Before anyone quotes the Haynes Manual, yes I used both the Haynes and Chiltons manual to aim my headlights.

The problem is that my headlights are too high no matter how low I try to aim them. The outer screws function as follows (loosen lowers the beam, tightening raises it). I've noticed that over the past six months more and more cars have been flashing their brights at me on the highway, and I wondered why since I wasn't going that slow. Turns out my lowbeams are as high as highbeams!

I've turned the vertical adjustment bolts as far out as they will go, but the beam is still too high on both sides.

Any suggestions on what I should do? At first I thought that someone must have hit my bumper up front and pushed my headlights up. But the lights would have been high immediately, not gradually as has occured on my car.

The funny thing is that a few months ago I was adjusting my lights and was able to aim them TOO low! They were too high to begin with, I adjusted it. Then they were too low so I adjusted it again to be "just right." Now they are just too high, even at the extreme range of "low" adjustment.

 

It sounds like your headlight unit is moving up werds gradually, defiying gravity . I whould remove the headlights and visualy check the units out and see if you can visualy see the problem. You may be able to push the headlights up and down with a little nudge, this whould meen that the headlight mount is defective or something. I honestly have no qlue why this is happing, but try what I said..

Another idea is your grill had somehow come loose from where it clips in and is possibly putting extra strain on your headlights and then the force of the wind is causing the grill to bend up and as a result your headlights are moving up to. Just something to think about, although the idea is really far fetched.

Let me know if you figure something out, maybe DBM will know the exact problem?

 

 

I had the same thing happen to me, I even got into a fight over it, this guy couldn't understand that I wasn't flashing my high beams at him, nothing happened to me but I got his *** thrown into jail.

Your support is probably worn out, mine was, so what I did was that I got a small rectangular piece of wood and slid it between the light housing and the plastic support located right behind it. That has keept my lights at the right height and I haven't had any problems since.

Good luck!!

 

1. Find level ground with a decent sized wall (prefereably painted white)
2. With a tape measure, measure out and park your car so that the headlamp lenses are about 25 feet from the wall.
3. Measure the distance from the ground to the center of your headlamps. (There should be a small dot on the lens of the headlamps that helps you find the exact center location of the bulb inside) Mark this measured distance on the wall with a marker so that it is visible to you.
4. Subtract 4 inches from this distance. This will give you a value less than what you had just measured (duh). Mark this on the wall also.
5. Since HB1 lamps give that central hotspot, aim your headlamps (vertical adjustment screw), so that the top part of the hotspot touches the second line you had marked off on the wall.

What you have done in effect, is to properly align the beam of the headlamps to the proper downwards angle. If you feel as the though you are losing too much far illumination, adjust the lamps after performing this procedure to your liking.

 

He said he's done that a dozen or so times already.

 

Did that already. My problem is that there is not enough downward adjustment on the headlamp to achieve proper aiming. I parked next to a 4th gen 97SE today and compared roughly the angle of the headlight assembly. Doesn't look out of place, nor does my bumper look pushed in.

The strange thing is that I've adjusted my headlamps about half a dozen times already (after changing bulbs, lowering, etc..) and have had a full range of adjustments from too high to too low, but always enough "range" on the adjustment screws to aim the lights properly. But this time, nada.

 

What you are saying is that you have tried his aiming method and are unable to lower the lamps enough to get below that "lower" line on the wall?

What type of bulbs are you using? In this case, I would suspect that either the bulbs are of poor quality (filament location should be closely held tolerance - any large enough shift on focal point can negatively affect the beam pattern). Another thing that might have happened is a shift on the headlamp boss on the adjustment screw.

I've noticed in the past that adjusting one screw (vertical for example) has an effect on the horizontal position.

 

Yes, I can't get the highlights any lower than they are right now, which is at the extreme "low" end of the adjustment bolt.

I am using Sylvania Cool Blues (like my sig says). I don't think its the bulbs since I've aimed the headlights fine with these bulbs before.

What is the headlamp boss? I know the adjustment screws pull or push the plastic clip which holds the headlight assembly to the plastic mount backing. Is that what you are referring to?

 

Perhaps you are working at the wrong end of the car. If the rear of the car becomes lower (weight in trunk? sagging springs?) the headlamp beams aim upward.

 

For lack of better terminalogy, yes, that's what I meant. If your headlamps recieved a large enough impact, it could have "stripped" the threads of the adjustment screw and moved the headlamp. I say this, because, well, I have that very problem on my passenger side headlamp.

Have you actually tried the procedure I had outlined. If not, try and see...it might turn out that with my procedure, you will not need to adjust them quite so low. With HB1s, there will always be glare to oncoming drivers...these are not HB2s.

One final stab...try yanking out the bulbs and sticking them back in...wiggling them so that they seat better...

 

That was so funny I forgot to laugh.....

 

thanks for the helpful suggestions...I will try out your tips tonight.