tuomopalo

I have a problem with the Intelligent Light System (ILS) not working.

When I start the car the lights don't search the position and the high beams doesn't activate automatically. When I turn the fog lights only the left light repositions but not the right one. The car instrument cluster shows the light symbol with an A in it like it those when ILS is active but the ILS does not function. Manually the high beams work but not automatically, also tested when driving on dark roads with no road lights. No dirt on the windshield blocking the ILS camera either, tried cleaning it. Sometimes before in heavy snow I had the error message pop up that says ILS is inactive (because of the heavy snow but ILS has reactivated later when the weather cleared up) but no such error code appears now either.

Does anyone no what could be the problem when the ILS is not working but no error codes appears in the instrument cluster.

The car is a Mercedes W212 E220 CDI 2014 facelift.

S. Madman

Quick question, why does this have a poll?

KEY08

The fog light is a higher illumination of the left rear tail light. The headlights don’t do anything.

S. Madman

Are you in the US? Because in the US that feature is not enabled, it has to be to coded in.

The same guy that did my pre facelift ILS did the ones on this forum for the facelifted ones.

KEY08

Not sure I understand the exact issue here, but the Auto high beam does not need to be coded to engage. It’s a normal option with the full lighting package.

decorily

In Europe the front lights do adapt.

S. Madman

He was asking for ILS.

Well he is newbie so we never hear from him again.

KEY08

^ Oh yeah, my bad...

LILBENZ230

I love the poll options. ILS or W212.

I can't imagine the car having a problem with this system and not throwing some kind of error.

tuomopalo

Yes good question, my first post and somehow I managed to make a poll by mistake, don't ask how. Tried removing it but I didn't figure out how. Sorry.

tuomopalo

Im not in the US, yes its a european registered car so the feature is enabled. The thing is that one of the headlights re position when I turn the fog lights on but not the other one.

tuomopalo

Ofcourse I will answer. Will post the solution if I can locate the problem.

tuomopalo

Sorry made the poll by mistake, I don't know how, but I managed to make one by mistake, couldn't figure out how to remove it either.

The problem is that when I have the ILS on and the light symbol with an A shows up, it don't work, its like I still would drive in manual mode without the ILS. A good question is why no error codes don't show up.

bmwpowere36m3

Do you mean messages in the cluster or actual codes from scanning the vehicle? If you scanned the car for codes, what scanner did you use?

pierrejoliat

Don't worry about it, welcome to the forum! It always helps out if we know your location if you wouldn't mind ? many here have upgraded to "full ILS activation" which is not sold in the US.

So you have a 2014 E350 with the LED lighting package and the lights work fine on manual low beam and high beam, but when you turn on the auto high beams they are not functioning?

tuomopalo

I read the fault codes today with the Delphi program, it actually found a fault code for right headlight, unfortunately the program wasn't able to identify the code for some reason. On Monday I will try to run it with a Bosch fault code reader if that one isn't able to read the fault code either I will take it to a Mercedes dealership to read the fallout code.

Still no error code appears in the instrument cluster. Like I said sometimes before in heavy snow I had the error message pop up that says ILS is inactive (because of the heavy snow but ILS has reactivated later when the weather cleared up) but no such error code appears now either. Its like the ILS would function normally but it don't.

Will post when I figure out what fault code it is.


Thank you!

Yes of course, I'm based in Finland, the car is originally and bought and registered in Germany. It was imported to Finland and registered here in 2016, I bought it in 2018. So the headlights follow the EU regulations and has the optional ILS lighting package from factory.

Yes, the lights work fine on manual low beam and high beam, but when you turn on the auto high beams they are not functioning.

pierrejoliat

I designed a distillation column for ethanol for ST1 in Finland, We also worked on a joint venture in Italy for a ethanol plant, but that one got bought out by local electric company. My favorite AK47 comes from Sako! Anyhow, I am guessing but likely your headlight bezel is stuck, either a motor failure or flap failure, in the old xenon lights, they used flaps to block the beam from oncoming traffic, in the new LED's I believe they move the whole inside bezel around. yours is either stuck or broken. As I mentioned, ours in the US was a greatly reduced functioning of your Euro ILS, some here have modified theirs to function like yours do. When you start it up do the headlights do a little dance on the garage wall?

LILBENZ230

He said that they do not do the calibration motions at startup. Something definitely off, might need to hook up a more advanced scanner. Even though only one of my headlights was damaged in the deer incident, the water intrusion into the control module on that side caused all functions to stop working. But I did get errors in the cluster about adaptive high beam assist plus being unavailable, then a series of check low-beam/marker light messages.

pierrejoliat

Ah, I missed that, In yours, do the whole internal bezels move or is it like the xenons where the lens moves? I would imagine they did away with the flap blockers in the LED's?

LILBENZ230

It has what appears to be 2 projectors per side. The outside ones move side-to-side and up/down. The inside projectors move up-down.

Here is a good video showing the functions of my headlights now that the full ILS is unlocked. At 4-5 seconds you can see the startup motion.

tuomopalo

Okay, very interesting! Glad you like the Sako! You know Finland quite well then, I have only visited the US once

Yes. I actually have two w212, one from 2011 pre facelift with the xenon adaptive high beam assists (with the flaps to block the beam from oncoming traffic) but that works fine. The other (that car this thread is about with the problem) w212 from 2014 facelift has the newer LED ILS with the LED diodes doing the job.

Okay didn't know before I started this thread that the US models were greatly reduced in functioning from our Euro ILS.

I'll post a video on it right away.

tuomopalo

Here is one video when I turn on the high beams manually, both headlights works fine.

tuomopalo

Here is another video when I start up the car, like you see only the left headlight repositions. The interesting thing is that one time when I started the car only the right headlight repositioned, didn't unfortunately get that on video, and often both headlights reposition, its like it wouldn't be an ongoing problem, it just occurs like every fourth or fifth time I start the car.

tuomopalo

Here is a third video when I put the fog lights one, here only the left repositions, but not the right, that happens every time, the right headlight never repositions.

LILBENZ230

That is correct operation for these.