Headlight Question's

Hi All,

I have an N reg 1996 Discovery V8i ES (Discovery I ?).
I am horrified at how bad the headlights are on this car, when driving on my local unlit roads (in and around Epping Forest) I have to use main beam just to be able to see the road ahead, with the obvious problem when faced by an oncoming car of dropping to dipped beam and being nearly blind. (My company car uses seperate 55W dipped and main bulbs and so gives almost blinding light in comparasion). I know that uprated bulbs may help and will be trying them soon, but I have also seen on here several mentions of upgrading from 200 to 300 headlights, now being a total Land Rover newbie I would like to ask if my vehicle is classified as a 200 or a 300 or is it a V8i (as the 200 and 300 always seem to be mentioned in the same breath as a diesel). I believe my vehicle may be a 'facelifted' version of the original Disco I as it looked different to my neighbours K reg one before he sold it.
Sorry if these questions have been answered several times before but with this 200 V's 300 query i'm not sure what threads I should be looking at to help me 'solve' this problem. One other thing to say is that my vehicle doesn't have a 'nudge bar' on the front, so adding extra driving lamps to suppliment the main beam (as I believe its illegal to add extra lights to the dipped beam?) is not a viable option at this stage. If the only realistic option (short of replacing the complete front end in an upgrade) is to use extra power bulbs, which ones are recommended to work with the standard wiring loom? and give me a better view of the dark road ahead?

Regards

mi5

I use the extra bright bulbs on my td5 as its lights are crap as well! i cant remember the specks but they came from halfords and were labled as high intensity bulbs. they just poped in with no problems and definatly make a difference especialy on dip. there the type that give a blue glow like you seen in hundreds of vaxhall corsas in mcdonalds carparks everywhare!

Hi Mi5

First disco's were fitted with 200tdi (1989 to 94) or the 3.5 V8 with carbs (1989 to 90/1) when the V8 engine got fuel injection, all had very poor lighting, the headlights where from the Maestro Van 'I believe'.

In 1994 the disco had a face lift and was fitted with the 300tdi engine and from then all D1 disco's have been unofficialy called 300 series.

I never thought my 300 series lights had any problem, but I have now fitted 50% upgraded bulbs and these give a longer distance main and a wider dipped beam.

Some say that to fit the D2 headlamps that were fitted to the first D2's (that's the ones with the black masking on the inside of the glass which gives the appearance of a round lamp) is a good upgrade also.

While I like the bulbs that give a blue tinge to the white light and would have them my self but I would have to change the bulbs in my two spots lamps and the fog lamps to match. expensive.

But more importantly, will the car pass the MOT because my side light bulbs are LED and although they have a bright white light they also have a very faint tinge of blue and my discovery would have failed the MOT if I hadn't change the LED's back to the bulbs on the spot.

According to the tester all front lights should be white.

Thats all and regards.

Back lights from Maestro van, headlights were from Sherpa

Davec said:

Back lights from Maestro van, headlights were from Sherpa

Click to expand...

I wasn't to sure. Your right of course Davec .. Just testing..

I bought the approx £10 Xenon filled ones off of fleabay.

Massively better light.

Splendid buy and went through the MOT no problems.

Although someone did point out I think on a previous thread that you can convert to a full xenon HID system for approx. £100 these days.

That'll be £100 + each side I think. Theres a grey area still with HID replacement lights for road use if there legal when retrofitted to vehicles that are not designed for them, something thing about cars must be fitted self levelling suspension.

There's a lot on the webb about this subject but as I will not be fitting these lights I let this info go over the top of me.

For replacement bulbs go to Car Bulbs from Power Bulbs - upgrade xenon car bulbs, headlight bulbs, autobulbs and autolamps from Philips, Osram and GE I ordered mine at 3:30pm and they were delivered at 08:30am the next day by the postman.

Regards

Hi, on my ancient (1990) the lights were awful, as suggested above the xenon bulbs on the auction site are good, may also be worth just getting new lamps, that made a big dif to mine as the silver reflective material had started to go brown in my old ones. (Hint - always ensure the back cover is on good, cos they dont like water so I have found!!) Its been through a MOT a month ago with them, no probs not even a mention. I believe it is the full xenon replacement kit that is an issue - it does need self levelling suspension or you will get a black mark from the grim reaper at MOT time

It could be your headlights need adjusting.

Somewhere on google you can get the DIY headlight balancing guide to MOT standard, I know that my lights at a certain distance need to be 5 bricks high on the wall at the end of my lane to be correct.

Could also be its not been clicked in properly and is shining too low.

Thanks for all the info. looks like I will be getting some 'extra power' bulbs ASAP and hope that helps (cheapest option first ). If not maybe i#ll see if the D2 lights fit my facelifted D1 without too much modding required.