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Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

bbc.com

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Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#71

Post by pjmlp »

everdrive wrote: post #10

I understand that currently this is sort of a collective action problem, but I'm a bit baffled why people ever thought they needed brighter headlights in the first place. In the city, it's so bright that you don't even need headlights to see whatsoever. When cars started automatically dimming the dash via a light sensor, there was actually a period of time where I totally forgot to turn on my headlights because thing…

What road lines?

There are plenty of country side roads in Europe that really dark with normal medium lights.

Now I fully agree that full intensity is too high as shipped in most cars.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#73

Post by yolo3000 »

gbil wrote: post #58

A few things I've experienced: - In many new cars the headlights do indeed appear as very bright. In the Xenon era the headlight height adjustment per occupancy was done automatically but at least in a few new cars I've been in with LED headlights this is not the case and the driver needs to adjust it by hand and I'm pretty sure the vast majority doesn't do that. - Many new cars offer automated switching of high beam…

I am in very small minority since my car is 20 years old now, but it has halogen lights with height adjustments, and they even check for height adjustment at the yearly inspection. But automated high beam switching and people are not ware of it? What sort of drivers do we have nowadays..

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#75

Post by kaelwd »

macintux wrote: post #6

Meanwhile, brake lights and running lights are frequently too dim because of an aesthetic obsession with "blacking out" tail lights.

Luckily that's illegal in my country, instead we have the opposite problem where new cars have LED taillights that are just as blindingly bright as their headlights.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#76

Post by mapt »

bayindirh wrote: post #55
Taek wrote: post #2

I feel the same way in America, I think there should be stricter regulations on how bright a car's headlights are allowed to be for it to be street legal. Wouldn't mind having a cap on blue-light levels in addition.

The maximum brightness is already regulated in US and Europe. US allows a lower brightness level. Some car manufacturer (Ford?) recalled their cars to fix their cars' headlight settings to match US regulations in the last 6-8 months IIRC. Also, light temperature has limits. I believe >4000K lights are already road illegal in UK and EU. They are also recently outlawed in my country, but there are many cars with after…

Do we enforce it?

At all?

It isn't just retrofits that are a problem, it's brand new cars.

It's not just about not wanting to be uncomfortably blinded by lasers shooting into your eyes at night. (Lasers well under 3000 lumens!). It's that this kills people. Frequently. It's a form of assault with hundreds of dead victims and thousands of injured victims a year.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#77

Post by eertami »

Maxion wrote: post #40
jansper39 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of my driving is down small, unlit country roads and I'm constantly coming across deer, sheep, people in dark jackets (walking back from the pub) and people riding bikes (occasionally with no lights on). I'm quite thankful for bright headlights.

Driving in the countryside, good headlights are *so* much safer.

This is exactly what high beams are for, and even 20 year old cars have very bright high beams that are plenty safe.

The problem referred to in the article is dipped beam headlights being too bright and often too high, which are making things less safe by dazzling other drivers and road users.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#78

Post by Aachen »

Where I live, it's customary to let other drivers know by flashing your brights when they're blinding you or if there's some other issue with their vehicle like a broken tail light or such. Maybe less now that you can't easily change the bulb yourself but as a principle

In recent years I've started being unable to tell who's intentionally blinding traffic and who's just got misconfigured lamps (shining at eye level instead of angled down at the road). It used to be feasible to also let people know when their lights are misconfigured, I'd probably decide 1 warrants a signal across several hours of driving (also because of avoiding collateral targets), but the most recent time I drove, I think there was always at least one car in sight that had the issue. It's completely constant. It was worsening a few years ago but it's really getting out of hand now, in Germany and the Netherlands at least. Some people's lights are even piercing by day! Thankfully that is quite rare yet

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#79

Post by WesolyKubeczek »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #37
nikanj wrote: post #13

The bane of my existence is the new "smart" matrix lights, which claim you don't have to switch to low beams for incoming traffic. I bet they work great in AutoCAD or perfect vacuum, but in reality you have the pesky atmosphere scattering the bright photons every which way - guaranteeing at least 40% hitting my poor retinas.

The only solution is to fit a 300W LED bar and consistently flash those guys until they are bothered enough to go into the menu of their computer-on-wheels and turn off this "feature".

...or piss those guys enough that they will call police on you for blinding them and creating a road hazard, or someone unhinged enough gets pissed off and will follow you, after which your behind will dearly regret buying such a long LED bar.

This is the same kind of useful advice as the one to brake check those whose driving style you don't like very much, fight (real or perceived) road hazard with deliberately creating more hazard.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#80

Post by delaminator »

everdrive wrote: post #10

I understand that currently this is sort of a collective action problem, but I'm a bit baffled why people ever thought they needed brighter headlights in the first place. In the city, it's so bright that you don't even need headlights to see whatsoever. When cars started automatically dimming the dash via a light sensor, there was actually a period of time where I totally forgot to turn on my headlights because thing…

> Out in the country, you still don't really need brighter headlights.

I guess you don't actually drive at night in the countryside then.

You need lights to see where the road is, not where pedestrians might be - on none existent footpaths

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