V70 headlights very poor

[brickman]

Originally Posted by v70cd

Hi

Have a look at this thread selling a set headlamps in Glasgow...you probably drove past his house but your lights were too dim....haha !!

http://www.volvoforums.org.uk/showthread.php?t=264902

Aye that's mine, provisionally sold! Would stay away from the cheaper pattern parts, mine were £150 each and are excellent, very little difference if any between them and crystal c70 jobs with same bulbs in each (Philips £40 VERY short lifespan jobs). Many folk who borrow my car comment on how good the headlamp pattern is.

[dingov70]

Fixie Bob , unless your car has projector lenses fitted , using HID lighting is a NO NO . I know because I am an MOT tester . My own v70 has ABM units with HID dip & LED mains & yes they are projector lights .

As for coating your reflectors with a " chrome " or similar plastic , as long as the light pattern on the beam tester is as required for the test , go for it . I would also suggest heating the film with a hair dryer to smooth any wrinkles out more easily .

If you do change your bulbs / light units / refelctors , please ask your local MOt tester nicely & offer a few pounds to set the headlights accurately . I do adjust them after test if they are out , to avoid a fail

[marcher49]

I’ve just replaced my headlights that had the usual problem with oxidised reflectors.
My initial searches revealed that RHD headlight assemblies cost more than three times the price of LHD assemblies!
Having established that the only difference was the glass lenses, I ordered a LHD pair from Ebay for about £100. These came from Germany with manual levellers and without bulbs. The quality of the assembly is generally good but the H7 bulb connections are simple Faston terminals.

The Fresnel lens patterns are indeed mirror images between LHD and RHD (see photos) and the glasses are identical in size and can therefore be replaced with the original glasses.


The reflectors are identical. This is not the case for Mk2 models and later where the reflector optics define the different beam pattern for RHD and LHD.
I encountered a slight problem when swapping the manual leveller with the old motorised leveller.
Although the body mouldings are identical in most respects, the notches for the levellers are misaligned and have to be opened up (see photos).



Separating the levellers from the reflectors is quite fiddly. It is a sort of ball and socket arrangement and care must be taken to avoid breaking the U shaped plastic socket.
The beams had to be adjusted lower by quite a long way. Curiously the dip beam pattern has a flat top without a noticeable kick-up on the nearside. However the result was worth it as I can now see where I am going!