[liquidlynx]

Hi,
So after a long trip with the treg and seeing how absolutely terrible (dangerous) my 06 V8 tregs headlights are I am curious what the best option / suggestion for upgrading anyone has?
I have a light bar going into the bottom grill but need to sort out this serious lack of light. Anyone else experience the same issues with the T2?

 

[Yeti]

If they are the original bulbs they may need replaced even if you are still getting light from them. You figure at this point yours would be 9 years old. Replace the bulbs and report back. There is a thread already going with this issue. Check that one out and see what all that member has done so far. Are the Xenon or Halogen?

 

[noobytoogy]

If halogens, simply convert to 55 watt HIDs.

Takes an hour with a good kit.

Otherwise replace the xenon bulbs [they degrade after two or three years depending on usage time] with genuine Philips or Osram bulbs.

 

[MJHandy]

Also, your lenses may need polished too. There are kits that make this easy.

 

[lml999]

If they are the original bulbs they may need replaced even if you are still getting light from them. You figure at this point yours would be 9 years old. Replace the bulbs and report back. There is a thread already going with this issue. Check that one out and see what all that member has done so far. Are the Xenon or Halogen?

Thanks for the pointer to the other thread.

Note, however, that this is work in progress and the OP of the other thread has not yet come up with a diagnosis/solution to his concern regarding dim low beams...

 

[noobytoogy]

Also, your lenses may need polished too. There are kits that make this easy.

x2

 

[imquattro]

I'm still diagnosing this very issue.

How could a survey be posted to the forum, just for curiosity's sake, to poll how T1 & T2 owners feel whether their lights are bright enough or not?

 

[Fonzi]

My headlights are pretty faded and I don't have problems with them. Granted I put in a new bulb every few months because they burn out so quickly from how much I drive. I also turn my fog lights on every time I drive at night.

Get LED D1S's and H11's. That's what I recently did. The H11 are the fogs, make sure you get resistors to get rid of the error message. Also they run 100x cooler so the headlights aren't baking something every time you turn them on.

 

[lml999]

I'm still diagnosing this very issue.

How could a survey be posted to the forum, just for curiosity's sake, to poll how T1 & T2 owners feel whether their lights are bright enough or not?

Not a bad idea. If you do set up a survey, isolate out the weather factor in your questions. Rain will dramatically reduce all headlamp performance.

Oh, and by the way, you might also want to ask a local VW service advisor if they get this complaint often...they may also have a diagnosis for you...

 

[imquattro]

My headlights are pretty faded and I don't have problems with them. Granted I put in a new bulb every few months because they burn out so quickly from how much I drive. I also turn my fog lights on every time I drive at night.

Get LED D1S's and H11's. That's what I recently did. The H11 are the fogs, make sure you get resistors to get rid of the error message. Also they run 100x cooler so the headlights aren't baking something every time you turn them on.

So wait, you installed LED D1S's? Can you provide some more info on that?

 

[ArgonSr]

My headlights are pretty faded and I don't have problems with them. Granted I put in a new bulb every few months because they burn out so quickly from how much I drive. I also turn my fog lights on every time I drive at night.

Get LED D1S's and H11's. That's what I recently did. The H11 are the fogs, make sure you get resistors to get rid of the error message. Also they run 100x cooler so the headlights aren't baking something every time you turn them on.

And where you bought them?? Thank you.

 

[Fonzi]

And where you bought them?? Thank you.

Bulbs: http://www.amazon.com/SNGL®-Bright-...e=UTF8&qid=1451422951&sr=8-2&keywords=d1s+led

Warning cancel: http://www.amazon.com/Kensun-Comput...e=UTF8&qid=1451422951&sr=8-5&keywords=d1s+led

It's a weird install because you need to find a place for them but the advertised lumens are 9k lm.

Ill post photo's when I get the chance, but if you're willing to spend the money I'd say go for it and the led's last very long.

Not my photo but very similar, the left is normal xenon and right is led.

The reason I actually got these was because the normal D1S's I kept getting were almost melting the inside of my headlights. These leds barely emit heat, but the resistors and warning cancelers might get hot so store them in a cool place.

There are some cheaper ones on ebay but they're not as bright and there's a 50/50 chance they'll work or you'll be getting a new set every half year or so.
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...RC1.A0.H0.Xd1s+led.TRS0&_nkw=d1s+led&_sacat=0
Warning cancel: http://www.ebay.com/itm/2x-No-Error...ash=item3f581deef6:g:BA8AAOSwpdpVaSH2&vxp=mtr

 

[ArgonSr]

Bulbs: Amazon.com: SNGL® Super Bright 90W 9000lm LED Headlight Conversion Kit - Adjustable Focus Length - Replaces Halogen & Xenon HID Kit / Bulbs - D1S / D1R / D2C / D2S / D2R / D3S / D4R / D4S - 6000K White: Automotive

Warning cancel: http://www.amazon.com/Kensun-Comput...e=UTF8&qid=1451422951&sr=8-5&keywords=d1s+led

It's a weird install because you need to find a place for them but the advertised lumens are 9k lm.

Ill post photo's when I get the chance, but if you're willing to spend the money I'd say go for it and the led's last very long.

Not my photo but very similar, the left is normal xenon and right is led.

The reason I actually got these was because the normal D1S's I kept getting were almost melting the inside of my headlights. These leds barely emit heat, but the resistors and warning cancelers might get hot so store them in a cool place.

There are some cheaper ones on ebay but they're not as bright and there's a 50/50 chance they'll work or you'll be getting a new set every half year or so.
d1s led | eBay
Warning cancel: 2X No Error No Flickering Warning Error Decoder Relay for LED Headlight D1S D2S | eBay

Just read your post and looked at the links. Also read some of the reviews on the LED kit. Did you have to cut into the factory wiring like the person with the C6 Corvette did? According to that review they have the same D1S HID bulbs and he had to cut into the factory wiring harness to make the lights work? Essentially saying that these are not plug-n-play for the "low beam" HID bulbs.

Here is a quote copied from his review:

"(2) I do NOT recommend the use of these type of LED bulbs on ANY factory HID bulb replacements. I bought a pair of D1S HID replacement for my 2008 Corvette Z06, as they are also advertised as plug and play. These kits do NOT come with any adaptor plugs, so you are going to have to cut into the factory wiring, and splice before the HID ballasts. I did NOT expect this, as I did not want to devalue my car by chopping up the factory wiring. I am not pleased, given that this kit comes with no adaptor plugs and the connection leads are pair small gage red & black wires. I measured for adequate room for the heat sinks and LED driver box module, but did NOT expect the lack of adaptor plugs, given the high quality level of the H9 bulb kit. I bought the SNGL kits for higher quality than the $89 or $100 competing kits on Amazon for the same bulb type. The seller tried to identify an adaptor plug that would allow me to retain the factory wiring. There may be something out there, but neither of us could find it. The seller did provide a full refund and refunded the shipping that the Amazon fulfillment center normally does not do. I think that these LEDs would have outperformed my 35W factory HIDs by a wide margin, but I am not willing to modify the factory wiring. So if you decided to try, find adaptor wires or be prepared to splice into the factory wiring."

If you would be willing to do a little write up with corresponding photos explaining exactly what you had to do to install them that would be great. I'm sure there are a lot of people that may shy away from this particular kit if you do actually have to splice into the factory wiring harness versus having a true "plug-n-play" application.

Otherwise this kit looks good promising.
Thank you.
ArgonSr.

 

[ArgonSr]

Also what "size" bulb kit did you pick? Just looking for a clarification. They have a number of different options and want to make sure the correct kit is picked.

Again Thank you.
ArgonSr

 

[imquattro]

Also subscribed as I'm pursuing a fix for this issue in another thread.

 

[ShadowImg]

Don't try to use LED replacements - the lumen outputs are 'theoretical' and the optics on them are no good. I can refer you here: LED vs HID and tell you that Matt knows what he's talking about.

I read through all of the discussions on the poor headlight output which is really surprising, given how impressive my Treg is in light output.

I haven't seen clear answers to 2 things, one of which has been asked several times:

1) Are the optics out from the bulb clear? If they aren't, you aren't going to fix it with any bulb/etc. You need clear optics, and more than likely you need to replace the units if they have fogged/clouded/scratched. You could try to polish them, but lens creation and polishing is not a trivial feat.

2) Has anyone actually put a meter on their bulb socket, ballast, etc and checked actual voltages and currents? I haven't seen actual voltage/current numbers anywhere. If you have a bad relay, bad ground, corrosion, failing ballasts, etc you should be able to see it this way. You can step back through the circuit and find exactly the point which has failed.

Properly functioning D1S HIDs are *plenty* bright, there is no design failure involved despite a lot of groaning about "poorly designed lighting".

 

[lml999]

Properly functioning D1S HIDs are *plenty* bright, there is no design failure involved despite a lot of groaning about "poorly designed lighting".

Well put. I'm concerned that the other posters are chasing solutions without identifying the root cause of their problem.

Some time with a meter diagnosing the problem would be well spent.

 

[ShadowImg]

Also for imquattro - yours clearly are in a failure state. It's not a matter of the light output on the low beams you have being low, it looks like your low beams essentially don't work. The amount of light output you showed in the pictures looked roughly like what DRLs should be producing. That's not how they're designed to work for sure, but I couldn't say what the failure is specifically - I'm guessing it's in one of the two areas mentioned above.

 

[imquattro]

I feel light the two lighting issue threads should be merged.
I also agree that further diagnosis needs explored.
The challenge is in the design of the headlights. Most vehicles provide (some only laughably) access to the bulbs and wiring under the hood while in their installed positions. The Touaregs not so much. Once the assembly is installed, wiring access is quite difficult -near impossible but not completely I suppose.
Possibly accessible if the fender liners were removed, but most likely a patch cable will have to be made to provide access to testing the headlight assemblies while they're attached (electrically) to the vehicle.
Truly there is an issue with something, my wife's halogen's are brighter and many have already noted how those are inferior to the HID setups.
I brought home the scan tool and will run some test tonight including a reset of the headlight alignment.

 

[ShadowImg]

Testing the HID will be interesting. If you know your way around a multimeter, you should be able to do it without much special access. If you can get to the ballast and the bulb socket both, you should be golden.

I would test first on the primary side (towards the battery) and measure your voltage/current draw from the ballast. This will tell you if the problem is in your general electrical supply in the vehicle, bad alternator, bad ground, etc. If that part tests OK, then you get into a funny spot.

Honestly, if you get there, I'd probably not mess around with the ballast, I'd get a new known good one and swap it out and just test it that way. If you REALLY want to prove it out without buying a new ballast first, you're going to need to really know what you're doing. The startup voltage coming out of that ballast is going to be up to like 30kV. That's no messing around - that'll go through air pretty well. You need to get the bulb lit before you attach it to the meter and see the output.

If any of this sounds at all questionable to you, don't mess with the ballast output, just get a replacement and test it that way.