Hi fellow sport likers. Although not new to this site this is the first time post from myself. I'm hoping that some one in the know may be able to push me in the right direction. I have read God knows how many post on here about AFS adaptive lighting on the range rover sport, I have a 58 plate TDV8 in white nice eye catcher goes like stink, but is driving me slowly up the wall with these lights, when they work they are great but, in the last week or so they've got into a habit of going thro the calibration dance on initial start up but only going half way thro their dance. That is they don't come back up to their correct height.
They do all the rest of their usual stuff like follow you around bends & such, corner lights come on when they should etc etc. After carefull study of this forum I came to the desision that I need to change the AFS control module behind the fuse box under the glove box, this is not an easy job when you have hands like JCB shovels but no matter the job is done, took nearly all day mind. My problem is I still have the same issue, do I need to have it plugged in to tell the system to tell the car to recognise this new part.
At current I'm in Devon & cornwal & there are some very high cliffs that it may find its self gettin a little too close for comfort. Cheers V frustrated at this time.
Any ideas welcome

The problem is in the headlight itself, sadly. You need new headlights. 2012 SDV6 - it's missing a couple of cylinders
2008 TDV8 - it was a labour of love and is much missed

Thanks for the input , but could you elaborate as to why ya say this.
Up to last week when I had it serviced all was well with the car the main stealer stated that there was a light come on the dash but that was for suspension, apparently it came on 20 mile previous to getting to the stealers, I have yet to see such light.
Could these be connected as obviously height sensors & lighting must at some point be connected via the mystery that is ECU for this that & the other.

You may (or may not) be interested in my posts under "Headlamp Levelling Fault - and possible upgrade?"

However our friend RRSTDV8 perseveres with the simple comment that it's a new headlamp ( or in my case now, possibly two!). Interesting that you have changed the control module with no improvement. Unfortunately this just emphasises that RRSTDV8 is right. Like you however I am trying to avoid the cost of headlamp replacement if it is something else. Looks increasingly likely that I'll end up with 2 new headlamps.
Do you find that the fault can be rectified ( if only till the next time you turn them on) by turning off engine lights etc. maybe even setting the alarm and then starting all over again. I find this works often enough to avoid the expense of replacements for now but come the winter when I'll need them more perhaps I'll wish I had done it in the summer.  Robin
2008 Range Rover Sport TDV8
Gone:
Jaguar S-Type V8 4.2 Sport
MGZTT 190 2.5

The head lights are indeed connected to the ride height system but only once they are up and running. When you first turn on the ignition, the head lights go through a calibration routine (called "dancing" on this forum). If, during this routine, the headlight finds an issue (or thinks there's one) it will park the relevant light at a lower angle than normal. If the fault is with the vertical movement, it will park it slightly lower than normal. If the fault is with the horizontal (swivel) movement then it will park it at a much lower position. This is to prevent glare of oncoming road users.

The problem for us is that you can't buy bits for the headlight (so far as I know anyway) so the only remedy is to replace the whole unit. Been there, done that.

You can buy OEM headlights significantly cheaper than buying from LR themselves. Mine, luckily sourced via a forum member, are from Hella and even have the LR logo on them (although the logo has been disfigured in order to be OEM I guess).

This problem appears to be increasing, presumably because of the age of the earliest AFS equipped vehicles. Whilst a replacement headlight is a big bill item, it would appear that you should get several years use from it. 2012 SDV6 - it's missing a couple of cylinders
2008 TDV8 - it was a labour of love and is much missed

Eaters wrote:

Do you find that the fault can be rectified ( if only till the next time you turn them on) by turning off engine lights etc. maybe even setting the alarm and then starting all over again. I find this works often enough to avoid the expense of replacements for now but come the winter when I'll need them more perhaps I'll wish I had done it in the summer.

Thanks for the response people, I'm actually at the stage where no matter how many times I stop & start they don't relent on me. It's interesting tho that it was normally the near side that occasionally played up but this was only after I had done the snow foam & pressure wash treatment. I found that a couple of days later the issue would disappear. The lights would do their dance & im smiling again. It's like they had died out.
When I took the car to the stealers for the service I asked them not to be too vigorous with the pressure washing as I had just replaced all the lettering with gloss back, looks great by the way & didn't want to have to refit these, no problem the sweet girl said, I'll make sure this is passed onto the wash crew. When we picked the car up all was well as it was bright sunshine, come night time the near side was fine but the off side decided that it was his turn to give me attitude, after thinking OK a couple of days to dry out it'll be fine. No such luck, so I plugged in my code reader in thinking I'll clear the codes, wrong, this just brought the two lights to colaborate with each other & now they are both stuck in the lower position.
So it looks like I'm now scouring the inter web for a couple of light units. .
Thanks again everyone for your input.

Latest update on my headlight issue.
Just dug deep and shelled out £600 for new light unit, it came today, it's now fitted with no effort at all. But there's an issue here I wasn't ready for, ---- wait for, it s still the same as before, so countless swearing & colouring the air blue, I'm no further forward. My thought now is perhaps I need to get the light set up at the steelers with the magic laptop.
I did notice before I fitted the light that the dip beam is pointing as far down as is possible, (I'm assuming for transport reasons) but thought this should correct its self when the ignition and lights were turned on, I was soo wrong on that score.
So whould I be right in thinking that this is a sign that says this light needs setting with the car.
Any thoughts on this whould be well appreciated.

If you have fitted a new Lamp Unit you will have to align the new light manually with the adjusting screws on the rear of the lamp the AFS does not do it for you, that is not how it works if I remember correctly. You should not need a dealer to activate anything either.

Cheers
Col

Thanks for your in put COL but have already tried that, they only adjust a small amount then the screw adjuster just jumps over the thread to say this is limit of adjustment.

I don't suppose by any chance the internal part of the lamp has become disengaged as they are only on a plastic ball and cup, if you take the rear bulb cover off check to see if the reflector part is loose these can be re-engaged if it has. It is only a though as have seen it happen.

Cheers
Col

That's a very good thought COL. I've just taken the lights out again to check & they are both as they should be.
Cheers anyway

I have also read loads of the posts on here after my car failed its MOT today on - "driver side beam too low" - I rarely drive the car (wife does) or I may have noticed.

Anyway, during start up the dance happens (always has as far as know) on both lights with this one difference from what I have read anywhere else:

The driver side does not complete the vertical part (horizontal yes), Passenger side no problems, hopefully is relativity easy to fix.

What is the possible issue and how can I test or identify the issue? There are no errors or warning lights.

Thanks in advance

Hi AJF. Just to make sure I've got this right, your drivers side headlamp ends it's "dance" by pointing about 6 ft in front of the car - yes? If so, this is the same issue discussed on many posts here and mirrors the symptoms I've been having. The best wisdom so far is from RRSTDV8 who says we need to purchase new headlamp(s). However, we have the post from Mark range who has invested in a new headlamp and an AFS module - and still has the problem. @Mark range - is this still the case?

I am currently persevering with the intermittent fault which is mainly on the nearside headlight. If it does not set properly then stopping the car and turning off, waiting about 10 seconds and then restarting - with the lights on "Auto", the dance happens and seems to fix it for now. (By the way, my headlights don't always do the dance - seems to be no rhyme or reason for when they do or do not do it)

Long term I don't know now what to do. Don't relish the idea of spending a couple of grand on new lights and a module if at the end of it, there is no improvement. I'm tempted to take a headlamp to bits and see if I can work out what's going on as there could be a significant earner for anyone who can come up with an answer involving refurbishing the existing headlight without having to buy new ones. RRSTDV8 mentions that it could be that cars around the same age as yours and mine (mine's 2008) are all going to start showing these symptoms and there may well be a significant demand for a fix. I for one would pay for a certain fix over this shooting in the dark approach we seem to have at the moment!
@Mark range do you still have your old headlight that you could play around with? Robin
2008 Range Rover Sport TDV8
Gone:
Jaguar S-Type V8 4.2 Sport
MGZTT 190 2.5

Got a pair of known good 2nd hand AFS lights on the car I'm breaking