[jayc]

Has anyone attempted (re)calibrating headlights at home ? Just checking for best practices & things to avoid. I believe the manual has some info but just want to know whether anyone actually tried it themselves than at service centre.

Last winter, I regularly got flashed at by other drivers so thinking of adjusting low beams slightly lower.

 

[BimbleEV]

Recent software update must have set my headlights to minimum as I could only see about 5m!

Sat in car park which was fairly flat pressed the button and the headlights self leveled. I could adjust each side separately but it looked fine to me so just left them as is. No flashing from oncoming drivers yet.

 

[CoWplagued]

I had the opposite, mine got tilted right up and I suddenly started getting flashed by EVERY oncoming car.
5 minutes in a garage that does MOT's is the right way to adjust them, but essentially they should be level, so find somewhere flat and level with a wall, drive up to the wall then back away. The light should not travel up or down the wall. You can have your curb side light slightly higher, but don't do that if you're heading to europe any time soon

 

[Lukievdb]

I have a service centre appointment next Monday to adjust the headlights that seem to have moved into a default LHD setup after they had to change a frunk wiring harness to fix a faulty GPS unit.
Last winter I didn't have any people flashing at me; these days even high-sitting lorry drivers are apparently blinded!

 

[Odinias]

I had the same issue since the last update. My lights were far too high and I was constantly getting flashed at by oncoming drivers. I adjusted the headlights myself but have no idea if it's correct or not. Just went with an educated guess to the correct level. So far not had anyone flashing me and I can see far enough ahead so I'll leave it as is for now. When I need to take it to service then I'll mention it.

 

[EarlyDays]

Mine often seem to go high after a software update. Just going into the adjustment menu triggers a levelling routine that sorts it out for me.

 

[Lukievdb]

It would be nice to have that procedure documented in the User Manual...
Talking about leveling, the Model 3 must have a self-leveling system to cater for different combinations of person/cargo loads. Otherwise it couldn't have passed European laws that say there must be either manual or automatic means to change the beams up or down for that purpose.

 

[PaulD]

Mine often seem to go high after a software update. Just going into the adjustment menu triggers a levelling routine that sorts it out for me.

I often used to experience headlight issues after an update. Since I started to do a full reset after every update I’ve not experienced any headlight issues. Might be worth trying a full reset before adjusting the headlights?

 

[jayc]

I often used to experience headlight issues after an update. Since I started to do a full reset after every update I’ve not experienced any headlight issues. Might be worth trying a full reset before adjusting the headlights?

Any idea what type of settings we lose after a reset ?

 

[Odinias]

I had an update (2020.40.9) a couple of days ago and once again it reverted my headlights to a really high position. I had to manually readjust them so that they don't blind oncoming traffic. If this is going to happen with every update then it's going to be rather annoying.

 

[PhilW]

I have to reset mine regularly. I had not made the connection between that and updates. I just thought bumps in the road got them out of sync.
It is very easy through the menu and let it do its routine. I do it facing a wall on level ground in the evening. This allows me to see the before and after and gives me an idea of what looks right. I would have also thought the car would need level ground but there is nothing in the manual to suggest this is needed.

 

[PaulD]

Any idea what type of settings we lose after a reset ?

I don't appear to lose any settings; everything remains as per my user selection. But the reset seems to avoid me having difficulties with such things as headlight adjustment. However, that may of course be that I wouldn't have had any problems anyway, although I did before I started doing the full resets (reboots)!

 

[Lukievdb]

My visit to the SC turned out to be a bit of a waste of time. Job was done in 10 minutes, no explanation as to why these lights get out of alignment. I mentioned this thread that seems to indicate software upgrades are a major suspect. No comments on that, really.
According to the alignment tool everything is within spec now. Let's see what's happening on the next upgrade...

 

[jayc]

I have to reset mine regularly. ...

Are you referring to the factory reset option under service menu or just soft reboot by holding down both scroll wheels together ?

 

[Dave W]

Noticed mine had gone out of alignment too, every car flashed me when I was driving in the dark the other day.

Must have been from a software update, as when I did the auto levelling last time, the flashing stopped. Posted the question elsewhere and someone else also replied to state theirs had reset, they think it was a couple of releases back, I've not done a lot of night driving of late, so hard to know when it reverted.

 

[PhilW]

Are you referring to the factory reset option under service menu or just soft reboot by holding down both scroll wheels together ?

The reset in the service menu.