Ruby Headlamp Mounting

[Denis Sweeney]

Been having a problem with the mounting of the offside Headlamp on Ruby for sometime now, it keeps drooping downward.
When I originally installed the Headlamps, I inserted a Nitrile washer between the wing and the chrome plated cup the headlamp sits in to protect the paintwork. On the nearside this has worked ok but on the offside, no mater how much I have tightened the brass nut underneath the wing the Headlamp always droops after running.
As can be seen the in the attached pic the hardness of the Nitrile rubber I used was insufficient and as a result has split and inspection revealed the extra tightening has damaged the paintwork beneath.
I am now considering using a harder rubber washer under the mounting, possibly with some fibre reinforcing or a PVC/Nylon or similar material, but has anyone used an alternate successful method for fixing the headlamp mount??
Both wings do vibrate when travelling along but I'm guessing this is normal with all variants of A7.
Any thoughts would be much appreciated.
Cheers

[andrew34ruby]

I fitted my Ruby headlights to the wings about four years ago with nothing at all between the "chrome plated cup" and the painted wing. My cups are not chrome plated, and don't have a sharp edge against the wing like yours look to do. On mine the edge of the cup was rounded inwards to present a very blunt painted edge onto the wing. Possibly you have the wrong headlights.

I've never noticed the wings vibrating at all either.

In more than three years of use one headlight drooped slightly, needing to be re-positioned and re-tightened just once.

[Reckless Rat]

There are no "official" cups on my RP's headlamp mounts (LB130s) just old brass front radius arm bushes painted black. They've been like that for about 35 years or more. I have added a large diameter (3") thick washer under the wing for extra support as the original pressed steel reinforcings were missing when I got the car.

[Duncan Grimmond]

By heck lad, tha's got such a shine on yon wing thar it's blindin'!

[Peter Naulls]

Our mounting cups were just like yours (but painted) before the car was restored and one had cut right through the wing for about 2/3rds of its diameter! we replaced them with cast ali ones from one of the suppliers at the time; they are bigger and have a gently curved edge profile.

[Denis Sweeney]

Brush painted with Tekaloid coaching enamel a goodly number of coats were wet ‘n dried before the last one was left as laid.