Hi forum friends, 

I've done a bit of digging around but haven't seen any examples of how the low beam on the matrix LED is meant to shine. I'm hoping some fellow Octy mk4 drivers can help confirm if my lights have the same angle or are off.

I believe the kerb side (left in Australia) seems to shine too high up. The base level (ignition on, engine off) is set a nice normal angle, (first image) where you can see the cutoff is nice and straight.

However, when the engine is on, the additional inner bulb group turn on and the additional beams appear, it's not so obvious in the second photo but the further the distance, the higher the angle. I do notice when in fully light and busy roads, those additional beams weaken by about half strength, however in low light areas or when stopped, the strength resets - it's great for seeing obstacles on the kerb side of roads, but it dazzles cars waiting to pull out from intersections or parked cars. I've been flashed multiple times by cars thinking my highbeams are on. 

To clarify, I'm not talking about auto-high beam / Dynamic Light Assist, there doesn't seem to be anyway to turn off these additional beam lights. I'm keen to see other matrix LED beam patterns, ie my sister has a Golf R mk8 and hers, whilst also a bit messy, stay relatively straight horizontally with only slight kinks. 

Here's another photo at the same distance as the first but with engine on. You can see the extra groups of beams which also move left and right with steering and seem to auto dim in built up areas (but not completely off and not very responsive either) - these are different to the auto high beams. I also haven't been able to confirm how effective the auto-high beams are as I haven't been able to drive down country roads at night yet (plus I prefer to control when my high beams turn on even with the auto-block out feature). 

It seems that your left light is adjusted a bit higher, than right light and that is causing issues.

If they are set correctly, on the same level, you should get ideally straight line with engine off, and one step only with engine one. In your case i can see 2 steps with engine on, and with engine off it's also going doenwards on the right side.

Take it for headlight adjustment and you will be fine.

I will post mine soon as I come home

Sorry if i state the obvious.

 

There is a wall right in front of the car and the Matrix light system knows there is. 

 

Go sit with just half a wall across in front of the car.

1 hour ago, Felix2021 said:

It seems that your left light is adjusted a bit higher, than right light and that is causing issues.

If they are set correctly, on the same level, you should get ideally straight line with engine off, and one step only with engine one. In your case i can see 2 steps with engine on, and with engine off it's also going doenwards on the right side.

Take it for headlight adjustment and you will be fine.

Thanks @Felix2021 - I noticed it's ever so slightly higher on the left too. Although to make that highest "step" line up with the middle one, it would have to make the whole cluster move down so far it would make the standard engine off beam uneven... If you're right about the steps lining up, then it's definitely a case the left one is misaligned as the beam gets higher with distance, whilst the middle step beam doesn't seem to. If that makes sense! 

I'll have to bring it up at it's next service but that's still another 5k KMs away and I'm already on a waitlist for a new dash in Feb due to warped heads up display cowling, and that's after 2 visits to deal with bad ride which was diagnosed as out of round tyres! So many trips to the dealer which is super far from me. 

 

1 hour ago, Rooted said:

Sorry if i state the obvious.

 

There is a wall right in front of the car and the Matrix light system knows there is. 

 

Go sit with just half a wall across in front of the car.

Hi @Rooted nah even with no wall, the left beam goes up higher. Ie if I'm driving down a quiet suburban road, the left "stepped" beam goes so high that tree canopies and street signs get lit up in the distance and you can see the light going above the window line of parked cars. Tbh it's great as you can see cats about to run across the road etc but then a car will be waiting to pull out of an intersection and you can see their faces get lit up which must mean they're getting dazzled. 

I'll try and take a photo driving down a road at night tomorrow. 

21 hours ago, dtdin92 said:

If you're right about the steps lining up, then it's definitely a case the left one is misaligned as the beam gets higher with distance, whilst the middle step beam doesn't seem to. If that makes sense! 

Well, i've been there

I mean my car had same problem, and was fixed by adjusting levels, now all is good.

18 hours ago, Felix2021 said:

Well, i've been there

I mean my car had same problem, and was fixed by adjusting levels, now all is good.

@Felix2021 does that mean you had to send your's back to the dealer for adjusting? i should just bite the bullet and call them up to book it in sooner. I hate the idea of blinding other drivers with incorrectly aimed lights - such a pet hate. i had even manually lowered the angle slightly as the low beam's non-engine-on beam angle seemed too high for my liking. Doesn't look like there's anyway to separately control how the additional LEDs located in the inboard clusters are angled?

2 hours ago, dtdin92 said:

does that mean you had to send your's back to the dealer for adjusting?

To be honest i can't remember now if it was fixed at the dealership, or if i did it on my own.

2 hours ago, dtdin92 said:

i should just bite the bullet and call them up to book it in sooner. I hate the idea of blinding other drivers with incorrectly aimed lights - such a pet hate.

Do it. It's really easy fix.

2 hours ago, dtdin92 said:

Doesn't look like there's anyway to separately control how the additional LEDs located in the inboard clusters are angled?

Actually there are additional screws for adjustment, but i never tested what they do. I mean i know there's one for adjusting vertical and one for horizontal angle. But as far as i remember there is one more, and this one might be for adjusting only matrix cluster, but i am not 100% sure.

But looking at your pictures, i think in your case it needs adjusting of the whole lamp, as this "static" segment of low beam also seems to be a bit higher on the left side.

@dtdin92Theese are mine when ignition is on.

Octavia Rs Tsi, 3 months old.

Matrix headlights

Cheers

10 hours ago, Filip222 said:

@dtdin92Theese are mine when ignition is on.

Octavia Rs Tsi, 3 months old.

Matrix headlights

Cheers

Thanks Filip! The extra stepped beams in your's seem to go even higher than mine, but sounds more like @Felix2021 where the beams seem to be same height. Really interesting to note though that yours quickly dims as it moves off-centre. Do both those stepped beams go dim as you're driving and reset to that pattern when stopped (ie at traffic lights?)