Mini Blue LED Interior Lights - WTF???

[nigelpugh7]

OK, so someone will probably say what the heck are you talking about, or that the topic has been done to death, but these things are really starting to bug me now!!

What I am referring too is a Blue (LED I assume) interior light, that seems to be on all the time in the new range of Mini (BMW) Cars.

As I regularly travel up and down the M40 for work, I have started to notice them more and more, and they are bugging the "@@it!" out of me.

They seem to be either in the interior light in the middle of the car, or perhaps over the coat hook area of the car.

They also seem to be on all the time, despite the interior lights not being on, are they some sort of interior ambient mood lighting or what??

Just wanted to know because everyone I see not it has started to seriously bug me!!

Anyone enlighten me please??

Rant over!

[Codswallop]

It's ambient mood lighting, and is colour switchable iirc. Awful marketing bull plop as far as I'm concerned.

[nigelpugh7]

Codswallop said:

It's ambient mood lighting, and is colour switchable iirc. Awful marketing bull plop as far as I'm concerned.

Thanks, that makes me hate it even more!!

I wonder if it is a distracting to the owner/driver as it is to all us poor fellow travellers who get distracted by the glow!!

[sawman]

I seem to have been surrounded my minis with this feature recently. I have noticed that some of them seem to change colour periodically too. I hope the poor saps with this "feature " havent had to pay extra for it

[nigelpugh7]

sawman said:

I seem to have been surrounded my minis with this feature recently. I have noticed that some of them seem to change colour periodically too. I hope the poor saps with this "feature " havent had to pay extra for it

Yes that was my point, on my drive back up to the Midlands from Weybridge last night on the M40, I spotted at least 4 cars with the blue glow , so perhaps all the new Minis come with them now.

I have only seen them glowing blue though, if they start chaining colour when I spot them net it will drive me even more crazy!!

[Maximum Bobs]

Surely it must be possible to turn them off? If not then I'd be improving them with these.

[wobert]

Yes they are ambient lighting.
They only come on when you either have the side or head lights on.
You can change the colour from blue through to orange.
The lights are in the B pillars, the door cards and above the rear view mirror.
Blue gives the best level of lighting in my experience.
No you don't pay extra for them

Hope this helps

Robert

[SSBB]

I have these in the XF. They are not overly bright. I assumed most modern cars had them. They do dim right down along with the instrument lights though.

[nigelpugh7]

Maximum Bobs said:

Surely it must be possible to turn them off? If not then I'd be improving them with these.

Mmmm,

Liking your thinking there!!

I wonder if we could do some stealth hacking of the onboard connected system via an Iphone or something like that?

Then whenever we spot an offender we can secretly turn off the interior light settings, hopefully without the owner noticing??

[nigelpugh7]

wobert said:

Yes they are ambient lighting.
They only come on when you either have the side or head lights on.
You can change the colour from blue through to orange.
The lights are in the B pillars, the door cards and above the rear view mirror.
Blue gives the best level of lighting in my experience.
No you don't pay extra for them

Hope this helps

Robert

Thanks Rob, I understand that concept, both my Land Rover and Porsche have a them in a form, I think Land Rover refer to them as Waterfall Lighting.

My point is that I am pretty sure they can not be seen by other road users outside the car, its the fact that the Mini version seems so distracting to other road users seeing them shining when driving past etc!!

[Superhoop]

nigelpugh7 said:

Thanks Rob, I understand that concept, both my Land Rover and Porsche have a them in a form, I think Land Rover refer to them as Waterfall Lighting.

My point is that I am pretty sure they can not be seen by other road users outside the car, its the fact that the Mini version seems so distracting to other road users seeing them shining when driving past etc!!

So distracting in fact, that I've never even noticed them - and yes I do drive a lot, about 35k a year on average

I have ambient lighting in my car, and find it quite relaxing

Edited by Superhoop on Saturday 4th February 09:24

[tyranical]

They're not distracting at all, I don't even notice they're on in mine until my girlfriend changes them to pink when i'm not looking, then I notice.

They are cool I like them, I wish my life was so good that I had nothing else to rage about apart from 2 tiny LED lights in a car I don't even own.

Get a Grip.

[Ari]

I had a MINI Cooper S with mood lighting, it's great!

Only trouble is that it dims with the instrument rheostat. I like to have the instruments turned right down so the mood lights were really dim.

But no, not distracting and I've never noticed them on in anyone else's car.

[VX Foxy]

tyranical said:

Get a Grip.

^This!

OP is your life really that empty?

[CatJ]

Got to say I haven't come across this. My Civic has such a light in the roof and casts a very subtle glow over the gear shift, but you'd certainly not notice it from outside the car.

[thinfourth2]

Woo Hoo

Another thing to go wrong

[nigelpugh7]

VX Foxy said:

^This!

OP is your life really that empty?

Probably!!

It gets boring driving up and down the M40 in the dark, my mind wanders you know!!

I am not the man I used to be!!

[ManBetterKnow]

Distracting to other road user's? don't make me laugh, anybody who finds them selves genuinely distracted enough for it to effect their driving should no be on the roads at all.Seriously is the nation becoming that sad a miserable,all you ever hear lately is people moaning about the most pathetic things go and spend a couple of weeks in africa, when you come back reevaluate how much ambient lighting,fog lights and badly modified car's are really anything to worry about.I wish people like this would put all that energy they seem to have to bh about these things and use it towards REAL needs and issues in this world.

[Fire99]

ManBetterKnow said:

.Seriously is the nation becoming that sad a miserable

I'd say both. As a nation we're definitely getting less tolerant and self absorbed, but on the flip side, cars now have far more 'trinkets' to annoy other... HID's, Daylight Running Lights, Universally loud Stereos, SUV / 4x4 fashion etc etc.

Things were simpler when the majority trundles around in Ford Cortinas and Mk2 Escorts.

[ocrx8]

My Cooper S has them. Nice touch IMO - better than no ambient lighting! As said before, options are blue, pink, purple and orange.

The facelift (generally 60-plate onwards) has a disco mode where it cycles through the colours. These models also have a much wider colour spectrum on the lights.