Are modern headlights too bright?

[carmadgaz]

Dipped beam yes, Main beam should be as bright as possible (and people should dip them in good time).

[Zwoelf]

aka_kerrly said:

People are running HID kits combined with the original glass/reflector set up

Is that not illegal and an MoT failure?

I thought HID lights had to have clear lenses, autolevelling, and headlamp washers.

[Dr Doofenshmirtz]

Zwoelf said:

Is that not illegal and an MoT failure?

I thought HID lights had to have clear lenses, autolevelling, and headlamp washers.

No.

[kambites]

Zwoelf said:

I thought HID lights had to have clear lenses, autolevelling, and headlamp washers.

Nope. HIDs must be EU type approved. There are both reflector and refractors units that have been approved, both with and without washers and self levelling functions.

[Twincam16]

I find it's the shade of light that's partly the problem. Rather than being a softer, more 'yellowy' light that still illuminates well enough, it's a very harsh 'white' light that looks, when one's coming towards you, like you're driving into the heart of a supernova. It obliterates the white lines in the centre of the road and is quite dangerous.

Problem is, it's an arms race. One car has brighter headlights, so another car in order to be seen has to have brighter headlights and so on. Same goes for height - I like cars to be physically quite low so they can cut through the air more efficiently and place the driver close to the centre of gravity, but because there are so many 4x4s on the road, you've now got an entire genre of family cars jacked up like 4x4s, with their headlights right in everyone else's rear-view mirrors.

[RemainAllHoof]

I have a solution to the headlights-in-the-RVM. If you drive slowly enough, they'll tailgate you so the boot blocks the light.

[Baryonyx]

I do find myself noticing that a lot of cars are fitted with extremely bright headlights now, it's quite annoying. It's especially noticeable in my MR2, and 4X4's are usually the worst offenders as they're content to drive very close behind you with their lights beaming into my car. As a result, I can't see in my mirrors, nor can I see the road ahead of me very well. I just tend to slow down then, to be safe.

[varsas]

Yes.

I don't see why dipped beam needs to be so bright. If you need to see where you are going use main beam. The lights on my Stag are fine when I'm on my own, on lit roads I leave them dipped, on unlit lanes I have them on main and am perfectly happy. The problem comes when someone is coming the other way...I'm fairly low down and my eyes have adjusted to 1970's headlights...so I get dazzled by the on-coming lights. My modern (halogen equipped) BMW has dipped beam which is way overkill, even in the lowest setting they are far brighter then I need but it does mean I can hold my own in the light war and so get dazzled far less. It's tempting to put zenon bulbs (not HID's, obviously) into my classics to put me on a more even footing but I have resisted so far.

Some cars do have lights which are totally inadequate, the sealed beam on my Land Rover are pretty poor and I used to drive round with my spitfire on full beam and never get flashed they where that bad but there has to be a happy compromise and overall I think it would be better if car lights where less bright.

[Timbuk2]

My friends '08 BMW has very bright lights and auto-levelling.

When I'm in the passenger seat I've noticed lots of oncoming drivers being dazzled when the auto-levelling messes it up - which seems to be most of the time on hilly roads, and you can't even adjust the level of the beam yourself??!!

Mind you, most people don't know how/bother anyway so perhaps fully auto adjusting lights that actually work would be for the best.

(And if you'd passed some sort of advanced headlight levelling course you may be allowed adjustable headlights?! )

Edited by Timbuk2 on Monday 14th November 17:43

[uncinqsix]

kambites said:

sharpfocus said:

kambites said:

You don't want auto-levelling, you want road tracking so the headlight beam cut-off tracks the road fifty feet (or whatever) in front of the car.

Agreed.

Thinking about it, this doesn't actually sound like it should be that hard to achieve to me. I wonder why it hasn't been done? Would it be legal?

It's been done and it available on quite a few high end cars. It adjusts beam pattern and aim depending on speed and steering wheel input etc. Very cunning. The standard for them is R123.

[anonymous-user]

carmadgaz said:

Dipped beam yes, Main beam should be as bright as possible (and people should dip them in good time).

Absolutely. So many cars out there with badly adjusted beams.

[-Pete-]

Dipped beams are way too bright IMO, even if properly adjusted. The self-levelling things and adjustable headlights would be fine if the world was flat and the drivers knew how to adjust them, respectively.

Anytime the headlining of my car is illuminated on a flat bit of road is means I'm being followed by someone with badly adjusted lights, whether through ignorance or small-cock syndrome. And it happens a lot.

I think almost anyone with half a brain ought to be able to see if they are dazzling other cars, but maybe I've set the bar too high for many road users?

[kambites]

uncinqsix said:

It's been done and it available on quite a few high end cars. It adjusts beam pattern and aim depending on speed and steering wheel input etc. Very cunning. The standard for them is R123.

I don't think that's what we're talking about, we're talking about headlights that track the road - I supposed you'd base it on scanning IR beam that works something like a Camera's autofocus to work out what angle the headlights need to be at in order to hit the ground the right distance in front of the car, so it would dip the lights on convex bits of road and raise them on concave ones.

[kambites]

Timbuk2 said:

When I'm in the passenger seat I've noticed lots of oncoming drivers being dazzled when the auto-levelling messes it up - which seems to be most of the time on hilly roads, and you can't even adjust the level of the beam yourself??!!

I think these systems are misunderstood - as far as I know they just work out the weight on each corner of the car and set the height correctly for a flat road, they don't attempt to adjust the headlights on the fly as you're driving to keep them level.

[David87]

I don't think they're too bright. In fact I was reading about the optional full LED headlamps on the new Audi A6 the other day and they sound absolutely fantastic. Here's some info:

"Featuring dipped beam, main beam, daytime-running lights, indicators, static turning light, all-weather light and LED motorway light function; includes main beam assist for automatic switching between main and dipped beams, an all-weather light function to reduce the risk of the driver being dazzled when visibility is poor (in fog, rain or snow) and an additional motorway light which automatically increases headlight range at speeds above approximately 68mph; LED technology allows near daylight illumination of the road for increased safety and comfort; minimal energy requirements, long service life and particularly good visibility to other road users."

Porsche does similar with the bi-xenons on the new 991 911:

[i]"The Porsche Dynamic Light System (PDLS) is available as an option for both models.
Its dynamic cornering light function swivels the headlights towards the inside of a bend, based on steering angle and road speed, in order to illuminate more of the road at tight bends and turns. Put simply, the road ahead is illuminated the moment you enter a bend.
The system also offers speed-sensitive headlight range control. With adaptive light systems, it is possible for the maximum range of the dipped beams to be increased as a function of the speed of the vehicle. PDLS takes care of this automatically in two stages. Stage 1 is the basic position for driving in city traffic, for example. Stage 2 is designed for driving at faster speeds, such as on the motorway. Above 130 km/h, the range is adapted again.
Another feature of PDLS is the adverse weather function, activated whenever the rear fog light is switched on. It reduces the effect of reflection phenomena in poor visibility conditions to avoid the risk of the driver being dazzled."[/i]

I appreciate they might be a little more dazzling for those coming towards you, but who cares about that when you're piloting something with a set of these attached to the front. :big laugh: On a more serious note, surely these speed-sensative beam adjustments will mean an end to dazzling?

Here's the Audi's ones:

[otolith]

Twincam16 said:

Problem is, it's an arms race.

This - cars having brighter headlights is generally a good thing, unless you are driving something with an earlier generation of lights. The problem isn't absolute brightness but relative. You only really get dazzled by dipped beams when they are a lot dimmer than your own lights (or when you are driving something very low, but we can't really choose to drive something lower than most other cars and then whinge about it). It would be good if there were easier ways to upgrade older lighting to modern standards in a manner which would be OEM acceptable.

The other things that make it worse, in my experience, are old windscreens and old eyes. Not much one can do about the latter.

[-Pete-]

otolith said:

This - cars having brighter headlights is generally a good thing, unless you are driving something with an earlier generation of lights. The problem isn't absolute brightness but relative. You only really get dazzled by dipped beams when they are a lot dimmer than your own lights (or when you are driving something very low, but we can't really choose to drive something lower than most other cars and then whinge about it). It would be good if there were easier ways to upgrade older lighting to modern standards in a manner which would be OEM acceptable.

The other things that make it worse, in my experience, are old windscreens and old eyes. Not much one can do about the latter.

That's the wrongest bit of wrong I've ever read on PH
How can the brightness of my headlights affect the dazzlyness of those badly adjusted unnecessarily powerful headlights dazzling me?

[Timbuk2]

kambites said:

Timbuk2 said:

When I'm in the passenger seat I've noticed lots of oncoming drivers being dazzled when the auto-levelling messes it up - which seems to be most of the time on hilly roads, and you can't even adjust the level of the beam yourself??!!

I think these systems are misunderstood - as far as I know they just work out the weight on each corner of the car and set the height correctly for a flat road, they don't attempt to adjust the headlights on the fly as you're driving to keep them level.

Yes I understand that, but without manual beam adjustment as well, then they are always getting it wrong is what I mean. If he could lower the beams standard setting a foot or two it would be fine but as it is he is constantly blinding people.

[otolith]

-Pete- said:

That's the wrongest bit of wrong I've ever read on PH
How can the brightness of my headlights affect the dazzlyness of those badly adjusted unnecessarily powerful headlights dazzling me?

Because the issue is the level of ambient light that your eyes are accustomed to, and the contrast between the illumination of the road in front of you and the brightness of the oncoming headlights. If your eyes are relatively dark adapted (because your main beams are, relatively speaking, a bit st) and the road in front is dimly lit (because your dipped beams are, relatively speaking, a bit st) you won't be able to see a bloody thing when something with brighter lights is coming the other way. Why do you think the people complaining about brighter headlights are the people who don't have them?

[-Pete-]

otolith said:

Because the issue is the level of ambient light that your eyes are accustomed to, and the contrast between the illumination of the road in front of you and the brightness of the oncoming headlights. If your eyes are relatively dark adapted (because your main beams are, relatively speaking, a bit st) and the road in front is dimly lit (because your dipped beams are, relatively speaking, a bit st) you won't be able to see a bloody thing when something with brighter lights is coming the other way. Why do you think the people complaining about brighter headlights are the people who don't have them?

If I shine my 5W LED torch in your eyes and you have one as well it won't blind you. Or lasers? We both have sharks with f****ing lasers?