UK Xenon Headlight question & HBA is cool.

[NPickles]

Does anyone know what the inside bulb on a Xenon headlight is used for. From what I can see it has a regular halogen bulb in it and the dip & main beam all seem to come out of the outer light in the headlamp unit.

It's not the fog lights as they are lower down in the bumper and no matter what position the light switch is in I can't get the inner light to illuminate, day or night.

For those of you in the 'States where legislation doesn't allow the HBA feature, having driven my first long trip in the proper dark the other night it is really cool, especially when following a car and getting the tunnel effect following the car in front. You don't know what you are missing out on.

One criticism I had of my last car, a Lexus RX, was that the cut off for the Xenon headlights was too harsh, you had the road ahead illuminated for 30 yards or so on dip beam then total darkness beyond that with virtually no light bleed. With the HBA on the F15 the left hand high beam is on most of the time and the right hand one dances all over the road avoiding oncoming traffic on motorways. Get onto a smaller A road and following another car you get the tunnel effect where the car in front is in a blacked out square that stops them being dazzled but you have both your high beams on so excellent visibility. Great feature BMW and very

Just need to find the correct coding for the F15 for Auto HBA on all the time instead of having to turn it on each time.

[plob]

I think the inside lights on the Xenon setup are just cosmetic. They have a bulb behind them to just provide enought light for people to see it is a BMW (in case the corona rings haven't told them that already).
AFAIK, they don't have a Xenon bulb behind them and will not light up even on high beam (apart from the small bulb behind them).

On the LED lights, all 4 headlights are operative. Each of them is split into an upper and lower half. The 4 upper halves all come on for low beam, whilst both the upper and lower halves then come on when you switch to high beam. As you say, that's when the fun starts as all these beams then start to dance around on the back roads.

I've just ordered a dash cam and hope to capture it so people can properly see how this works. It really is a cool feature

[Baunton]

Originally Posted by plob

I think the inside lights on the Xenon setup are just cosmetic. They have a bulb behind them to just provide enought light for people to see it is a BMW (in case the halo rings haven't told them that already).
AFAIK, they don't have a Xenon bulb behind them and will not light up even on high beam (apart from the small bulb behind them).

On the LED lights, all 4 headlights are operative. Each of them is split into an upper and lower half. The 4 upper halves all come on for low beam, whilst both the upper and lower halves then come on when you switch to high beam. As you say, that's when the fun starts as all these beams then start to dance around on the back roads.

I've just ordered a dash cam and hope to capture it so people can properly see how this works. It really is a cool feature

Hi plob; WRT dash cam...which model are you going for. Are you doing the install your self?

[plob]

Hi mate
I went with the Blackvue DR650GW two channel unit in the end. Although there are reports of some pixellation and a purple tint in the corner of the screen, I reckon it looks pretty good and the software appears to be the best I have seen.

A mate of mine is a BMW master technician and he has agreed to fit it for me (for a curry and a couple of pints of course) and he reckons it is pretty straightforward. He seems to think he can pick up switched/permanent live connections near to the courtesy light. When he fits it, I'll take photos and share what he does.

He thinks that the hardest part is passing the cable through the rear tailgate conduit. Again, I'll let you know how I go on.
I don't know how long it will take for the camera to arrive as I've only just ordered it and they seem to be in short supply at the moment.