Highbeams functionality
 

I found the first thing that I genuinely do not like about the 2014 E63... and that's the operation of the highbeams.

I live in a rural area with narrow 2 lane roads infested by deer. Good lighting is literally a life saver.

When you engage the high beams, by pressing the lever forward, it takes approx. 2.5 seconds for them to fully deploy. Which is absurd.

Am I doing something wrong? If you pull the lever (flash to pass) they illuminate immediately.

Another baffling thing is that when driving slowly, the highbeams will not illuminate. I live on a long gravel drive. <15mph is the travel speed. The car will not go to brights.

Am I missing something???

You might have them set them on automatic. If you toggle that off, you should be able to operate them on your own without a delay.

Page 132-135
http://www.mbusa.com/vcm/MB/DigitalA...edan_Wagon.pdf

Thanks for the link. Now I have something to read while waiting for my wagon to appear next year. :y

yeah i found that adaptive hi beam is useless, manual is better

yes i agree totally, i took mine off as they do not come on fast enough and they are they very sensitive to signs and house lights, things like that. its a cool feature but i like manual better. the setting to take it off is in the lighting section of the settings menu on the drivers display.

I live up in the mountains and there are plenty of windy roads with plenty of oncoming cars and wildlife (deer and elk mainly). I've actually been quite impressed with the auto-highbeams so far. I didn't read up on the feature at first, so was a bit surprised to find the lights beams dipping and rising depending on speed and oncoming traffic. However, i've found it to be a really useful feature because before I would have to drive with my hand close to the highbeam stalk ready to toggle them off as soon as I saw oncoming beams around the corners (yes i am that considerate!). Now I don't have to worry so much as the auto-functionality takes care of it.

It's not so fast to turn on the high beams, but the regular lights are very good, and the fire-and-forget nature of the auto feature allows me to keep both hands on the wheel and enjoy the road.

Not sure about the new LED, but I find the pre-LED low beam for the W212 quite poor.

Eventually all LED headlights will self adjust the pattern to not blind oncoming drivers while keeping the high beam on, like that new LED technology shown by Audi a few months ago.

I've read the applicable portion(s)of the manual. A couple of times.

It would appear that the "adapative" functionality (that which royally sucks) is tied to the rotary light switch. No way to disable the setting, other than rotating the light switch to a position other than "Auto."

My original assessment stands: This "feature" makes driving less safe, and is quite frustrating. I know the amount and pattern of light *I* need in a given driving situation. I don't want the car controlling this critical driving aid.

Did you know that if the lights are in Auto mode and the high beams are enabled, it may activate the high beams if it feels the conditions warrant them? But those conditions *DO NOT* include driving <16mph. FFS that is stupid. Give me my control back!

I swear, the HIDs on our '06 W211 are superior in virtually every way to this overly-complex lighting system.

Oh, and one more gripe about the headlights... they cast a weird green tint to the road surface very close to the nose of the car.

As was said you can turn the feature off in the lighting menu and just control the high beams manually, at least that's how it is on my 2012, pretty sure it's the same on the 2014's.

FYI i see not option to turn off the adaptive high beams in the lights section of the settings menu on the 2014 model. Only options I see relate to daytime running lights, interior ambient lighting, and the dash brightness.

When you turn on your rear fog lights your front headlights will stretch more

I hope this helps

I hate all "automatic" stuff on cars... especially the wipers that are supposed to adapt to the rain intensity. They are almost always wrong, either they go like crazy in a slight drizzle or they dont go in a downpoor. I miss a good old "delay" rotatory switch that you adjust and it gives perfect results. Same thing with this gimmicky high beam thing. No mater how well they program the algorythms it will never replace a human brain.

The only good automatic thing I found is the "auto on headlights". It's sad to see a car going down the road with all lights out in the middle of the night and the driver does not notice it, and if you flash your lights they think you are crazy!!! In this situation a light sensor is better than a human brain!

I can't get my brights to even come on period. The only way they work is by pulling back on the stalk rather than pushing. My guess is that the auto function senses some other lights ex : street lights and thinks its a oncoming car.

Now that I'm driving almost entirely in the dark during the week, I thought I'd give the auto function another shot. Used it for more than a week.

To their credit, when they dip or raise, the movement is nearly instantaneous. And they light up the roadway pretty well, especially around turns and over crests in the road.

But, and this is a couple of big but's.... my earlier gripe stands about not being able to quickly demand high beams when the headlight rotary knob is set to auto. There is no friggin reason I should have to wait 2.5 seconds for the illumination boost.

Additionally, I've found a serious problem with relying on the car to sense when to dip the beams... if there are cars on cross streets or driveways waiting to enter the roadway (this is on dark, winding two lane country roads) the sensors cannot detect those drivers. Which means they get blasted by my car's lights. I've received a couple of one finger salutes to emphasize that fact.

The solution is to manipulate the stalk to turn them off. Which really defeats the purpose of the "auto" system. Either the car is controlling the lighting, or I am.

Give me my high beams back while leaving the headlights in auto-on mode!!!


Final grade on the 2014 adaptive high beams: D minus

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I'm pretty sure the delay in the high-beams on first activation is totally related to the radar system initializing. As the beams will automatically dip when detecting to oncoming traffic, it probably needs a minimal amount of time to get it's bearings and ensure that there are no vehicles moving towards you that should not be blinded on initial activation. Might be a slight inconvenience but totally makes sense when you think about it.

There are some things better left to driver judgement... I think that's one of them. In 8-10 years when the sensors go bad, it will be a total nuisance!

I don't think it makes sense to make the "auto on" headlight function totally unusable.

One cannot allow this car to turn on the headlights at sundown or in the rain (as virtually every of other modern car is able to do) and still retain control over the highbeams.

That's a silly trade off. I accept that a car (any car) can easily determine when it's appropriate to activate the headlights. But if I want to turn on the highbeams at low speed or wish to otherwise operate the high beams in a given situation, I must turn the rotary light control to a position other than auto.

I did some experimenting with this.

With the rotary headlight knob set to "Auto," when the rear fog light is engaged, the headlights actually dip. You get a smaller lit area.

Same thing when the rotary knob is on the "On" position.

Last night I had the pleasure of being refreshed in just how bad this auto functionality performs when you need it. I guess it's been quite a while since I drove the E at night.

Very dark night. Low beams on Auto. Two lane rural road. I get to a spot where deer are likely to be found, and I flick the lever... nothing. Dammit. Ease on the brakes, and just as the highbeams finally decide come on, I see a few deer just off to the side. Coulda been ugly.

Stupid, stupid, stupid "feature."

u can run the highbeams manually, just turn off the auto hi beam BS thru the screen....i did the first day i got the car

As mentioned earlier in the thread, this is not possible with the 2014 headlights. The only control is via the rotary knob. The driver either gets full-full-full automatic lighting or manual.

I want to auto-on headlights, but retain manual control over the high beams. Which is simply not possible.

Personally a fan of the auto high beams; only gripe is low speed, below 30km/hr where it is disabled and I need to rotate the dial to manual for our dirt road into home.