Disabling Auto Headlights

[Me]

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,



I think this is referring to a requirement known as "dim dip" which existed
a while back - probably in the 80's - but I'm pretty sure that it no longer
exists, because newer cars don't comply.

At the time, the lights had to be wired in such a way that if the parking
lights *and* ignition (but not headlights) were switched on, the headlamp
dipped beam lights would also come on dimly. This was achieved by wiring
them in series rather than parallel under these circumstances. The logic at
the time seemed to be that this was suitable for driving in areas with
street lamps - where the dipped headlights would help cars to be seen
without causing dazzle.

I believe the idea was to make it impossible to drive on sidelights alone,
it came in around 1987 and was dropped in the late 90's.

Just to add to the debate - my 850 has the low intensity running lights and
have left them be for the moment (winter) but I will switch them off in the
summer months, luckily I have the option via a recessed switch next to the
light switch.

 

[Bonnet Lock]

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,

I believe the idea was to make it impossible to drive on sidelights
alone, it came in around 1987 and was dropped in the late 90's.

That sounds about right. At least you then had the option of driving with
*no* lights during the daytime - which is denied to those Volvo owners who
can't work out how to defeat their daytime running lights!

My V70 (1999 vintage - I guess the new shape is different) has a 3-position
screw just below the light switch which enables 3 modes to be selected - one
of which allows you *not* to have lights during the daytime. None of the
modes provide dimmed beams though. What I really miss is a little bleeper -
like many other makes have - to warn me if I accidentally leave the
sidelights on when parking.

 

[Joe landy]

When you consider my expense of over £600 to replace the headlight units
because the reflector surface had peeled, you'll quite understand why people
want to turn their day running lights off !!
When I had the problem of spread-beam headlights, I was continuously getting
other drivers flashing me, suggesting I was dazzling the oncoming traffic. I
was only on dipped-beam all the time, so I thought I'd better investigate.
The problem was that the reflector surface had lost it's adhesion to the
backing plates. The whole reflector had gone rather dull, and polishing just
made large sections of the reflector material flake off.
I wrote to Volvo UK, asking why these reflectors had peeled so soon (car is
6 years old), and explaining that only genuine bulbs had ever been used in
the car, and no water-ingress was apparent e.t.c. I suggested a quality
problem with the reflectors, and stated that with such cost involved in
resolving the problem, I'd like to know of any other alternatives, i.e spare
reflectors.
They wrote back saying that they'd sort the problem at their expense. When I
telephoned to arrange this, they said that because the car had done over
120,000 miles, they wouldn't pay. Obviously the car wasn't under warranty,
but Volvo UK originally admitted that this shouldn't happen.
Therefore, I was left to pay £600 for 2 new headlamp units, which aren't
available as separate parts (reflector, lense, body e.t.c.). My dealer says
that in the UK you can buy new headlamp lenses no probs, but Reflectors are
only available for older cars e.g 740.
I chased all the way through the Hella group too, because the headlight
lenses have 'Hella' stamped (well, moulded) on them. It turns out that these
lamps are actually made in the Volvo factory, but under licence from Hella.
No joy with spares there then.
In the end, Volvo UK can kiss my arse, because I found some broken headlamps
in a breakers yard for £10 each, with perfectly good reflectors. It's
something I'd consider on my next car though.
Either be prepared for silly, unnecessary expenses at MOT test time, turn
the day-running lights off, or get prepared and start searching for spares
in the scrappy long before you need them!

My final word is that I still DO use my day-running lights, and am still
looking for some 2003 C70 headlamps with the clear lenses (no prism effect)
in a breakers yard to give the car a facelift.

Cheers.
Joe landy
Peterborough
UK.
1997 V70 TDI 227,000 miles.

 

[Stephen M. Henning]

What I really miss is a little bleeper -
like many other makes have - to warn me if I accidentally leave the
sidelights on when parking.

In the US, the "sidelights" are called parking lights and are intended
to be left on when the car is parked on the edge of a highway. If it is
well off the road the parking lights are used. If it is close to the
main traveled lane(s) or partially blocking the main traveled lane(s)
the hazard warning lights (flashing all 4 turn signals) are turned on.

In some states, it is illegal to drive with the parking lights on since
some one may mistakenly assume the car is parked and not moving.

 

[Stephen M. Henning]

When you consider my expense of over £600 to replace the headlight units
because the reflector surface had peeled, you'll quite understand why people
want to turn their day running lights off !!

The solution is to make Volvo provide you a safe car, not to defeat the
safety features they do provide. Obviously using headlights should have
no deleterious effect other than just using some of the finite life of
the lamps. If the reflector is failing in normal use, that is a design
flaw and should be reported to national safety monitoring agencies and
Volvo. They need to fix it pronto. In the USA that is reason for a
model recall which means manditory replacement at the manufacturers
expense.

 

[Bonnet Lock]

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,

When you consider my expense of over £600 to replace the headlight
units because the reflector surface had peeled, you'll quite
understand why people want to turn their day running lights off !!
When I had the problem of spread-beam headlights, I was continuously
getting other drivers flashing me, suggesting I was dazzling the
oncoming traffic. I was only on dipped-beam all the time, so I
thought I'd better investigate. The problem was that the reflector
surface had lost it's adhesion to the backing plates. The whole
reflector had gone rather dull, and polishing just made large
sections of the reflector material flake off.
I wrote to Volvo UK, asking why these reflectors had peeled so soon
(car is 6 years old), and explaining that only genuine bulbs had ever
been used in the car, and no water-ingress was apparent e.t.c. I
suggested a quality problem with the reflectors, and stated that with
such cost involved in resolving the problem, I'd like to know of any
other alternatives, i.e spare reflectors.
They wrote back saying that they'd sort the problem at their expense.
When I telephoned to arrange this, they said that because the car had
done over 120,000 miles, they wouldn't pay. Obviously the car wasn't
under warranty, but Volvo UK originally admitted that this shouldn't
happen.
Therefore, I was left to pay £600 for 2 new headlamp units, which
aren't available as separate parts (reflector, lense, body e.t.c.).
My dealer says that in the UK you can buy new headlamp lenses no
probs, but Reflectors are only available for older cars e.g 740.
I chased all the way through the Hella group too, because the
headlight lenses have 'Hella' stamped (well, moulded) on them. It
turns out that these lamps are actually made in the Volvo factory,
but under licence from Hella. No joy with spares there then.
In the end, Volvo UK can kiss my arse, because I found some broken
headlamps in a breakers yard for £10 each, with perfectly good
reflectors. It's something I'd consider on my next car though.
Either be prepared for silly, unnecessary expenses at MOT test time,
turn the day-running lights off, or get prepared and start searching
for spares in the scrappy long before you need them!

My final word is that I still DO use my day-running lights, and am
still looking for some 2003 C70 headlamps with the clear lenses (no
prism effect) in a breakers yard to give the car a facelift.

Cheers.
Joe landy
Peterborough
UK.
1997 V70 TDI 227,000 miles.

Are you suggesting that the life of the reflectors depends on how much the
headlamps are switched on? If so, that seems unlikely to me - more likely to
be a time thing - or maybe exposure to some corrosive gas or something.

 

[Bonnet Lock]

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,

In some states, it is illegal to drive with the parking lights on
since some one may mistakenly assume the car is parked and not moving.

In the UK, it's perfectly legal to drive with just sidelights on - and is a
reasonable thing to do when visibility is just a bit poor - i.e. you can see
where you are going but others may be able to see you better with *some*
lights on. However, when you get to the end of your journey and park - maybe
off the road - it's all too easy to leave the lights on, with the risk of
running down the battery. [There's no indication inside the car, because the
instrument panel lights go off when the ignition is turned off]. All my
previous (non Volvo) cars and my wife's current car (Ford Puma) have a
bleeper which operates when you open the doors with the sidelights on.

 

[Peter Milnes]

Unfortunately the USA headlamp regulations are just a loads of hogwash with the
result that USA lighting is just about the worst in the world. I am sorry but
there it is! You only have to get a set of European headlamps from IPD and
others to improve the dismal output from the USA designed lighting fitted as
standard to all imports (and home market vehicles) to comply with the USA laws.

Cheers, Peter.

:
: > When you consider my expense of over £600 to replace the headlight units
: > because the reflector surface had peeled, you'll quite understand why people
: > want to turn their day running lights off !!
:
: The solution is to make Volvo provide you a safe car, not to defeat the
: safety features they do provide. Obviously using headlights should have
: no deleterious effect other than just using some of the finite life of
: the lamps. If the reflector is failing in normal use, that is a design
: flaw and should be reported to national safety monitoring agencies and
: Volvo. They need to fix it pronto. In the USA that is reason for a
: model recall which means manditory replacement at the manufacturers
: expense.
:
: --
: Pardon my spam deterrent; send email to [email protected]
: Cheers, Steve Henning in Reading, PA, USA
: Owned '67,'68,'71,'74,'79,'81,'87,'93,'95 & '02 Volvos.
: The '67,'74,'79,'87,'95 and '02 through European Delivery.
: http://home.earthlink.net/~rhodyman/volvo.html

 

[James Sweet]

Unfortunately the USA headlamp regulations are just a loads of hogwash with the
result that USA lighting is just about the worst in the world. I am sorry but
there it is! You only have to get a set of European headlamps from IPD and
others to improve the dismal output from the USA designed lighting fitted as
standard to all imports (and home market vehicles) to comply with the USA laws.

Cheers, Peter.

Yeah that sure is the truth, I was shocked by the improvement when I
switched to ECE lamps.

 

[Mike F]

In the cities of France they drive around with parking lights on. They
seem to go out into the country with these also, forgetting to turn on
the headlights. Old VWs used to have a small bulb in the headlight that
was used for city driving.

My V70 has provision for a small 5W bulb inside the headlight housing,
and a an extra terminal wire in the socket for it as well. I guess that
somewhere these are fitted, even still.

--
Mike F.
Thornhill (near Toronto), Ont.

NOTE: new address!!
Replace tt with t (twice!) and remove parentheses to email me directly.
(But I check the newsgroup more often than this email address.)

 

[Mike F]

I think this is referring to a requirement known as "dim dip" which existed
a while back - probably in the 80's - but I'm pretty sure that it no longer
exists, because newer cars don't comply.

At the time, the lights had to be wired in such a way that if the parking
lights *and* ignition (but not headlights) were switched on, the headlamp
dipped beam lights would also come on dimly. This was achieved by wiring
them in series rather than parallel under these circumstances. The logic at
the time seemed to be that this was suitable for driving in areas with
street lamps - where the dipped headlights would help cars to be seen
without causing dazzle.
--
Cheers,
Bonnet Lock
______
Please reply to newsgroup. Reply address is Black Hole!

This makes sense. With the harmonization of rules and regulations
across Europe, this is the kind of country specific requirements that
are supposed to be eliminated. The only thing I actually know about
DIM-DIP is what I've noticed in Volvo wiring diagrams manuals. Volvo
used a controller that supplied reduced voltage to the low beams when
the ignition was on - turning the lights on just bypassed this
controller.

--
Mike F.
Thornhill (near Toronto), Ont.

NOTE: new address!!
Replace tt with t (twice!) and remove parentheses to email me directly.
(But I check the newsgroup more often than this email address.)

 

[Stephen M. Henning]

Unfortunately the USA headlamp regulations are just a loads of hogwash with
the result that USA lighting is just about the worst in the world.

In the '60s they wouldn't even let a person drive in Europe with USA
spec headlamps. On those cars we had both sets and changed depending
upon where we were driving. However, today you can use either set
either place. Since I buy most of my Volvos in Europe, I have driven my
USA spec headlamps many miles in Europe and can't say that my headlights
were worse than those on the other cars on the highways I was driving.
Maybe before 1992 that was true, but after 1992 the USA spec headlamps
were as good as any headlamps on other cars that were on the road.

 

[James Sweet]

In the '60s they wouldn't even let a person drive in Europe with USA
spec headlamps. On those cars we had both sets and changed depending
upon where we were driving. However, today you can use either set
either place. Since I buy most of my Volvos in Europe, I have driven my
USA spec headlamps many miles in Europe and can't say that my headlights
were worse than those on the other cars on the highways I was driving.
Maybe before 1992 that was true, but after 1992 the USA spec headlamps
were as good as any headlamps on other cars that were on the road.

There's been some changes and better cars today have headlamps that meet
both sets of regulations from what I gather, either way I'm seeing a lot of
US headlamps that look very much more like ECE lamps from their beam
pattern. There's still plenty of cars that come with absolutely horrid
headlights that still manage to meet regulations though. Try driving an F350
Diesel pickup sometime, my friend's dad has the base model, I think it's a
2002, the lighting is awful.

 

[Joe landy]

Hi there mr Bonnet lock, and thanks for the input.
Yes I do think the headlamp reflector life is directly related to the length
of time the headlamps are on for. The surface peeled in the places closest
to the bulbs. Worst area was directly above the bulb glass, where heat has
obviously risen. This evidence made me suspect use of the wrong headlamp
bulbs, i.e values of above 55 watts. All my service documentation suggests
that only Genuine bulbs have ever been fitted, and during the time I've
owned the car, I have only fitted a couple of sets of genuine bulbs.
As for corrosion, the car has never had a replacement headlamp lense, and
has perfectly good seals around the lense edge, i.e no moisture inside.
Like I said, the problem is fixed for the moment, but is sure to crop up on
others at Annual Testing time.
Cheers for now.
Joe Landy.
Peterborough
UK.