|
I seem to have been taken by surprise by this new lighting development that I see a lot now on Rangerover Sports and other big 'pimpy' suvs - are these very bright ice/blue/white lights legal? I know I shouldn't look at them but they really are distracting and dazzling
|
These are the new discharge rather than filament based lights. I forget the name, Xenon I think but I'm sure I've known of that for ages.
Don't know how the poxy things got approved.
|
|
|
|
They must be the ones with zenon lights. I find them dazzling too at times. Add in the nerds in front waiting at the lights with their brakes on & there's no respite for the eyes...
|
|
Xenon sorry, I stand corrected...
|
|
|
there's no respitefor the eyes...
what with the perpetual flashing of speed and paparazzi cameras, traffic lights, flashing LEDs on pushbiles and the crazed glitter of people's fangs and eyes as they snarl at each other, it's a wonder any of us can still see at all. Very sensible of HJ, those shades...
|
|
I suppose we'll get used to them after a while when they become the "norm". It was the same when Halogen lights first came out, you could see an Austin Allegro miles away coming in the other direction.
|
|
|
|
But to look on the "bright" side - replacement xenon bulbs run around £125 + VAT and new headlights (for a Citroen C5) are around £800 each! so he will pay the price for dazzling everyone at some point in the future.
|
|
|
|
|
The real issue is that these lights aren't too bad on normal cars - it's the height above the road on SUVs that are the problem.
|
Yes but it's their right to drive vehicles which by design will do this, and you have no right to impeach on it.
;-)
|
|
Re-read my post, I'm not making any judgement on the rights or wrongs of SUVs, I'm simply stating a fact.
|
|
Oh come on I even put a ;-)
|
I agree, the light from these bulbs is terrible - hard on the eyes and can't be good for night vision.
I would vote for a ban.
|
Paint 'em all yellow! ; )
---
Xantia HDi.
Buy a Citroen and get to know the local GSF staff better...
|
|
|
I'm with you on that.
Out of interest (On principle, I wouldn't drive a vehicle which ran the risk of dazzling someone and causing an accident), what is the purported benefit of these lights, is it purely a 'statement' or does the driver of such a vehicle have improved visibility, even if nobody else does?
|
Surely, it is not simply the fact that the lights are mounted higher off the road. Lights on trucks have been high off the ground for ever. It is down to the angle of dip of the headlight units.
Brighter and whiter/bluer they may be, but rather that than driving around with defective lights.
|
|
The "height from ground" debate is my fault, I mentioned SUVs because I've mostly seen these lights on SUVs, however, I've also seen them on Jags, BMWs and other nearer to the ground 'flash' motors - and the lights are just as blindin'
|
I think this post is getting lots of confusion in it.
1 Any headlamp (whatever type and whatever vehicle) should not dazzle any other road users. Another point where speed cameras do not help and traffic police would !
2 Xenon is what is fitted to uprate halogen headlights.
3 High intensity gas discharge lamps (fitted to newere, better motors) give a blue appearance to others but a whiter light, and if angled correctly not dazzling. Far more helpful for all road users becaus eof better light.
4 Tinted lights (xr3i style) which are usually halogen with a blue tint which decrease light output but increase the style of the car (so some say!) or make it obvious its a tw chav driving it !
Hope this helps some confusion !
|
|
|
|
Brighter lights = better visibility, for the driver that is.
Some cars have the lights set too high on dipped beam, so that if there's something heavy in the boot the lights can dazzle other drivers. You notice this when being followed by such a car on a bumpy bit of road: the lights 'flash' as the car alters its attitude over bumps.
After years of proper MoT testing, many fewer cars have one headlight pointing straight into your face when the other is dipped, but they are still to be seen. I notice that drivers are better at dipping promptly than they used to be, too.
I was driven a long way in Nigeria in a car whose headlights were wall-eyed - pointing outwards at the road verges and leaving the actual road in total darkness. I found this so alarming that I persuaded the driver to let me try to adjust them. However this always takes a long time, especially in the bush in the middle of the night, and I was not allowed to finish the job. Neither the driver nor his henchmen, who were also present, really thought I was right, and Nigerians are nothing if not extremely impatient. Fortunately however we survived.
|
a lot of rally cars used to adjust their lights like that.
use dipped beam to point at either hedge, and then set spots for the road. Then whatever position the car got into (apart from backwards!) there was always some light on the road/track !
|
I am not any sort of expert on xenon lights, but from looking at manufacturers brochures etc. I gather that they are
a) Expensive, as usually an option around £700 or so
b) designed to be self levelling when manufacturer installed
c) usually on the dipped beam element only - main are still halogen
b) is part of the reason for a) ;-)
Some people do aftermarket fitting, and then the self levelling part is absent. There is some argument about the legality of these?
|
|
The self-levelling systems aren't great. This morning I was in front of a newish BMW 5-series with HID's. For some reason he'd left his headlights on (it was fairly light) and I kept thinking he was flashing them at me. He wasn't, it was just a rather bumpy road and they are **very** bright when angled right at your rear view mirror. In fact even though it was quite bright I was still dazzled by these HIDs in my mirror - the self-levelling clearly couldn't keep up with the road bumps. last winter I also drove a Vauxhall with HID's on some bumpy rural roads and it was terrible - the lights were bouncing up and down the road.
|
|
Some "drivers" leave them on as a status symbol (one can only assume) - the auto light setting may have been on...
|
|
I hjaven't driven behind HIDs but the white light is a great improvement to night vision. It is much easier and relaxing on the eye to see real colour rather than a sodium tinged monochrome. However, I was driving on the unlit M55 last week and firmly suspended BMW with regular lights came up behind me. He was bouncing all over a smooth motorway road causing great annoyance to those in front of him. So it's not just the HID's that cause problems.
|
|
The fundamental problem does seem to be that the levelling systems are designed to cope with changes in the angle of the vehicle due to loading, not short term changes due to speed bumps / potholes. I had a beemer 650 following me across the New Forest the other evening and his HID lamps were more or less permanently dazzling me.:-/
|
|
|
|
|
|
Yes, sorry - thought after I posted it! Next time I'll do it the other way round :-)
|
|
|
|
|
