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B

Bob

Well-known Member
... you happen to be trying to navigate down the road after dark with your tractor/tractor/SWMBO hauler...

WHY is it clever/swell/legal/tolerated in polite society to have 4 or 6 projection/HID/LED/arc/laser headlights on your SUV or "crossover"
and burn the retinas out of the eyes of every driver you meet on a two-lane road when you are (supposedly) driving on low beams?

HOW many/how BRIGHT of headlights are needed on low beam?


... But then, come to think of it, how many "drivers" even bother to dim to oncoming traffic?
 
Good question! I guess you could say that some people just like to see and be seen. Some years ago, I left the house one night about nine to pick up one of the kids from their part time job, less than half mile from the house was a stop sign and while sitting there the hilltop above me suddenly looked as if the sun were coming up! Over the hilltop came a pickup with four big KCs on a light bar behind the cab. He saw me and turned them off until he got past. Were I the suspicious type, I would swear he was deer hunting at night!
 
AMEN.....I cuss the idiots with their add on ultra bright lights, as well as the engineers that have designed the newer cars with the factory ultra bright lights. Personally I"ve driven quite a few old vehicles with the old, standard, round sealed beam headlights as well as the "newer" ones into the 2000ths with the newer bulbs. In both cases I rarely ever drive with the high beams and, high beams or not you simply do what I was taught when I first learned to drive.......You don"t ever "outdrive" your headlights. That being the case the brighter lights simply give the other driver the ability to see further ahead and drive faster....while causing you to go blind and narrowly avoid going off in the ditch because you can"t see.....
 
My eyes are sensitive to light. I rarely use the brights. I hate it when oncoming drivers don't dim their lights. When I see brights I flash mine hoping the oncoming driver will dim theirs. I'll give them two chances. If they don't dim theirs, I put my brights on. That usually gets them to dim their lights but some are just too stupid to get the hint.
Now we have to deal with those people that think they need headlights and driving lights on their pick ups and SUV's.
My nephew added driving lights to his pick up. He was telling me how bright they were. I told him I hoped he never used those !#$%^&!!! lights. He asked why. I said because you're going to !#$% someone off when you blind them and they'll kick your !#$.

My BIL had a friend that put some airplane landing lights on his car. If oncoming drivers didn't dim their lights, he's turn on the landing lights and lit up the road like it was daylight. Must have been like looking into the sun for the oncoming drivers.
 
"The brighter lights simply give the other driver the ability to see further ahead and drive faster"--
So true! And Wayne, what they don't realize is, no matter how bright your lights are, it is still hard to avoid a deer at 70+mph! I have thought many times, I still can't find anything wrong with the "old fashioned" sealed beams! Hmmm, makes me think, maybe I need to stock up before they become obsolete!
 
And on a related note, I'd like to catch the genius that decided all new road signs should have twice the reflectivity of your average mirror. You get a bunch of them in a row, and the aforementioned oncoming idiots, and you can't even look away from the center of the road to avoid being blinded.
 
In Texas, a few years back headlight aim and brightness was a part of the annual inspection.

Suddenly it went away, I think for a couple reasons, too many dishonest inspectors wanting to make an extra $10 adjusting headlights, and the liability of damaging the car, striping the brittle plastic adjusting nuts on the older cars.

The same machine also tested the brightness of the lamps. They had to be within a certain range, not too dim, not too bright.

Once the machine went away, it was run whatever. But... there is still a legal limit for headlights. You can and should get stopped and ticketed for unsafe headlights.
 
I find it funny when I see people in the middle of town with their brights on. I was always taught brights were for outside of city limit use.
 
I don't see too mnay people forgetting to dim, and if they do, a quick flash fixes em. But yes, I agree on the new LED and halogen headlights. I drive Grand Am 100 miles a day which sits pretty low. Almost half the year I do all that driving in the dark on a busy 2 lane state road. Those dang beams are aimed right at my grille, but as soon as there's a little bump in the road... BAM right in the eyes from MILES away. Even worse when it's really really cold and the air is full of ice crystals. Makes for a prism effect. And then the vehicles with fog lights on ALL the time. '04 and newer F-150's with a lift kit are great for that. I have fog lights on my Grandammit, and they are helpful once in a while in the fog, but shut em off when you don't need em!
 
my much older cousin lives close to me and we once passed each other often before he retired , when speaking to him one day I commented to him you must really like those fog lights on you pickup, his comment was "I just love them" I said to him would you be so kind to adjust them so everyone else love's them also .
 
Better than that, How about cop cars with...I don't know...maybe 20 strobing red, blue, amber, and white lights all going full blast during a traffic stop. The you're supposed to go around them on the side of the road with opposing traffic head lights and still see for pedestrians. Yeah, Yeah! We see your cool cop car! With its way cool lights! Now dim about half of em!
 
Basically people don't know how to drive anymore. Hilarius to watch folks try to parallel park.
Or if someone is riding a bicycle,tractor/combine, mail delivery, trash truck, etc. and is partially in the opposite lane, some on-coming idiot will invariably pull into your lane to set up a head-on collision with you rather than slowing down and waiting to pass when it is clear. I guess you are suppose to drive off the right shoulder so they aren't inconvenienced?
Then there is people who hold up traffic on a two lane road by driving 40 in a 55 - that is until they get into town - then they drive 15 mph over the limit!
I'd also question the reasoning of someone to return the favor of putting their bright lights on someone else as retribution. Some of those folks might be elderly with cataracts and can't see to begin with. So now we have TWO drivers blinded. Maybe automatic dimmers should be standard equipment just as seat belts, air-bags, anti-lock brakes?
Automatic license renewal doesn't help matters, either - especially for teens and seniors. (I am a senior by the way)
 
First of I am showing of to the neighbors how cool my truck looks now.
Second I can buy off road lights; marketed to me as street legal lights so I know no better; put them on my truck; blind everyone; and the local cops tell me nothing.
Third I can see well with all these lights so who cares how much I blind you or what you think of me.

Yes that was spoken in the third party because it is a pet peeve of mine also but everything I said is true.
 
(quoted from post at 01:21:57 02/24/14) My eyes are sensitive to light. I rarely use the brights. I hate it when oncoming drivers don't dim their lights. When I see brights I flash mine hoping the oncoming driver will dim theirs. I'll give them two chances. If they don't dim theirs, I put my brights on. That usually gets them to dim their lights but some are just too stupid to get the hint.
Now we have to deal with those people that think they need headlights and driving lights on their pick ups and SUV's.
My nephew added driving lights to his pick up. He was telling me how bright they were. I told him I hoped he never used those !#$%^&!!! lights. He asked why. I said because you're going to !#$% someone off when you blind them and they'll kick your !#$.
My BIL had a friend that put some airplane landing lights on his car. If oncoming drivers didn't dim their lights, he's turn on the landing lights and lit up the road like it was daylight. Must have been like looking into the sun for the oncoming drivers.
Click to expand...

Really bright Pops1532 no pun intended
I am not defending the idiots that can't be bothered to dim there lights to oncoming traffic, but think a minute about what you say you are doing.
Blasting an oncoming vehicle with your high beams cause you are mad or pissy about there lights then wonder why that same idiot loses vision momentarily and smacks into you head on.
Try shutting your lights off and back on quickly it is much more noticeable and effective.
 
So it"s wrong for your BIL"s friend to use his landing lights, but ok for you to put yours on bright to blind the oncoming driver.......and you have sensitive eyes?
 
[b:4d1447925e]Try shutting your lights off and back on quickly it is much more noticeable and effective.[/b:4d1447925e]
Click to expand...
Nope, that's the traditional signal to get someone to turn their lights ON.
It's not like I leave my brights on till they pass. I do dim them when the car gets close so, no, I'm not going to blind someone causing them to lose control.
And yes, I do get pissy about someone blinding me!
 
There is a certain amount of etiquette involved with use of extra lighting, and with the explosion of factory fog lights and HID lighting, a great deal of it hasn't been learned by the general motoring public. I haul fuel for a living, and we gross around 140,000 lbs loaded. One of the hauls is in the mountains, and during winter months, mostly done in the dark. Trust me, every extra foot of vision you can get with additional lighting, I'm all over it. But, you have to have a conscience to run them. Any vehicle within a mile ahead of me, I turn off my extra lighting. Half a mile, my brights get turned off. Just don't flash me when my brights are off, because as the saying goes, "Turnabout is fair play."
 
Factory lights too. We get flashed all the time in our Nissan on low beam. Had alignment checked, still happens.
 
I remember decades back when I lived in Chicago and was stopped at an intersection facing a cop stopped facing me the other way. A guy drove up behind him with bright driving lights turned on and didn't turn them off, lighting up the inside of that cop car and blinding me. Their light and a turn lane went green, but I still had a red and sat. The cop car didn't move, so the car behind him with the bright driving lamps pulled into the other lane and went around him. Then the cop turned on his "pull over now" lights and pulled the guy over. I guess that he didn't like the guy's bright driving lamps either. Actually, I'm pretty sure that he didn't. My light went green, so I proceeded on my way. Being that it was a Chicago cop, he might have pulled out his 5 D-cell maglight and beat the guy...

Mark
 
I drive an 08 Toyota Sienna with factory lights that have never been altered, but sometimes the car I meet will flash me and my lights are already of dim. I thought about having the aim checked. Then a month ago or so when I was driving at night a car with bright lights that were on dim came up behind me. When he passed me I found out it was another 08 Sienna. Sometimes I think the factory designers are pushing the limit a bit on headlight brightness. Jim
 
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