A while back, I broke a headlight adjuster screw when attempting to adjust the headlights. Dorman 42188 is what was spec'd for an OEM replacement for our trucks. It was recommended to warm them up prior to install. I wanted to see what might happen and took a chance. Of course, I push it into place ... SNAP! Anyone else who's been there, done that will likely agree that these are an absolutely horrible design. A member in a Facebook group mentioned that 42185s have been used with success and, while they're spec'd for Jeeps, they've worked on our trucks. I ordered 4 of them and installed them today. What a far better design! I will use and recommend these from now on!

I've documented what needs to be done to make them fit. Very little work to be done and all you need is a utility knife/blade. What I haven't documented or provided any links to is an adjustment procedure. You can take measurements of the positioning of the outer buckets before you remove them or do some research about proper headlight adjustments/positioning.

Now, let's make these adjusters fit!

What you need; Dorman 42185.



Remove a small amount of material from here on both sides. Just enough until it's the size of the rectangular hole in the bucket. The orientation will be obvious.



Radius the top and bottom forward edges of all 4 inserts. An unmodified insert is shown for comparison.





For the inner (horizontal) adjusters, radius only 2 corners on the long side. There is a slight taper of the "ear" surrounding the rectangular hole. This is may or may not be needed but it seemed they wouldn't fit if I hadn't.





Feed the inserts in from the backside of the bucket and push them through their bores. Their locking tabs will spring into place. Use the insert with 2 radiused corners on the long side in the inner hole. Orient the insert with the radiused corners to the inside.



Install the associated screws into the slots of the outer headlight bucket, install the outer bucket, hooking the spring into the lower corner of the bucket and threading the screws into their respective inserts. Return the bucket to the previous positioning (if you measured) or adjust them to a position that looks close to square off of the front of the truck and follow an adjustment procedure after.