Working on the SM
- Thread starter Ken W
- Start date
So Marc,
Are you saying Rhys's lights are for driving on the right side of the road? They seem to be the same layout as Christian's lights.
Looking at my sad light set, the low beam on the left of the bench is for driving on the right side of the road and the low beam light on the right of the bench is for driving on the left side of the road?
With Christian's lights, are the centre smaller pair of lights the main beam lights and the outer two the directional lights? That is the way they were on my car when I bought it.
I dropped all my reflectors off to Mario and HYQUAL today. He said he would take them all back to bare metal and then put them through the process. He showed me one he had just metalised and it looked fantastic.
Ken
Are you saying Rhys's lights are for driving on the right side of the road? They seem to be the same layout as Christian's lights.
Looking at my sad light set, the low beam on the left of the bench is for driving on the right side of the road and the low beam light on the right of the bench is for driving on the left side of the road?
With Christian's lights, are the centre smaller pair of lights the main beam lights and the outer two the directional lights? That is the way they were on my car when I bought it.
I dropped all my reflectors off to Mario and HYQUAL today. He said he would take them all back to bare metal and then put them through the process. He showed me one he had just metalised and it looked fantastic.
Ken
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Ken, yes that's my understanding. My car is an original UK import and the clear zones are in the lower left hand corners (looking head on). So I assume that's correct figment for driving on the left.
Guess it's best if someone who is driving an SM on the right side of the road could confirm the location of the clear zones on their headlamps. Re the directional lights the ones with the clearest glass lenses are the directional lights on my car.
I've got a spare new headlamp somewhere, will have a look for it when I get home.
Cheers
Marc
Guess it's best if someone who is driving an SM on the right side of the road could confirm the location of the clear zones on their headlamps. Re the directional lights the ones with the clearest glass lenses are the directional lights on my car.
I've got a spare new headlamp somewhere, will have a look for it when I get home.
Cheers
Marc
Hi Ken,
While my car was a UK import too, (and alleged to be owned by a Citroen dealer there) - it could have been supplied new to any market. The headlights are configured for my style of driving, which is both sides of the road ......and occasionally the footpath.
With your headlight glasses off, did your lights contain the metal insert between reflector & glass (outlined in red) as in the photo below?
Regards,
Rhys
While my car was a UK import too, (and alleged to be owned by a Citroen dealer there) - it could have been supplied new to any market. The headlights are configured for my style of driving, which is both sides of the road ......and occasionally the footpath.
With your headlight glasses off, did your lights contain the metal insert between reflector & glass (outlined in red) as in the photo below?
Regards,
Rhys
It is also to do with the dipping of the lamp onto low beam. LHD beams dip and point slightly right to illuminate the right edge of the road. And RHD visa versa. The cutoff of the high beam is also affected. Beams are designed to be flat topped in order to avoid dazzling oncoming traffic the flat top is not horizontal but shines a shorter distance towards the centre of the road. Hence a LHD cars flat top beam will slope down to the left of the car and a RHD car will slope down to the right, hence projection further along the road on the gutter side.
Headlamp Glass Pictures
Hopefully these are better pictures.
The one low beam glass that looks like the glasses in the other pics has 100 under the E2 label and a C in the bottom left corner and a 1 in the lower right corner. The reflector had 'J1 Made in France 1' in white printing on the brown body.
The other one is quite different. It has no central coding but does have an E in the lower left corner and a 1 in the bottom right corner. It also has a much bigger 'clear' section which is slightly rippled. The reflector on this light had GO as its label.
Both had the shim section fitted on the side with the 'clear' section. See pics below.
Both appear to have the same bulb holder with all the same numbers on them.
What do you make of that?
Cheers, Ken
Hopefully these are better pictures.
The one low beam glass that looks like the glasses in the other pics has 100 under the E2 label and a C in the bottom left corner and a 1 in the lower right corner. The reflector had 'J1 Made in France 1' in white printing on the brown body.
The other one is quite different. It has no central coding but does have an E in the lower left corner and a 1 in the bottom right corner. It also has a much bigger 'clear' section which is slightly rippled. The reflector on this light had GO as its label.
Both had the shim section fitted on the side with the 'clear' section. See pics below.
Both appear to have the same bulb holder with all the same numbers on them.
What do you make of that?
Cheers, Ken
Attachments
I am used to living with the left hand and right hand flare since living with R10, several GSes and CXes. I remember there being a tab you could move to get the H4 bulb to tilt differently so that the low beam flare would swop from the left to the right. It will be interesting to see how these perform when I get the reflectors back and reglued to the glasses. I have ordered some H1 LED bulbs for the low beam lights so that might be an interesting comparison.
Cheers, Ken
Cheers, Ken
Headlight Photo Survey
Here are some photos of headlight configs. I will just get the pics up and then edit in my comments.
Lights 1 and 2 are from George Klein in Toronto. He has the mostly clear glasses in the directional pod.
Lights 3 is from the 642 Citroen SM Spare Parts manual and also shows the mostly clear glass in the directional pod.
Lights 4 is a UK car and although fuzzy but I think the clear glass is in the main beam position.
Lights 5 is an NZ car with clear lights in the main beam position.
Lights 6 is an ex UK car now in Tassie with these lights in the directionals pod. The low beam lense looks just like my odd one too!
Lights 7 is Citrothello who has them in the main beam position.
So in 40 years they have moved around a bit.
Cheers, Ken
Here are some photos of headlight configs. I will just get the pics up and then edit in my comments.
Lights 1 and 2 are from George Klein in Toronto. He has the mostly clear glasses in the directional pod.
Lights 3 is from the 642 Citroen SM Spare Parts manual and also shows the mostly clear glass in the directional pod.
Lights 4 is a UK car and although fuzzy but I think the clear glass is in the main beam position.
Lights 5 is an NZ car with clear lights in the main beam position.
Lights 6 is an ex UK car now in Tassie with these lights in the directionals pod. The low beam lense looks just like my odd one too!
Lights 7 is Citrothello who has them in the main beam position.
So in 40 years they have moved around a bit.
Cheers, Ken
Attachments
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Hi Ken,
So with your headlights -
On the low beam, does the large outer lights illuminate - then go out when the high beam illuminates the middle lights. The inner turning lights go on and off on high beam. (by all this, I mean that all six lights are never on simultaneously)
Regards,
Rhys
So with your headlights -
On the low beam, does the large outer lights illuminate - then go out when the high beam illuminates the middle lights. The inner turning lights go on and off on high beam. (by all this, I mean that all six lights are never on simultaneously)
Regards,
Rhys
Hi Rhys,
Not 100% certain exactly how mine are working at present and with no lights currently installed I would have to set up some meters or dummy lights to find out. I know that the outer lights came on for low beam work. The main beam lights came on for high beam and were much brighter ( I found they had 100W H1 bulbs in them ) as well as the directionals if they were enabled. What I am not sure about is whether the low beams turned off when High Beam was selected as I have seen in all the brochure pictures. I will check sometime in the next few days.
I have been thinking about the position of the high beam and directional lights. I would think it would be best to have the small lights with more lensing in the glass in the main beam position as you do need a bit more spread on these especially if the low beam units turn off when the main beam is selected.
Cheers, Ken.
Not 100% certain exactly how mine are working at present and with no lights currently installed I would have to set up some meters or dummy lights to find out. I know that the outer lights came on for low beam work. The main beam lights came on for high beam and were much brighter ( I found they had 100W H1 bulbs in them ) as well as the directionals if they were enabled. What I am not sure about is whether the low beams turned off when High Beam was selected as I have seen in all the brochure pictures. I will check sometime in the next few days.
I have been thinking about the position of the high beam and directional lights. I would think it would be best to have the small lights with more lensing in the glass in the main beam position as you do need a bit more spread on these especially if the low beam units turn off when the main beam is selected.
Cheers, Ken.
That's what happens with mine. I'm not sure as to why all 6 wouldn't turn on with high beam but the inners do light up the night sky - curious to know Citroen's rationale there.
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mine only has four, boo hoo
Tony,
I am a bit jealous of you 4 light guys at the moment - the complications in getting the 6 light system to work as designed and fit in around are many and complex. Do you really want a whole lot more complication when you probably only/mostly drive it during the day anyway.
Rhys,
I have checked and my low beam lights do turn off when high beam is selected just like an H4 double filament bulb type headlight would do. I guess what Citroen have really done with the SM lights is to separate the low/main beam lamp that most cars of the time had into two optimised light housings. It's just a pity that the low beam lamp shroud blocks at least half of the bulb luminance in order to get a good cut off line. Why did you ask the question?
Donat,
I have worked out a way to get all six lights on, select low beam and then use the headlight flasher to bring on high beam and the directionals when selected. I used to do that with my GS CX and BX cars for very short periods. It does put a four light current load through the ignition switch tho if additional relays have not been fitted.
Cheers, Ken
Hey Ken,
My lights had not been assembled correctly. I assumed that both a high/low globe would be in each of the two large outer reflectors. Wiring diagram suggests that the high (separately) was in the middle lights - which is how I wired them.
On many a day I have envied the US headlight owners. Subsequent to the investment of an obscene amount of hours on reflector repairs, hydraulic cable repairs and clips, rods and adjusting....I am smugly superior about the Euro lights once more.
Regards,
Rhys
It's not that difficult to get all six lights to come on at the same time. Simply remove the H1 bulb holder in the outer reflectors and replace with a P45T H4 bulb, it is a direct fit. Then source a replacement connector for the USA type three filament bulb (in the States they are sold at the local auto parts store as a repair item for many many cars sold here with dual filament sealed beam headlights). Add a relay to handle the extra load and voila!
Marketplace:John Titus - Citroen SM Wiki
(Scroll to the bottom). By the way, I make a kit to replace the fluid actuators with Bowden cables for the turning lights. It frees up a lot of underhood space and won't ever leak....
Marketplace:John Titus - Citroen SM Wiki
(Scroll to the bottom). By the way, I make a kit to replace the fluid actuators with Bowden cables for the turning lights. It frees up a lot of underhood space and won't ever leak....
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Ken, I'm almost certain that I don't have a flasher option with the stalk I have. Not sure if it's a North American quirk or just plain old faulty.
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Hi Ken, I have a spare set of US style headlights if you want to swap 
Donat, my car has no flasher function on the stalks which I presume is a US delete. The DS stalks seem very similar to the SM's so the flasher stalk may be able to be substituted. I will be looking into this shortly as headlight flashing, in addition to the polite and angry horns gives one an other communication option. (why don't all cars have the dual horns).
cheers Tony
Donat, my car has no flasher function on the stalks which I presume is a US delete. The DS stalks seem very similar to the SM's so the flasher stalk may be able to be substituted. I will be looking into this shortly as headlight flashing, in addition to the polite and angry horns gives one an other communication option. (why don't all cars have the dual horns).
cheers Tony
Flasher action is opposite to horn action in the indicator stalk ie push stalk away from steering wheel.
Cheers, Ken
Cheers, Ken
The USA market 1972 stalks can be swapped with a DS unit but the lengths are different. DS unit is probably too long and ungainly for the SM.Hi Ken, I have a spare set of US style headlights if you want to swap
Donat, my car has no flasher function on the stalks which I presume is a US delete. The DS stalks seem very similar to the SM's so the flasher stalk may be able to be substituted. I will be looking into this shortly as headlight flashing, in addition to the polite and angry horns gives one an other communication option. (why don't all cars have the dual horns).
cheers Tony
Do the dance. Do the Daffyduck dance using the Aussiefrogs app. Be real happy if you can.
Hi Ken,
I have an article on repairing Jaeger clocks that I will copy and bring along to the next meeting if I can't email it to you.Think iot is for Ds, but may be the same as for the SM.
Still struggling with the Air Con wiring in the CX GTi. Good luck.
I have an article on repairing Jaeger clocks that I will copy and bring along to the next meeting if I can't email it to you.Think iot is for Ds, but may be the same as for the SM.
Still struggling with the Air Con wiring in the CX GTi. Good luck.