AudiForums.com - Strange like behavior how should they work?

Hi guys,

Quick query about how headlights are meant to behave on a 2000 A6 (2.7T). I bought the car about 6 months ago. I don’t drive it very often in the dark but I noticed that when I drive the car at night and I have the headlights on biped beam and then when I push the stalk away to put on the full beams (aka brights) the dipped bulbs would go out. However I went out to dinner with some friends tonight and drove home around 12am this time I noticed the dipped beams staying on with the full beams. I also noticed that when the fog lights were on and the full beans were enguaged the front fog lights would go out, how ever they now seam to stay on.

I am from the UK and this is the first car I have owned in the US so put this behavior down to the car being to US specs (I know when US cars come to the UK things have to be changed on them relating to the lights,I have noticed similar behavior with headlights and foglights going off when full beams being engauged on trucks over here). However can someone tell me which way round the lights are meant to work? Either

When full beams are switched on are the dipped bulb is meant to go out

OR

When full beams are switched on are the dipped bulb is meant to stay on and the full beam lights

To my mind it would make more sense if the dipped lights stayed on when the full was engaged and that is how they work in Europe. I did some research and it seams to suggest that if the dipped bulb goes out when the full beam is engaged that there can be a fault with the switch on the column and to fix it this should be replaced. However with my cars recent change in behavior I am unsure how things should work, if my car has fixed its self them I am one happy guy and I hope the “self fix” continues to hold or am I on for one expensive bill if I have to replace the stalk? (I have found several DIY fixes for the stalk but not related to a problem with the lights, usually cruse control)

Thanks for the help
James