highest permitted level.

 

FWIW, even though you'd think it should make no difference, my experience has been that if the front or rear level sensors have been removed from the suspension arms then re-attached, the beam height can shift from where it was before.

Thank you for your reply I have got to the bottom of it. In short the level sensor had snapped in the front left wheel arch the black plastic arm has snapped in two pieces. So I'm starting the search for another one.