Constant Headlights - thoughts ?
Discussion
Trying to gauge opinion on this one . What do you guys think on running with constant dipped beam on ? . I know Volvo has done it for years , all new cars now have DRL's and Ive also spent a lot of time in Sweden where all cars MUST have their dipped beam on .
The other day I was playing around with all the settings in my car and noticed there is a setting to have Constant Headlights .
I will probably activate this in a few weeks time when the darker mornings \ nights are here but whats your thoughts on just having them ON - period ! regardless of whether the sun is splitting the trees or not.
The other day I was playing around with all the settings in my car and noticed there is a setting to have Constant Headlights .
I will probably activate this in a few weeks time when the darker mornings \ nights are here but whats your thoughts on just having them ON - period ! regardless of whether the sun is splitting the trees or not.
I hate DRL's and thankfully my car has the option in the menus to turn them off (also, it just has normal sidelights not those god awful Christmas tree LEDS). I still drive around with the headlights set to auto and if the car thinks it's dark enough for headlights, then I'll go with that.
Only occasionally in crappy drizzle do I have to override it and pop them on myself.
In the UK where we have daylight for a fairly major chunk of the day in summer DRL's are overkill imo.
However, when I was driving in America where roads heat haze is an issue, daylight running lights are a necessity otherwise you'd never see half the cars coming the other way.
Only occasionally in crappy drizzle do I have to override it and pop them on myself.
In the UK where we have daylight for a fairly major chunk of the day in summer DRL's are overkill imo.
However, when I was driving in America where roads heat haze is an issue, daylight running lights are a necessity otherwise you'd never see half the cars coming the other way.
58warren said:
jimbobsimmonds said:
As an OVLOV driver I'm used to it...
And driving do the A1 and M25 in the rain around 9am I would rather everybody had them on all the time than people driving in the wet and dark with nothing on...
Wouldn't they get goosebumps and hypothermia?And driving do the A1 and M25 in the rain around 9am I would rather everybody had them on all the time than people driving in the wet and dark with nothing on...
k", then i got it 
Liquid Tuna said:
Yes anything that hides motorcycles must be good. Oh, wait a minute....
Bikes should put their lights on as well. The number of bikes I see riding along with no lights on, even in this stty weather is amazing. Suppose it keeps the organ donation register people busy...Liquid Tuna said:
Yes anything that hides motorcycles must be good. Oh, wait a minute....
fking sense of entitlement these days, eh. Cyclists, bikers, mothers with children the lot. Everyone is so vulnerable and under a constant threat from cars. Cyclists: Don't drive like a tit and I'll be able to spot you no probs. Do 80 in 30 zone or change lanes without looking in your mirrors and not even the brightest of beams will save your back end.
Mothers: Pay attention to what your children are doing, make sure they don't cross the street where they're not supposed to and they will be alright. I'm yet to meet a person who thinks that mounting a footpath and chasing the kids is fun.
As for OPs question, what pisses me off is bikers who drive on a main beam. I was on M1 recently, sat behind me was a t
t on Harley and not only was the farting annoying as hell but also his main beam was burning my retinas. I was this (||) close to testing my emergency braking skills. nouze said:
Cyclists: Don't drive like a tit and I'll be able to spot you no probs. Do 80 in 30 zone or change lanes without looking in your mirrors and not even the brightest of beams will save your back end.
One big reason for bikes is when someone's waiting to pull out of a junction ahead. If you have the lights on your bike on, it's proven time and again you're far mor likely to be seen. I know bikers cover the brake anyway (or at least they should!) but it helps if the car/bus/lorry/dumper truck doesn't pull out on you in the first place.P2 DJX said:
Trying to gauge opinion on this one . What do you guys think on running with constant dipped beam on ? . I know Volvo has done it for years , all new cars now have DRL's and Ive also spent a lot of time in Sweden where all cars MUST have their dipped beam on .
The other day I was playing around with all the settings in my car and noticed there is a setting to have Constant Headlights .
I will probably activate this in a few weeks time when the darker mornings \ nights are here but whats your thoughts on just having them ON - period ! regardless of whether the sun is splitting the trees or not.
I think it's wrong on a lot of levels. I can justify it... but it usually falls on deaf ears.The other day I was playing around with all the settings in my car and noticed there is a setting to have Constant Headlights .
I will probably activate this in a few weeks time when the darker mornings \ nights are here but whats your thoughts on just having them ON - period ! regardless of whether the sun is splitting the trees or not.
1. In daylight having a car with it's lights on actually obscures the car. They in fact hide it as you can primarily only see the lights. I believe such a technique was used in WW2 to try and hide ships on the horizon.
1a. The knock on affect of this is, it is harder to judge speed and distance of an object that you can't actually focus on correctly.
2. If the road is wet, having your lights on in daylight causes a greater dazzling affect, which extenuates the affects of 1 and 1a.
3. Do you really need to see a car 2-3+ miles away? Even at 70mph there is nothing you can do with that information. In day light you will easily see a car without lights on at a distance that is suitable for you to actually use that information.
4. With the advent of auto-lights that switch on automatically when in low light levels it totally makes using lights in daylight completely 100% redundant.
LuS1fer said:
F*cking annoying if I'm blunt. We seem to now live in a world where everyone perceives themsleves as a target.
Not a target as such...article said:
Black cars are up to 47 per cent more likely to be involved in crashes, research shows. A 20-year study revealed black cars to be the most dangerous - and white, gold and yellow to be the safest. The reason lies not in who is behind the wheel, but in the visibility of their vehicle, say the researchers.
Black, grey, silver, red and blue fail to stand out against the background of the road, scenery and other traffic. The team, from Monash University in Australia scrutinise police data on 850,000 accidents for information on the car, they time of day and the type of prang.[/i]
Commercial vehicles, including taxis and white vans, were excluded from the mix.
After trying to take into account the possibility that drivers who take risks might be drawn more to some colours than others, they found black cars to be most accident prone.
During daylight hours, they were up to 12 per cent more likely be in crashes than white vehicles, while at dawn and dusk, the figure rose to 47 per cent.
Grey and silver cars were the next most risky, followed by red and blue, the journal Safety Science reports.
Interestingly, the study hinted that orange cars may be even safer than white ones - although the scientists could not be confident about this.
They said that although their findings seem to suggest that steering customers away from black cars would make the roads safer, this might not necessarily be the case.
This is because having lots more white cars on the road would mean there was less contrast between vehicles and so make them harder to spot.
Researcher Dr Stuart Newstead said: 'Whilst campaigns to modify vehicle colour choice could alter the crash risk for the fleet, colour is a much less influential crash risk modifier than behavioural traits such as drink-driving, and speeding.
'It may be possible that simple solutions such as the use of daytime running lights or headlights could effectively negate the elevated risks of higher risk vehicle colours.'
http://www.aviva.co.uk/risksolutions/news/2007/06/12/least-popular-colour-cars-are-more-safe/Black, grey, silver, red and blue fail to stand out against the background of the road, scenery and other traffic. The team, from Monash University in Australia scrutinise police data on 850,000 accidents for information on the car, they time of day and the type of prang.[/i]
Commercial vehicles, including taxis and white vans, were excluded from the mix.
After trying to take into account the possibility that drivers who take risks might be drawn more to some colours than others, they found black cars to be most accident prone.
During daylight hours, they were up to 12 per cent more likely be in crashes than white vehicles, while at dawn and dusk, the figure rose to 47 per cent.
Grey and silver cars were the next most risky, followed by red and blue, the journal Safety Science reports.
Interestingly, the study hinted that orange cars may be even safer than white ones - although the scientists could not be confident about this.
They said that although their findings seem to suggest that steering customers away from black cars would make the roads safer, this might not necessarily be the case.
This is because having lots more white cars on the road would mean there was less contrast between vehicles and so make them harder to spot.
Researcher Dr Stuart Newstead said: 'Whilst campaigns to modify vehicle colour choice could alter the crash risk for the fleet, colour is a much less influential crash risk modifier than behavioural traits such as drink-driving, and speeding.
'It may be possible that simple solutions such as the use of daytime running lights or headlights could effectively negate the elevated risks of higher risk vehicle colours.'
Cheers,
FT.
Liquid Tuna said:
Yes anything that hides motorcycles must be good. Oh, wait a minute....
Except it kind of doesn't - in good daylight I've never known cars or bikes having their lights on make any difference to whether I could see them or not. In dim light then both having them on helps me notice both, I've never encountered having a bike "hidden" by car lights.Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff