People, driving at night, and (blue) headlights

[Ted]

I don't live in the city. We don't have streetlights. And I regularly go out walking with the lights off (turned on when there is a reason to such as a car passing). I can easily see 1/4 mile down the road, in pine forest. I can only surmise that you've never tried this.

Sure, I've gone out walking plenty of times in the country with no street lights. Completely different than driving. When was the last time you went out and tired driving with no headlights at night?

Many folks who live "in the country" don't really know what a dark site is like because the "country" in some places looks just like the suburbs.

You never saw where I lived.

 

[Ted]

That works perfectly well when walking along at 5 mph. Your eyes can gather plenty of information in time to avoid problems. Not so at 60 mph.

That pothole, branch in the road, sand in the road? Would be hard to see and process in time without lighting.

Nevermind other visual cues like where the road turns into a ditch.

 

[Unbeliever]

Most factory vehicles now a days come with hid lights. I put a kit in my truck and love them.

Aftermarket HID kits are almost universally not-road-legal. The factory ones are legal because their housings are designed to properly disperse the HID light and block the light from being projected where it shouldn't be.

--Carlos "almost because all absolutes are false" V.

 

[ClimbnSink]

When was the last time you went out and tired driving with no headlights at night?

I've done that a bunch it isn't difficult. With no streetlights snow cover and a moon it is easier to drive at night with the lights out.

 

[Ted]

I've done that a bunch it isn't difficult. With no streetlights snow cover and a moon it is easier to drive at night with the lights out.

Sure. And how about when there's no moon?

 

[ClimbnSink]

Sure. And how about when there's no moon?

Still not hard most of the time. Blasting headlights are a sign of weakness.

 

[RJM62]

The phenomenon of people not dimming their lights seems a regional thing. It may also have to do with familiarity with the roads.

Where I live, for 10 months out of the year, everyone dims their lights pretty much immediately when there's oncoming traffic, sometimes before the actual oncoming vehicle is even seen. You see the glare past the hill or around the turn before you see the actual vehicle, and then you see the glare dim. In other words, we dim in anticipation before we can even see each others' vehicle, just based on the glare.

It's the very rare driver who doesn't dim. Most times you can tell it's because they weren't using the high beams to begin with. I don't always use mine on familiar roads, especially with a good moon. Other times the driver's mind is just wandering and they dim late, when they realize they forgot.

It's in the summer, especially on Friday nights, that you encounter the non-dimmers. They're tourists from downstate who are unfamiliar with the roads and unaccustomed to driving on unlit roads in general. In New York City and its immediate surrounding areas, even most of the Interstates are lit. Up here, streetlights are rare except when passing through the occasional village. The rest of our winding, twisting roads that meander up and down the mountains are unlit.

The fact that the non-dimmers also drive really, really slooooowly leads me to believe that they're just so uncomfortable with the whole idea of driving at night on country roads that they're simply afraid to dim.

I sometimes get stuck behind these folks. They're usually driving minivans or SUVs, laden with their spawn in the back and their paraphernalia on the roof, driving 20 in a 55 (most of our roads have no posted speed limits, meaning the speed limit is based on conditions, with a maximum of 55), braking at every turn of the road, with high beams on all the way.

What's funny is that people make fun of old folks' driving, but my town (and county, and region) is flush with old folks, none of whom drive as timidly and indecisively as the young folks who are on vacation. They're pretty comical unless you're in a hurry and stuck behind one of them.

Fortunately, there's rarely any reason to be in a hurry up here, anyway.

-Rich

 

[Bill]

Still not hard most of the time. Blasting headlights are a sign of weakness.

So is flying with a parachute all the time

Nice troll, stinky bait.

 

[ClimbnSink]

So is flying with a parachute all the time

Nice troll, stinky bait.

Haha Rich said the same thing I did, he just used more electrons.

 

[us AAirways]

I always wonder about those guys who continually get flashed by oncoming traffic, but won't adjust their headlights to stop blinding everyone else. :wink2:

I gave my son that lecture a few weeks back when he made the same comment, and it took all of 10 minutes to fix his problem.

If they don't dim their lights, toss some road stars out the window into the oncoming lane.

 

[Dan Thomas]

Many years ago (40), before it was outlawed, I installed aircraft landing lights in the high-beam sockets of my '68 Ford (four-light system). Anyone who didn't dim for me sure did it quick enough with a brief flash from those high beams. The drawbacks: the beams were too narrow and didn't light up the margins enough, and such hazards as deer about to corss the road didn't show up if I was too close. And the 100-watt bulbs overheated the headlight switch, which had a self-resetting breaker designed for the normal 55-watt high beams. ALL the lights would go out.

Dan

 

[RJM62]

The problem isn't so much the intensity, it's the glare and the instant, painful, destruction of the rhodopsin in the eyes that's the problem with the blue color light. You could have just as intense of a light in an amber range and you would actually have better ability to see without blinding oncoming traffic. There is no real need for having great color acuity when driving at night.

That's another reason I say it's basically a small penis thing. It's like, "Look at me! I have more powerful lights than you! I can blind you if I want! HAHAHAHAhahahaha!"

The reality of it is that blue light does nothing to improve visual acuity. In fact, it makes it worse.

-Rich