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Thanks sirron, I thought that rear fog lights were not fitted in US cars.
That really surprised me.
They can be a pain in the butt when people use them inappropriately, but are invaluable in the right circumstances.
Jezer, as Sirron correctly notes, U.S. law doesn't require them. (But honestly, if we U.S.-ers can't even use front-facing fog lights correctly, do you REALLY think we'd manage the proper use of REAR fog lights???) However, U.S. versions of some Euro-cars (M-B, Audi, etc.) do come with rear fog lights. Except some of the empty-headed owners of these cars either don't know what they're for. OR leave 'em on riding around on sunny days...
This is God's way of thinning out the biblically stupid. White cars are the worst offenders of driving in snow and fog without lights. Not sure why. But, I also see professional drivers of big trucks and police cars doing the same thing. Running lights are great to see the car behind me, but they are of no consequence. If you need headlights, you need taillights.
My lights come on when I start my SUV. I want you to see me even if you are on your phone, texting, putting on makeup, reading, or talking over your shoulder to kids in the back seat. It amazes me how often I'm still invisible to other drivers.
If you don't have yours on I view you as an idiot.
I encountered this problem on my way home this morning. Maximum visibility: 1/4 mile. I had to make a decision to either take side roads home at lower speeds and contend with hundreds of low-visibility intersections along the way, or take the expressway home where speeds are higher but there are no intersections. I chose the latter. As I'm absolutely white-knuckling it at 50mph in the right lane hoping that gives me enough time to stop if there's anything or anyone in the roadway, people are blowing by me at up to 70mph -- lots of them with no lights on. I don't even understand how they could see anything at 70 miles an hour. Lights or no lights, you might as well just be driving with an off-white sheet of paper in front of your face.
I'll be amazed if we make it through the morning with no news of any motorists being killed. I will never understand why we as a society countenance such malignant stupidity.
About a month ago we drove on the Interstate in very dense fog, and it was white knuckle all the way. Luckily there wasn't a lot of traffic. I happened to end up following a car that was driving at about the same speed so I stayed back far enough to see his tail lights, barely.
That car was my "early warning system". If I saw those lights come on I was slowing down, fast. Never happened.
Well, there aren't really "back roads" around here. In my neck of the concrete woods, the city thoroughfares are heavily trafficked and there's an intersection a minimum of every 1/8th of a mile -- more often than not it's every 16th of a mile. I could have stayed off the thoroughfares and taken residential side streets all the way home, but that would have stretched out my 8-mile commute to the better part of an hour and I still would have had to cross a couple dozen major thoroughfares along the way. From a safety standpoint it should have been a much safer bet to take the expressway, and even with the manifest imbecility going on it probably still was. But god damn that was an aggravating drive.
Kind of like the bozos who drive with just their parking/running lights on until it's almost dark. Never understood that one. I guess they think they look cool
Just turn on your headlights and get it over with.
DRLs (daytime running lights) are automatic, and don't require driver input, so I doubt it's people thinking they are cool.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Trucker7
Many of the newer cars with daytime running lights also illuminate the instrument panel all the time. When you turn on your lights, comes up. Nothing else. At night, the drivers looks at the road, and is lit by his daytime running lights, then looks at his instrument panel, and is also lit so he thinks that everything's ok, not realizing that his taillights and side markers are OFF.
My car does this, and the dash lights up at night.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sonata36
Because so many cars have auto-on headlights now that people can't decide for themselves when to turn on headlights...?
I have never seen a car in the fog without lights on before, though...probably because I can't see them in the first place!
I think this is what is actually happening more often than not.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jtur88
The quasi-scientific answer is this. The reason it is difficult to see through fog is because the droplets intercept and disperse the blue end of the light spectrum. Throwing a lot of dispersed blue light into the fog just creates a distracting halo glare, as the light bounces back to you. Since standard headlights contain some blue light, turning your lights on just adds more glare, which is why fog lights are amber. If you drive in fog with low beam, you can minimize the glare at eye level, so it is true that you should not use your brights in fog. The reason fog lights are mounded as close as possible to the ground is because fog is least-dense (and often absent) at ground level, and the light from lower sources can penetrate further before being reflected back to your eye.
The above has gotten distilled down through serial folk-translations to "Turn your headlights off in the fog".
However, that ignores the essential principle that, except in deep darkness, the reason you use your headlights is not so that you can see the road better, but so other drivers can see and be aware of you. If you turn on your headlights and you can't tell if they are on or off, the ONLY thing they are doing usefully is making you visible to other drivers.
By the way, if you wear amber-tinted sun-glasses (such as blue-blockers) when driving in fog, you will be amazed how much more clearly you can see objects in the distance. I always wear mine in fog. They block out the scattered blue light rays that have been diffracted by the fog, and only "true source" light waves reach your eye.
Finally, someone with the real answer. I was always told, and have experienced, that fog reflects headlights, so having headlights, or "brights" on may be worse than not having them on at all. This does NOT mean that parking or running lights should be off as well. That makes no sense. I would never turn off all my lights on a public road at night or during inclement weather.
The point of having your lights on in fog, or in low light dusk/dawn conditions for that matter, isn't so much to help you see but to help you be seen.
As a note, people who drive with their parking lights on drive me crazy.
The point of having your lights on in fog, or in low light dusk/dawn conditions for that matter, isn't so much to help you see but to help you be seen.
As a note, people who drive with their parking lights on drive me crazy.
This, and this.
People who drive only with their fog or running lights on (when there's no reason to use either) seem to me the mopst pathetic of poseurs: Oh wow, look, I have the ability to turn on my parking lights and nothing
else. Oh teh techmology. Wow!
Jezer, as Sirron correctly notes, U.S. law doesn't require them. (But honestly, if we U.S.-ers can't even use front-facing fog lights correctly, do you REALLY think we'd manage the proper use of REAR fog lights???) However, U.S. versions of some Euro-cars (M-B, Audi, etc.) do come with rear fog lights. Except some of the empty-headed owners of these cars either don't know what they're for. OR leave 'em on riding around on sunny days...
I don't recal when rear fogs were a part of Vovlo tradition and I should, but don't. I do know my 85 wagon has them, but I don't dare use them. Whgen I do the dash lights have failed and the brake warning lamp in the dash has illuminated. And so then I use them manually as brake lights, that works. I don't know why that all is since the brake lights are not on the same fuse. I haven't looked deeply either. I suspect there are several fuses on the same 12+ vlt in line though.
The old style German fuses with pointed ends do leave a bit of something desired.
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) However, U.S. versions of some Euro-cars (M-B, Audi, etc.) do come with rear fog lights. Except some of the empty-headed owners of these cars either don't know what they're for. OR leave 'em on riding around on sunny days...
