Beam me down

Following the advice in your column I have bought a Skoda vRS diesel for an astonishing discount. Thank you. Naturally a good price limits choice of specification to what is in stock and mine came with Xenon headlights. The salesman told me I didn't need to manually adjust for load as they are self-levelling, but I am being repeatedly flashed and full beamed by other drivers for dazzling them when the car is carrying nothing but two passengers. How do they work? The cutoff on the lights seems correct when behind another vehicle, is it just that they are very bright or do I need to go back to the dealer?

Asked on 7 March 2009 by

Answered by Honest John

They have electric motors to 'self level' them, but this system is
notoriously unreliable, particularly on VAG cars, and anyway, on an
undulating road (or one with speed humps), the self-levelling system cannot react fast enough to prevent the lights dazzling oncoming drivers. It's yet another example of EC legislation that was never properly thought though, just like the ridiculous requirement that every car must contain a spare set of light bulbs but there is no compulsion on carmakers to make it possible for a driver to fit those bulbs.

Tags: xenon owning lights headlights

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