Cat's eye - fail!/?

[300bhp/ton]

I'm sure I'm not the only one to notice this, but it was very evident at the weekend where I drove a 2h 45min round trip in the dark and fog, consisting of city roads, unlit country lanes, motorway and unlit dual carriageways.

What was evident at how few roads have cat's eyes these days and the ones that do how few actually seemed to function.

It seems the old style cat's eye:


With it's self cleaning ability is a thing of the past. Some roads still have them, but most of these roads I drove on the cat's eyes where missing from the holders or in a state of disrepair.

What did amaze me though, was the more modern cat's eye like these:


While very bright and reflective when new, seem to be completely useless when dirt and/or old. We went down one stretch of road that had cat's eyes like these. I could see them when close too due to my headlights lighting up the ground, but none of them reflected at all, which to my thinking would seem to completely defeat the whole point of installing them in the first place?

[TommyBuoy]

This has reminded me, around here there seem to be stretches of road with very bright blue / white light cat eyes - that are still lit up when you look in the rear view mirror.

Just wondered if anyone knew about these too?

/Thread Hijack

[Deluded]

Most likely down to the cost of the old design. The new ones seem far simpler and just look glued to the floor too so easy to install.

Shame when something is designed perfectly but not used because of our government skimping on just about everything these days. Wonder where all that VED goes. Not on the roads by the looks of things.

[aka_kerrly]

Deluded said:

Most likely down to the cost of the old design. The new ones seem far simpler and just look glued to the floor too so easy to install.

Shame when something is designed perfectly but not used because of our government skimping on just about everything these days. Wonder where all that VED goes. Not on the roads by the looks of things.

I think we have established that VED is nothing to do with road maintenance but the rest of your points are perfectly valid.

It does seem to make no sense that in the world of cost cutting measures it is better to use an inferior design and no doubt replace the plastic cat eyes on a regular basis compared with using the more expensive design that lasts many many years.

[Redmax]

TommyBuoy said:

This has reminded me, around here there seem to be stretches of road with very bright blue / white light cat eyes - that are still lit up when you look in the rear view mirror.

Just wondered if anyone knew about these too?

/Thread Hijack

I've noticed that too - between J5 and 6 of the M40 for example.

[300bhp/ton]

TommyBuoy said:

This has reminded me, around here there seem to be stretches of road with very bright blue / white light cat eyes - that are still lit up when you look in the rear view mirror.

Just wondered if anyone knew about these too?

/Thread Hijack

LED solar powered ones. There are several places around me that have these. Very good the first few years, but after a while they seem to stop working, especially in winter when they are needed the most.

[300bhp/ton]

Redmax said:

TommyBuoy said:

This has reminded me, around here there seem to be stretches of road with very bright blue / white light cat eyes - that are still lit up when you look in the rear view mirror.

Just wondered if anyone knew about these too?

/Thread Hijack

I've noticed that too - between J5 and 6 of the M40 for example.

I don't think they are new though.

The first ones I recall seeing where on Dead mans hill on the A6 just north of Clophill, I think it was around 1998 +- a year.

[FreiWild]

The old style cat's eyes look quite robust indeed, contrary to the new ones.

But why have the cat's eyes on the road? Mounting them on poles at the side of the road would eliminate the wear and tear by a huge margin, no?

[5lab]

theres a few of the 'self lit' ones on the a23 (down handcross hill). You can drive along with no lights on at all.

[Efbe]

300bhp/ton said:

Redmax said:

TommyBuoy said:

This has reminded me, around here there seem to be stretches of road with very bright blue / white light cat eyes - that are still lit up when you look in the rear view mirror.

Just wondered if anyone knew about these too?

/Thread Hijack

I've noticed that too - between J5 and 6 of the M40 for example.

I don't think they are new though.

The first ones I recall seeing where on Dead mans hill on the A6 just north of Clophill, I think it was around 1998 +- a year.

:::WARNING AHEAD!!!!!:::

These lights are really really dangerous.

There is a stretch of moorland road with these lights on near us.
When driving late at night, it is so goddamn tempting to switch all your lights off and just use these catseyes. allegedly it feels like your in some kind of tron style compputer game.
This is very stupid and very dangerous, more so that there are likely sheep close to the road, and potentially other objects on the road.

you have been warned

[Mr GrimNasty]

The roads were never built for the out-sized lorries now using them, these have the unfortunate habit of ripping up the old style eyes that then become immensely dangerous/damaging chunks of iron in the road. It’s the same reason you have to snake down the road these days trying to avoid every cast iron cover with a 5 inch drop on it.

[attym3]

FreiWild said:

The old style cat's eyes look quite robust indeed, contrary to the new ones.

But why have the cat's eyes on the road? Mounting them on poles at the side of the road would eliminate the wear and tear by a huge margin, no?

Cost?
Plus most cats eyes are to show where the centre of the road is, poles every 5 feet would make overtaking... Erm interesting