D4 high-beam alignment

My D4 (Feb 2010 build, May delivery) with xenon headlights, came complete with the infill H7 halogen possum lights. Noticed this "feature" on the first night drive home from Sydney to the Hunter Valley.
Same test results on the garage door as everyone else too.

Replaced the H7 halogen bulbs with a H7 55W 6000k Xenon bulb kit. Much improved spread. Actually, it has resulted in an enormus spead of light!

The 'bead' xenon bulb where the gas is ignited is about 7mm further forward in the light when compared to the halogen bulb. No longer do I get the distinct possum light band. Now it is fully diffused in all directions & has made an impressive difference.
No joking...the light now spreads left & right, like a fog light, illuminating like day for 15~20m. And it still sends light skyward, so I still get to search for drop bears...
And best of all, no dark spots anywhere!

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Originally Posted by Duck's Guts

Replaced the H7 halogen bulbs with a H7 55W 6000k Xenon bulb kit. Much improved spread. Actually, it has resulted in an enormus spead of light!

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My plan too but once the aim is fixed. I might even try to get 3000K to improve dust and fog penetration.
The HID kits certainly generate heaps more light than halogens.

This is a great idea. I have noticed some black patches, with my D4 halogens definitely pointing high, although not as bad as some have reported.

Do you mind me asking, did you go with a high quality kit or an ebay/chinese import?

It was an eBay/chinese job. Seller was in Aust & had Aust stock. Seller name was "celli_electronics". Quick delivery. I'm happy.
Ballasts incorporated "integrated canbus & warning light cancellation technology". So no error codes.

Remember the ones I have are H7 55W HID's at 6000k colour. They have a noticable blue tint to their light colour output compared to the factory HID's at 5000k colour.

PS. I am not related to the eBay seller what-so-ever.

This sounds like an interesting solution to the problem. Duck's Guts, are you able to post some photos of the beam pattern that your lights now throw onto a wall from 15 - 30m away? A regular point-and-shoot camera will take this photo fine just shooting through the windscreen without need for a tripod. Make sure the flash is turned off and snap a few in case you get some blurry ones from camera shake. I just rested my hands on the steering wheel and it seemed to work OK, even from 40m when using a pale wall.

Filling in the missing parts of the beam pattern by moving the light source forward by 7mm raises an interesting question: perhaps the high beam reflectors were originally designed to use zenon bulbs, but were replaced with halogens that are too short to match the focus of the reflector?

In the meantime, no real progress to report at my end. As of a couple of weeks ago, LR are still waiting for a response from UK about the ADR compliance issue. I'll let you know when I hear more.

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Originally Posted by Duck's Guts

It was an eBay/chinese job. Seller was in Aust & had Aust stock. Seller name was "celli_electronics". Quick delivery. I'm happy.
Ballasts incorporated "integrated canbus & warning light cancellation technology". So no error codes.

Remember the ones I have are H7 55W HID's at 6000k colour. They have a noticable blue tint to their light colour output compared to the factory HID's at 5000k colour.

PS. I am not related to the eBay seller what-so-ever.

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I have the possum hunters as well. Can I ask what sort of dollars are involved in the conversion ?

Ok. Just found them on Ebay. Is that $99.00 odd dollars for the complete kit? Yes it is . Certainly worth taking a chance with them.

All these posts make very interesting reading. I have a 2010 RRS 3.0V6TTD. I've reported my possum lights to my dealer who adjusted them down so I only had 20m light from the low beam and the halogen lights were still too high. I certainly intend contacting Customer Care to add to the growing list of concerned owners. Perhaps forum members should contact motoring journalists including Jeremy Clarkson (a Range Rover fan) from Top Gear. It seems to me the more the wheel squeaks, the sooner a fix will be found. Replacing the halogen globe with Xenon lights should not be necessary as this so called characteristic design/manufacturing fault is LR's responsibility. Owner's should not have to rectify something that is obviously (to us) not right. How many of these representatives of LR actually own or drive D4s or RRSs? And how many of them have driven one at night on country roads, not freeways, where maximum illumination of the road ahead, not the tree tops, is a necessity.

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Originally Posted by ADMIRAL

Ok. Just found them on Ebay. Is that $99.00 odd dollars for the complete kit? Yes it is . Certainly worth taking a chance with them.

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You hit the nail on the head....

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Originally Posted by Beamin

This sounds like an interesting solution to the problem. Duck's Guts, are you able to post some photos of the beam pattern that your lights now throw onto a wall from 15 - 30m away?

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I'll have a go tonight as soon as I've put the billy lids in bed...