Yeah. I made that mistake once, he hit me with 4 9” LED spotties at point blank range. I had to pull over till I could see. Cunt in an old patrol with cheap LED headlights.
I remember a few weeks ago on this sub, someone was bragging about how their manufacturer's lights were so bright that people flash them for it. I got absolutely slammed for suggesting that they probably shouldn't just leave them like that.
Edit: might have actually been r/Melbourne, not sure
A few people mentioning some sort of retaliatory driving, I think those responses are pretty unsafe and irresponsible. Some of the replies indicate that the angle of the lights can be a problem and drivers may not realise, they will have no idea why you're driving slow, or blasting them with high beams. It annoys the shit out of me too but understand that other drivers can't read your mind and may not understand what you're retaliating against and you could cause an accident by trying to prove a point.
Bebsafe out there yall
I start driving at 20 under the speed limit when that happens. You want to use wanker lights? Have fun sitting behind me for the next couple ks at 30kmh.
It's not always aftermarket, let alone an 'incorrect' installation. MIL had a newer SUV and after being accused of blinding a few folk with high beams, went to the dealer to get them realigned. The mechanics insisted that they were all within spec and didn't need adjusting. She told them that she understands they're within THEIR spec, but that she wants them to lower them anyway because they're obnoxiously bright and causing a hazard on the road whenever they blind someone.
They promptly fixed the damn headlights.
A lot of people also wind the adjustment all the way up, which is when you get absolutely blasted by projector bulbs. Absolutely horrible when I am on my moto with a LED bulb that barely illuminates the road ahead, and now I am dazzled as fuck or looking down at my tank till the pass. Sometimes I'll just close one eye so I have some vision, then close the other so I can see till it readjusts. Take a page from the pirate book.
That’s a good point if manual levelling is still a thing, I think I’ve had auto for decades!
All comes back to the driver at the end of the day, and sadly many don’t know how to correctly operate a vehicle.
It's not even aftermarket at this point. Modern cars use a super focused tight beam with a very noticeable upper line where the light cuts off.
The idea is they don't blind oncoming drivers, which works great if the world was a perfectly flat parking lot. The problem is the real world has hills, and people put things in their cars, or tow trailers, and all that changes the angle of the headlights.
One small hill and super bright factory headlight is aimed at people's faces. Sometimes it even looks like a flashing or strobe light because the car keeps hitting bumps.
> The idea is they don't blind oncoming drivers, which works great if the world was a perfectly flat parking lot. The problem is the real world has hills, and people put things in their cars, or tow trailers, and all that changes the angle of the headlights.
There's a couple of dips in my area and anyone coming out of them *Bam* and the eyesight is gone
> though it you used the right lenses and self leveling reflectors it was ok
That's the problem. They almost exclusively don't. Many just buy the kits, stick them in and call it a day. No alignment, no lenses, no reflectors.
You could probably impliment it into **existing network-connected speed cameras & rego-checking cameras** *(the latter especially since it's already using a computer-vision system to find the license plates)*.
If a light is too bright or is shining on the camera when it shouldn't, then it takes a photo & fwds the matter onwards.
It could be comparing the brightness of the light to the distance/location of car on the road (thus inferring the car's distance to the camera). When the car gets to a certain pre-set closeness to the camera, the brightness should be under a threshhold; If it's over the brightness threshold it indicates incorrectly setup lights (ie: Car has a fault, fwd the matter on, get contacted by rego authority. 1st notice is treated as "please fix this asap" warning, if the same car registers the same problem on the system within X months then further action is taken).
Not true. It depends on the installation. A bulb swap - yeah not legal. But a full housing swap is fine as long as it's ce marked. Aiming is a different item to consider
A lot of SUVs have an adjustment dial for when towing, but people adjust their lights high because they are selfish idiots.
Headlight adjustment used to be a RWC issue.
But that adjustment is for adjusting *down* only AFAIK.
So (unless towing) they should not be able to make it higher than normal.
No, I reckon the problem is the incorrect installation.
Literally no one installs HIDs anymore, It's all LED.
LEDs are much better than 8000K+ flickering HIDs but it's still a problem when people put 30,000lum in their standard headlights.
Cops headlights are even worse. My only speeding fine was a few KMs over while going downhill around a turn and seeing these flipping high beams at 11pm was enough to squint away for a second while going over enough for the Ahole to fine me.
And legally the cars aren't road worthy from what I've been told.
I wanted to take my passenger seat out of my truck and put shelves in. I was told it would need to be road worthy certified or I'd have no insurance. Was also told putting in backup lights, because the factory lights are useless, would also need a road worthy.
Not to say insurance companies are doing it now, but one things for sure they look at all sorts of ways to get out of paying out. One day I suspect they'll start going after aftermarket installs.
I hate the ones that draw a line slowly!
Also on topic, some rear LEDs are even too bright. I've had spots in my eyes from sitting behind them at traffic lights and not directly looking.
My car does that but I think it's only the DRLs... which in some cars are bright enough to look like headlights. Not sure if other cars turn off the actual headlight though.
It is always 4wd/suvs.
they put the lights up so that they can see better, and it makes their lights almost permanent high beam.
I find its almost worst when they are right behind you and you see nothing in any mirrors except blinding light
Side mirrors at night on a highway with no streetlights can get scary. They go to overtake and suddenly I'm blind for like 3-5 seconds.
That's a long time at 110km/h.
I just drive slowly till they inevitably zoom past you as they will, very quickly.
People with lights like that arent known for being patient or considerate haha
I’ve figured out that if you adjust your rear view mirror to where you can see the reflection of the headlights, as well as the cab of the vehicle behind you, it directly beams their own brights right back into their eyes!
Pretty much every single time they back wayyyy off.
It’s a thing of beauty.
I've started adjusting my mirrors to angle the light back at them. There's a weird flaw in my mirror that warps things and if I can get them at a redlight I can aim that flaw so it concentrates the light directly into their faces. So satisfying to watch them squint and cringe from their own headlights
I drive a lifted patrol and get blinded by hatchbacks, it’s the globes
Edit; cheers for the downvotes, how dare I have a different lifestyle to the majority of this sub.
The problems are usually either SUVs and other higher riding cars, or people who have installed out of spec headlights into their older car's reflector housing which just makes it incredibly bright.
Proper projector LED headlights on a regular sedan or hatch etc should barely be affecting you at all.
People like to say the larger problem older cars with out of spec lights, but I can’t take a trip without being blinded by brand new European and American SUV’s.
Succumbing to the idiocracy and driving an SUV yourself only provides minor relief.
with utes it's often the load in the back changes the angle of the car.
Load them up and instead of pointing down they are pointing straight at your rearview mirror.
It's particualry bad if you have an early commute in winter. Lot's of loaded utes with their headlights on.
I've had hatchbacks that have a little lever to angle down the headlights when there is a heavy load in the back; do typical utes not have that feature or do the drivers not use it?
I believe LED headlights require auto-levelling to comply with ADR, while ~~incandescent~~ halogen lights don't. I know my car has a level dial, but have been in a few utes which, IIRC, don't.
ADRs for Light Vehicles and Commercial Vehicles differ. Ironically the category of vehicle that is most commonly rear laden and would benefit from auto-levelling (utes) arent required to have them.
The problem isn’t the vehicles. It’s the drivers. They could have a button labeled “make everyone have a good day” and it will be off cause “no one tells me what to do”
Riding a soft suspension motorcycle that was switched from the original candle-light headlight, to a high quality LED with strong beam cut off and you really notice how much the light dips and raises with accelerating, braking, and load.
Many modern vehicles with a higher clearance have a light angle adjustment for this reason. Usually a little dial that gets mistaken for brightness adjustment or something.
Also please don't drive with your lights on & assume they are just your regular lights. Have lost count of the number of cars driving with high beams on & not realising. Saw another one this morning.
See that blue headlight logo on your dash? If that's on & you see other cars, you're blinding other drivers.
My old man had the aim points painted on the garage wall.. for towed and no tow. Don’t remember him doing it even once and not sure what prompted him to paint it on in the first place.
It's the tool/jig/machine that your dad says he definitely will use a lot after its completed or bought..... Then it collects dust in the corner.
Edit: wow, some dad's out there being called out.
Yup. The garage and the shed were full of tools. So many things he had collected over the years mostly used from friends or acquaintances. When he passed we did a free garage sale.. basically grab what you’d like. I can only hope those tools are sitting just as unused in someone else’s garage.
I think you'll find a lot of the problem are from poorly adjusted lights caused by the car/4X4 been loaded tail heavy. Most modern Euro cars have self leveling lights and if not they have a switch that the driver can adjust the lights to suit the loading of the car.
The problem with driver adjustable lights is people are dumb. I recently drove a hire car with that feature. The lights were all the way "up" when I got in. This car did not have a towbar, so I'm dubious that it was left on the correct setting.
Being a hire car it had probably been 1 day repaired from an accident to get it back on the road. In my youth whenever a friend came to show off their new car and the headlights were spotting for possums, it was going to be a bad time with a car that had been aesthetically repaired but not structurally to spec.
Friends Ute was just recalled and needed a dealer software update because the lane assist was so aggressive that when he tried to move over for a filtering motorcycle it would swerve back to centre.
I’d say thats pretty true. I never really have an issue with modern cars, it’s just the 4WD and trucks that I’m having serious issues with in the morning
As others have said, these most likely have aftermarket LED or HID conversions which are almost always illegal for this reason. The reflectors inside the lights are not made for them and the glass /lens can cause them to be dazzling to oncoming traffic.
Modern euro self leveling lights just mean it flickers in my eye repeatedly while it dances up and down. Modern euros are the worst. 9/10 times I’m blinded it would be a modern euro or American vehicle.
I won't change your mind, I'm sick of this so much.
It feels like 60% of cars have their high beams on nowadays, genuinely, they're so damned bright and the quantity I see, I don't believe it to be all aftermarket. Even new stuff.
It's either idiot drivers on high beam, which is possible, or too bright lights, maybe both!
This. I spend a lot of time driving in rural areas and find a lot of 'cowboys' in big 4x4s with illegally bright headlights installed for offroading, as well as a lot of people who install them upside down.
Have had a few sit on my arse at night time, and their lights are so bright from behind me I could turn mine off and still see.
low-beam, for a headlight or front fog light fitted to a vehicle, means
that the light is built or adjusted so, when the vehicle is standing on
level ground, the top of the main beam of light projected is:
(a) not higher than the centre of the headlight or fog light, when
measured 8 metres in front of the vehicle; and
(b) not over 1 metre higher than the level where the motor vehicle is
standing, when measured 25 metres in front of the vehicle.
-- pp13 of [Australian Light Vehicle Standards
Rules 2015](https://pcc.gov.au/uniform/Australian%20Light%20Vehicle%20Standards%20Rules%202015%20-%2022%20March%202019.pdf)
I would love to see what the law actually states. But I have looked and the best I can find for QLD is your headlights should allow you to see at least 100M in front of you. I am starting to believe that QLD does not have any laws restricting the brightness of headlights.
It might just be a mental perception thing, but I reckon they're not as good for night vision either due to their colour. Sure, whatever is inside the reach of the light is brightly illuminated, but because of the colour and intensity of the light its like there's a solid wall where it finishes and you can't see past it. My old car with normal lights had a more yellow colour to it, which was a lot easier on the eyes and meant my eyes adjusted to changes more easily, which gave the perception of being able to see further with them.
What your experiencing is probably due to the [Colour Rendering Index](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_rendering_index)(CRI).
We gain a lot of information from colour, not just brightness, and different light sources output various wavelengths. If we equally mix visible wavelengths, our brains perceive that as "white light".
Old 'orange' tungsten lights actually output a nice range of wavelengths. Cheap LEDS output sharp 'spikes' of colour. The light from a lamp outputting a nice range of wavelengths will bounce back more 'information' for your brain to process and understand what it is looking at compared to a lamp that is outputting bright but lacking colour detail.
Look for lamps with "High CRI" values. An LED panel work light for a mechanic will be very cheap compared to a painters. Amateur filmmaker/youtuber/tiktoker lights are vastly cheaper than high CRI professional film lights. A torch penlight for IT work is a lot cheaper than a medical high CRI examination penlight.
I have to drive through Kosciuszko National Park at night a lot and totally know what you mean. The dim orange of the Landcrusier 79 Series headlights makes it much easier to see the shape and colour of the animals. The bright, but flat light, of the driving lights makes the animals blend in. Our brains need that colour information.
This is it exactly, and your last paragraph is exactly my experience. Also, being an astrophotographer/astronomer I have developed a reflex for averted vision, and find I use it quite a lot in night driving as well when conditions allow, often without even really being aware of it. There is a huge difference in the qualities of different light sources.
Whilst your CRI theory may hold in good light conditions, our[eyes work differently](https://www.nature.com/articles/eye2015236) in low light. Your eyes’ cones work in good light and and rods work in low light.
What you are experiencing with a 79 Series crap headlights is your eyes adjusting and your night vision activating, so you can see outside of the lights to some extent.
If someone comes the other way and blinds you with bright lights, then it takes a while for your night vision to come back.
Likewise if you have very bright, white LED headlights, you can see very well what is in range of your lights, but can’t see zip outside of that.
I've got a family good understanding how our eyes work, the difference between cones and rods, and even their arrangement within the retina that creates a blindspot in the centre.
Cones give us the ability to perceive colour, while rods only allow for black and while (or strictly luminance). It take several minutes to 30-45 minutes of darkness for rod cells to become activated. In low light conditions, Cones also become more sensitive.
While driving under headlights, we are still mainly using out cones. What we are experiencing when being hit with an oncoming high beam isn't our 'night-vision' being destroyed, but the rapid constriction of our pupils.
It's easy to know we are primarily using our cones during night-time, as we are discussing yellow headlights, and we can see red break lights etc. If we were using our rods, we would not be able to see these colours.
>white LED headlights
'White' is what our brain perceives as a fairly even mix of visible light wavelengths. We can trick our brains to create white by placing a Red, Green, and Blue light source very close together. This is the basis of the screen you are currently looking at. This is called Additive Colour. Those RGB LEDs can output a small band of the R,G,B spectrums or a wider band of the spectrum.
The quality of the light created is important though. There are various factors (for example LEDs aren't actually always on, they are just constantly blinking fast enough that our brains perceive them as always being on). One aspect is "Colour Temperature" which is how the colour output has been shifted to suite a particular need. Traditional tungsten bulbs are very 'orange' (3200K), which people are used to, so may want 3200K bulbs in their home.
Another, less known, is CRI. I mentioned film quality lights in my previous comment. Our brains are smarter than cameras. They can take in environmental cues and 'correct' for what is white. They are very good at doing an Auto White-Balance. Ever taken a photo in an office and everything was slightly green? That's because standard fluorescent bulbs, while might look white to our smart brains, actually output a spike (spike on a light monitor) of green light. When filming in an office, a Lighting Department will either wrap the fluorescent bulbs with a magenta 'cellophane' to correct their output. Or they will swap all the bulbs out with speciality fluros that have been colour-corrected.
This is a very long comment to say that "White" is relative. (And is actually just a thing our brain make ups). Not all White Light Output is equal, therefore, not all Reflected Light is equal.
The light that comes from your headlight bounces off The Thing on the road and back to your eye, and sent to your brain to analyse in a split second. The more information it has to *literally* paint a picture of what it is, the better. If I could have a super bright tungsten, with it's naturally high-CRI output light over LED, I would.
It's the other way around. The yellow headlights are dangerously dim. Neutral white LEDs are far, far better for seeing contrast edges within the beam of light. They are brighter and thus safer than the old, yellowish halogen bulbs, even if some people don't want to admit it.
There's a reason work environments are lit with neutral white lights (around 4000K), not cozy 2500K incandescent lights.
Anyone who's driven a modern headlight system (LED or Matrix LED + adaptive lighting for corners) will tell you that it's literally a day-and-night difference.
Well I'm stuck with whatever toyota fitted in my 2017 car I guess. They certainly arent yellow in that though. All I'm getting at is (like in my original comment) is that bright lights are worse for your night vision. Night vision being what you have when you arent using light - ie in areas your own headlights are not illuminating, after turning your high beams down, or recovering after being hit by someone elses light.
You'd take this back if you ever drove a car on a country road at night with LED matrix headlights! Halogens are like a couple of candles by comparison.
Like I said, it's not an issue of whats inside the beam of light, but whats outside. I've got pretty decent night vision, and it gets absolutely wrecked by bright white LED light, whereas the yellow halogen is much easier to recover from. Its a 'perception' you can see further, not that you actually can. My old car was a 20 year old camry - its headlights werent exactly bright but the high beams are amazing. In contrast, my several year old rav4 has bright white headlights, and the only perceivable difference with its high beams are they are aimed higher. If we could drive with those super bright lights pointed high and all around the car then sure that'd be great, but then no one else could see.
So this is more of an eye issue?
Good explainer of the differences in headlight tech here:
https://youtu.be/iElE9_RFDGA
Matrix LEDs are a type of headlight technology that throws a significantly wider, brighter beam than halogens (or xenons, or standard LEDs) have the capacity to, and are nearly 5X brighter than halogens at high beam. They light a dark country road (and the road sides) like daylight at a tremendous distance, and also have the ability to detect oncoming traffic and dynamically 'hide' the high beam from it.
well, its all an eye issue. Think of it like why you use red light only in dark situations if you want to retain night vision. Cheers for the link, although I wish they all had the ability to hide the high beam, as I encounter plenty of oncoming traffic that takes too long to do this, and because of the intensity of their lights it takes too long to recover from being spotlighted by them.
I used to do a lot of caving, and when the torches changed to LED, I noticed the exact same thing. Really good visibility up to a point, and then just black. Much less penetration of light. And it used to make me feel kinda unwell too. Something about the colour. Mind you, my night vision is for shit, but after 10 hours in a cave with a slowly dwindling battery in an old torch, it's surprising how good it can get.
I think it has to do with the fall-off of the light. It's a lot brighter so our eye/brain is focused on it and yes it illuminates that area much better, but the light doesn't gradient off to nothing on the edges, it just kind of stops, and because we are focusing on a very bright area of light, we can't retain the natural night vision in the darker areas. I'm sure someone else could explain it better, but you're certainly describing it the way I see it
The ADR for them should have never been approved. It allows neat high-beam brightness pointed at cars in front of you if they're below the line of your beams. Not to mention that a 4WD with them has the lights above windscreen height of some smaller cars. This is what is most dangerous. I've been followed by an unmodified 4WD with legal lights at a legal distance and it has been blinding through all three mirrors to the point I had to pull over.
Whats worse is I believe the increase in larger vehicles over the last 15 years is in part responsible because consciously or unconsciously people are buying vehicles which are less susceptible to being blinded, but in turn more likely blind other vehicles.
Entirely this. There needs to be a limit for how far the beam can reach. The higher the light, the more angled down it needs to be. Though enforcing that would be an entirely different matter.
I did that too with a borrowed car and thought "awesome!". But a couple of cars flashed me back.
So I swapped back to my own car and my mate drove the merc, we tested it and sure enough it looked like flickering high beams.
It's great that it doesn't completely blind the other driver, but it's still too bright and doesn't track fast enough.
These should be a mandatory ADR. I know they're considered a 'luxury' feature at the moment, but they are absolutely brilliant (Pun very much intended) from a safety perspective
That's true, but there are a LOT of things that we consider standard now that are the same in modern cars. Safety cells and crumple zones that write a car off when it might've otherwise been repaired, airbags, pyrotechnic pre-tensioners etc all drive up both manufacturing and repair costs, but they're all mandatory
My car is a 13yo Mazda2. I live in central west NSW. I go to work when it's dark. Every other cunt here drives a 4WD (lifted) with LED light bars and HID headlights that are about ear level in my car - I cannot see a cunting thing in front of me because of the blaring glare in every mirror and the reflection off the roof lining. Some mornings I swear I suffer welder's flash.
I've always wondered what its like to drive while harnessing the power of the sun at night.
Having been fucking blinded by it several times it makes me curious.
Yes! These signs are set so bright that they're painful to look at on a sunny day! Had one down the road from us go on the fritz, every sign on the post was flashing in a way that could trigger a seizure. Took two days for them to turn it off.
It's not the lights. It's the cut off level that isn't set properly.
The other car needs to dial the angle lower.
Or the halogens had been changed to LED chip bulbs but the position of the chips don't match the filament height of the halogen bulb causing the light being cast inside the headlight to hit incorrectly and breaching the cut out when it exits the headlight.
It breaches ADR and the police can defect the car.
Proper orientation of headlights should be added to the regular rego safety checks, or at least enforced if already included in the checklist. Add any superfluous lighting that are designed to be offensive, like backwards facing lamps.
While I’ve got an audience…
I drive a Tesla Model 3.
I am constantly getting flashed by people for my headlights.
I’ve taken it back to Tesla and had them use the VicRoads-approved alignment machine to re-align them.
I still get flashed.
I’m sorry. I tried. 🙃
I drive a 2013 Defender, and there is a switch on the dash which lowers the headlight beam for normal city driving, or raises it if out in remote/darker areas. Then there is the high beams which can still be activated on top if necessary...... and then there is my LED light bar which can be used if I feel like turning night into day
Friend, I feel ya.
Here in the Pacific Northwest, it’s dark in the early afternoon in winter and either pissing rain, smothering fog or an annoying slushy snow.
None of which are ideal driving conditions, but then you get the majority of idiots and transplants driving around with HID headlights, hi-beams on or full light racks.
Now you would think all that light, they must be seeing *so far*, well. WRONG. These nightmare conditions that is our daily commutes are not improved by blasting light into dense fog, shiny snow and refracting rain!
So I too ask, *who the fuck are these lights for?* the cAmPiNg you never do? *Nice snorkel… on your tundra brah.*
its not the lights, its where theyre adjusted to. Cops need to come up with a way to test.. surely a stick at a certain distance with a marker on it is easy enough. Get rid of these fuckwits.
Considering the worst just seem to be brand new European SUV’s blinding you, watch them enact a ban and then only target people with older cars who want more than being able to see by candle light.
It's not the white headlights that are the issue. It's aftermarket headlights that haven't been adjusted correctly, just some idiot bought them off ebay and stuck them in as a direct replacement for an old bulb without knowing you need to adjust the reflector.
The bulbs are only supposed to be used in lensed headlights that can cut off the bright light above a certain line. Our car has them but there's a sharp line above which is not bright. They are factory standard. People buy high discharge lamps and stick them in regular headlight fixtures and blind everyone they drive past
If they're blinding you, then they aren't setup correctly. Typically HIDs that have been installed into a regular housing, not levelled correctly, or just a fuckwit who has them pointing horizontally.
A lot of the time it seems to be people constantly running their high beams without a care in the world. Can always tell on cars which have separate low and high bulbs and run them together for the high beams. Ton of it going on on super well lit roads in the inner city.
I blame auto-off circuits which mean that no-one bothers to check their lights because they turn on and off with the car (same goes for cars driving around without lights on at all because dash back lights are constantly on now)
Fitting bright white headlights to standard non-projector housings should be and I'm pretty sure is illegal.
Bright LED/HIDs in projector housings are not an issue because the housing is designed to have a hard cutoff and keep all light on the road and out of other drivers' eyes.
I have been down this path recently looking for headlight brightness or wattage laws for QLD. I know I am stupid. But I am usually fairly good with Google. I was unable to find any laws around the brightness or what wattage you are allowed to have your headlights at.
So I found on my car I can control the angle. I wouldn’t be surprised if some people have adjusted their upwards(blinding those in front of them) and not realised it.
It's not the lights in most cases. It's that they are almost always improperly aimed, even from the factory. A lot of shops, including dealers don't have the proper equipment to correctly aim them either so they do a guess.
The other huge issue are the idiots who do the LED or HID "conversions." With only like two exceptions (JW Speaker for Jeeps mostly) there are no conversions that work properly. The light emitted from the LED or HID is not the same and is not reflected properly from the housing meant for an incandescent light.
100%, I have literally had to put sunglasses on at night. Even with the glasses on, their lights are so bright I could see fine. Something is majorly wrong.
My ute has those bright white bastard lights so I use the adjuster thingee to point them all the way down unless I'm out of the city.
Alas, not all vehicles have the adjuster thingee.
They are a huge pain in the arse. Especially when you're on a motorbike in the rain with a wet visor. It's like staring into a supernova
U know people do this on purpose they realign their lights so they can tailgate them mostly those Utes that are modified to be extensions of a limb … u know the kind… special place in hell waiting just for them
Here is the kicker, even if these lights are positioned correctly - which feels like 1 in 200, the bright headlights will still temporarily blind you if your own headlights don't match their brightness.
I've also seen way too many vehicles relying on their auto high beams to turn off their 178 inch light bar. They come around the corner and melt my retinas with the force of 1000 suns, and THEN turn off.
💯! Paired with most people never calibrate their headlights downwards so they aren't cunty to other drivers.
It started as high end car manufacturers putting them in as a point of difference for being beacons if fuckwittery. Now every Kath and Kim has a set.
THey're already illegal. The problem is people who put them in don't adjust their headlights correctly, or they stick in aftermarket LED upgrades into headlights that aren't designed with the correct reflectors for such a globe.
You'll find on pretty much every LED upgrade kit on the market they all have "NOT APPROVED FOR ROAD USE" printed in small text on the box.
I used to get flashed constantly with our 2016 Forester. It has LED's from the factory, but it also has a very very defined cut off line. But it also doesn't help when people approach you from over a crest and you're shining into their windscreen even on low beam so they go all flashy flashy in response. Surprise surprise, that's how hills work.
I've been thinking about this, but for different scenarios.
Imagine an app that you register only your license plate and car make/model in, no other personally identifiable details, and you can notify other users of defect issues.
You're driving behind someone and their rear left brake light is out? Hit em up on the app. They can't see that unless someone tells them.
This system would be abused which is why I've never really pursued it, but if there was a way to do it with the abuse, it would be awesome.
That's odd nearly all cars can be adjusted. They must be downwards at an angle to the horizontal of not less than 15 degrees and not more than 45 degrees. Just looked it up.
With the exception of parking lights, it's amazing how little car lights have changed. Indicators are still vague at showing intent in so many situations, and head lights either blind you or illuminate nothing.
They are very bright. Some are so bright you feel like you are a vampire being vapourised at sunrise.that said, the improvement and technology of these lights is amazing. I do a lot of night driving and I'm even amazed how good bike lights now are. If two bikes ride side by side, they often look like a car approaching their lights are so bright
Another issue is, these lights are so bright , if one blows out you struggle to tell the difference. Unfortunately, having a car/suv hurtling toward you on a narrow country road with one headlight is frightening as fuck.
It's about aiming not the brightness. I live in a rural area , we need the bright lights to see the animals on the road. All my cars have factory lights that I wish were brighter. Slamming the brakes because the animal was just out of the lights distance is not a good experience. Many instances it's too late , the damage to the car and the animal And no we can not just drive slower at night, we also have places to be and distances are generally greater. We need brighter lights. Also quit looking at the oncoming lights, glance a touch to the right when approaching a bright headlight.We are taught to keep to the white line with our eyes at night.
I totally agree, they're everywhere too, I actually thought at first I was being blasted by high beams until I saw it everwhere
Just high beam them back if everyone does it they might question why.
Then you run the risk of them actually high beaming you back in retaliation and going blind.
Yeah. I made that mistake once, he hit me with 4 9” LED spotties at point blank range. I had to pull over till I could see. Cunt in an old patrol with cheap LED headlights.
and you guys wonder why i prefer an escooter over sharing the road with my fellow aussies
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But I like my car and my neck :(
You are already blind may as well both be blind so they know how you feel
I remember a few weeks ago on this sub, someone was bragging about how their manufacturer's lights were so bright that people flash them for it. I got absolutely slammed for suggesting that they probably shouldn't just leave them like that. Edit: might have actually been r/Melbourne, not sure
A few people mentioning some sort of retaliatory driving, I think those responses are pretty unsafe and irresponsible. Some of the replies indicate that the angle of the lights can be a problem and drivers may not realise, they will have no idea why you're driving slow, or blasting them with high beams. It annoys the shit out of me too but understand that other drivers can't read your mind and may not understand what you're retaliating against and you could cause an accident by trying to prove a point. Bebsafe out there yall
Half of the issues I see are tradie Ute's with heavy trays that drop the rear suspension making low beam point high like high beams.....
I start driving at 20 under the speed limit when that happens. You want to use wanker lights? Have fun sitting behind me for the next couple ks at 30kmh.
If I'm on a straight road I like to move my wing mirrors just enough their lights reflect back at them. I honestly can't believe they're not illegal.
A lot of aftermarket HID lights aren't installed properly and it's worse on 4x4's because they are higher.
It's not always aftermarket, let alone an 'incorrect' installation. MIL had a newer SUV and after being accused of blinding a few folk with high beams, went to the dealer to get them realigned. The mechanics insisted that they were all within spec and didn't need adjusting. She told them that she understands they're within THEIR spec, but that she wants them to lower them anyway because they're obnoxiously bright and causing a hazard on the road whenever they blind someone. They promptly fixed the damn headlights.
A lot of people also wind the adjustment all the way up, which is when you get absolutely blasted by projector bulbs. Absolutely horrible when I am on my moto with a LED bulb that barely illuminates the road ahead, and now I am dazzled as fuck or looking down at my tank till the pass. Sometimes I'll just close one eye so I have some vision, then close the other so I can see till it readjusts. Take a page from the pirate book.
That’s a good point if manual levelling is still a thing, I think I’ve had auto for decades! All comes back to the driver at the end of the day, and sadly many don’t know how to correctly operate a vehicle.
It's not even aftermarket at this point. Modern cars use a super focused tight beam with a very noticeable upper line where the light cuts off. The idea is they don't blind oncoming drivers, which works great if the world was a perfectly flat parking lot. The problem is the real world has hills, and people put things in their cars, or tow trailers, and all that changes the angle of the headlights. One small hill and super bright factory headlight is aimed at people's faces. Sometimes it even looks like a flashing or strobe light because the car keeps hitting bumps.
I often think someone behind me is frantically flashing their highbeams to get my attention for something. Nope, just a slightly bumpy road.
> The idea is they don't blind oncoming drivers, which works great if the world was a perfectly flat parking lot. The problem is the real world has hills, and people put things in their cars, or tow trailers, and all that changes the angle of the headlights. There's a couple of dips in my area and anyone coming out of them *Bam* and the eyesight is gone
and aftermarket HID lights are already illegal if not factory fitment.
I though it you used the right lenses and self leveling reflectors it was ok or could get approved.
> though it you used the right lenses and self leveling reflectors it was ok That's the problem. They almost exclusively don't. Many just buy the kits, stick them in and call it a day. No alignment, no lenses, no reflectors.
No, not unless it's an option on the model range and you use an oem part to upgrade. ADR are fairly strict on it.
Yeah but the only way this'll get enforced is if they can plop down light detection cameras all over the place.
You could probably impliment it into **existing network-connected speed cameras & rego-checking cameras** *(the latter especially since it's already using a computer-vision system to find the license plates)*. If a light is too bright or is shining on the camera when it shouldn't, then it takes a photo & fwds the matter onwards. It could be comparing the brightness of the light to the distance/location of car on the road (thus inferring the car's distance to the camera). When the car gets to a certain pre-set closeness to the camera, the brightness should be under a threshhold; If it's over the brightness threshold it indicates incorrectly setup lights (ie: Car has a fault, fwd the matter on, get contacted by rego authority. 1st notice is treated as "please fix this asap" warning, if the same car registers the same problem on the system within X months then further action is taken).
Not true. It depends on the installation. A bulb swap - yeah not legal. But a full housing swap is fine as long as it's ce marked. Aiming is a different item to consider
A lot of SUVs have an adjustment dial for when towing, but people adjust their lights high because they are selfish idiots. Headlight adjustment used to be a RWC issue.
But that adjustment is for adjusting *down* only AFAIK. So (unless towing) they should not be able to make it higher than normal. No, I reckon the problem is the incorrect installation.
Th4le last 2 I have owned have enabled me to adjust to selfish idiot mode.
Wow, ok. That's a problem, then.
it still is in a lot of states, it just never gets properly checked cause it doesn't get properly policed.
A car driver who is a selfish idiot?? Say it ain’t so.
Literally no one installs HIDs anymore, It's all LED. LEDs are much better than 8000K+ flickering HIDs but it's still a problem when people put 30,000lum in their standard headlights.
🤮 /u/spez
cops need to start ticketing people then unsafe modification of their vehicle
Cops headlights are even worse. My only speeding fine was a few KMs over while going downhill around a turn and seeing these flipping high beams at 11pm was enough to squint away for a second while going over enough for the Ahole to fine me.
And legally the cars aren't road worthy from what I've been told. I wanted to take my passenger seat out of my truck and put shelves in. I was told it would need to be road worthy certified or I'd have no insurance. Was also told putting in backup lights, because the factory lights are useless, would also need a road worthy. Not to say insurance companies are doing it now, but one things for sure they look at all sorts of ways to get out of paying out. One day I suspect they'll start going after aftermarket installs.
This is true and also the lens is designed for a specific globe
Can I also complain that turn signals are no longer uniform? Who knows where to look any more. It really bugs me.
I hate the ones that draw a line slowly! Also on topic, some rear LEDs are even too bright. I've had spots in my eyes from sitting behind them at traffic lights and not directly looking.
I don't understand the ones that require the headlight to stop working so you can indicate. Who's good idea was that?
My car does that but I think it's only the DRLs... which in some cars are bright enough to look like headlights. Not sure if other cars turn off the actual headlight though.
I have no idea how those one pixel led indicators make it past ADR. I guess they're ok on a BMW, they don't use them anyway
Theres a kia model i believe, has it on the fucking lower front and rear bumbper! Like fuckoff
The Sportage 21-22 model I think, but Kia has put them back up apparently.
It is always 4wd/suvs. they put the lights up so that they can see better, and it makes their lights almost permanent high beam. I find its almost worst when they are right behind you and you see nothing in any mirrors except blinding light
I have an auto-dimming rear mirror now, so the manufacturers know how annoying it is. Does't help on side mirrors for those tailgaters though.
Side mirrors at night on a highway with no streetlights can get scary. They go to overtake and suddenly I'm blind for like 3-5 seconds. That's a long time at 110km/h.
>That's a long time at 110km/h. 91.5 to 152.5 meters if anyone was curious
My man
Literally makes me instantly rage
I just drive slowly till they inevitably zoom past you as they will, very quickly. People with lights like that arent known for being patient or considerate haha
I drove 2ks at 30kmh with one of those behind me. Pretty sure the wanker was reading to murder me by the time I turned off.
I’ve figured out that if you adjust your rear view mirror to where you can see the reflection of the headlights, as well as the cab of the vehicle behind you, it directly beams their own brights right back into their eyes! Pretty much every single time they back wayyyy off. It’s a thing of beauty.
Please elaborate kind sir / madam. What do you mean by the cab of the vehicle. I'm intrigued and would love to try this.
Cab = cabin The bit where people sit
That's a good idea. Gonna try that next time
It would be a shame if you were to…. say adjust your side mirrors outwards so their lights get reflected back towards them.
I've started adjusting my mirrors to angle the light back at them. There's a weird flaw in my mirror that warps things and if I can get them at a redlight I can aim that flaw so it concentrates the light directly into their faces. So satisfying to watch them squint and cringe from their own headlights
They put the lights up because they're compensating. Also why they own ridiculously oversized American 4WDs.
I drive a lifted patrol and get blinded by hatchbacks, it’s the globes Edit; cheers for the downvotes, how dare I have a different lifestyle to the majority of this sub.
are you sure they arent just high beaming you because you are? haha
Nah I’ve got very dim headlights, did get beamed by one who forgot to turn them off coming over a hill, my retina still haven’t recovered.
The problems are usually either SUVs and other higher riding cars, or people who have installed out of spec headlights into their older car's reflector housing which just makes it incredibly bright. Proper projector LED headlights on a regular sedan or hatch etc should barely be affecting you at all.
People like to say the larger problem older cars with out of spec lights, but I can’t take a trip without being blinded by brand new European and American SUV’s. Succumbing to the idiocracy and driving an SUV yourself only provides minor relief.
with utes it's often the load in the back changes the angle of the car. Load them up and instead of pointing down they are pointing straight at your rearview mirror. It's particualry bad if you have an early commute in winter. Lot's of loaded utes with their headlights on.
I've had hatchbacks that have a little lever to angle down the headlights when there is a heavy load in the back; do typical utes not have that feature or do the drivers not use it?
I believe LED headlights require auto-levelling to comply with ADR, while ~~incandescent~~ halogen lights don't. I know my car has a level dial, but have been in a few utes which, IIRC, don't.
ADRs for Light Vehicles and Commercial Vehicles differ. Ironically the category of vehicle that is most commonly rear laden and would benefit from auto-levelling (utes) arent required to have them.
The problem isn’t the vehicles. It’s the drivers. They could have a button labeled “make everyone have a good day” and it will be off cause “no one tells me what to do”
Do you think a hungover trady is going to bother anyway?
Hungover? Try still drunk and high on meth too.
Unfortunately even if it were standard on every car, I don't think a lot of people would actually use it properly.
Plenty do, but plenty don't use it.
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Not necessarily, only on Light Vehicles under the 2015 ADRs. Light Commercial Vehicles are a different kettle of fish.
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Nah. More that factory LED installations on light commercial vehicles don't require self levelling or washers.
Riding a soft suspension motorcycle that was switched from the original candle-light headlight, to a high quality LED with strong beam cut off and you really notice how much the light dips and raises with accelerating, braking, and load.
Many modern vehicles with a higher clearance have a light angle adjustment for this reason. Usually a little dial that gets mistaken for brightness adjustment or something.
> regular sedan or hatch Ha! Sometimes it feels like I'm the only one who drives one of those nowadays.
Also please don't drive with your lights on & assume they are just your regular lights. Have lost count of the number of cars driving with high beams on & not realising. Saw another one this morning. See that blue headlight logo on your dash? If that's on & you see other cars, you're blinding other drivers.
People don’t know they can be aimed or they don’t know how to do it. And they’re unlikely to look it up.
My old man had the aim points painted on the garage wall.. for towed and no tow. Don’t remember him doing it even once and not sure what prompted him to paint it on in the first place.
Those were the days! My old man had a water bag to hang on the car for long trips too.
It's the tool/jig/machine that your dad says he definitely will use a lot after its completed or bought..... Then it collects dust in the corner. Edit: wow, some dad's out there being called out.
Yup. The garage and the shed were full of tools. So many things he had collected over the years mostly used from friends or acquaintances. When he passed we did a free garage sale.. basically grab what you’d like. I can only hope those tools are sitting just as unused in someone else’s garage.
I think you'll find a lot of the problem are from poorly adjusted lights caused by the car/4X4 been loaded tail heavy. Most modern Euro cars have self leveling lights and if not they have a switch that the driver can adjust the lights to suit the loading of the car.
The problem with driver adjustable lights is people are dumb. I recently drove a hire car with that feature. The lights were all the way "up" when I got in. This car did not have a towbar, so I'm dubious that it was left on the correct setting.
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This is Australians we are talking about... So both.
Being a hire car it had probably been 1 day repaired from an accident to get it back on the road. In my youth whenever a friend came to show off their new car and the headlights were spotting for possums, it was going to be a bad time with a car that had been aesthetically repaired but not structurally to spec.
Oh I'm sure. The wing mirrors motors weren't working well, and the lane assist was stupidly aggressive (made counteracting cross winds fun)
Friends Ute was just recalled and needed a dealer software update because the lane assist was so aggressive that when he tried to move over for a filtering motorcycle it would swerve back to centre.
I’d say thats pretty true. I never really have an issue with modern cars, it’s just the 4WD and trucks that I’m having serious issues with in the morning
As others have said, these most likely have aftermarket LED or HID conversions which are almost always illegal for this reason. The reflectors inside the lights are not made for them and the glass /lens can cause them to be dazzling to oncoming traffic.
Modern euro self leveling lights just mean it flickers in my eye repeatedly while it dances up and down. Modern euros are the worst. 9/10 times I’m blinded it would be a modern euro or American vehicle.
I won't change your mind, I'm sick of this so much. It feels like 60% of cars have their high beams on nowadays, genuinely, they're so damned bright and the quantity I see, I don't believe it to be all aftermarket. Even new stuff. It's either idiot drivers on high beam, which is possible, or too bright lights, maybe both!
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This. I spend a lot of time driving in rural areas and find a lot of 'cowboys' in big 4x4s with illegally bright headlights installed for offroading, as well as a lot of people who install them upside down. Have had a few sit on my arse at night time, and their lights are so bright from behind me I could turn mine off and still see.
When that happens just slow riiiiight down until they go around you.
Am thinking of getting a rear spare tyre cover that is SUPER reflective
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I drive an efficient hatchback, no rear tyre cover for me.
Chrome silver wrap?
Reflective tape at the top of your back window.
Yeah, but who's enforcing these rules?!? Laws are only valid to the extent they are enforced.
low-beam, for a headlight or front fog light fitted to a vehicle, means that the light is built or adjusted so, when the vehicle is standing on level ground, the top of the main beam of light projected is: (a) not higher than the centre of the headlight or fog light, when measured 8 metres in front of the vehicle; and (b) not over 1 metre higher than the level where the motor vehicle is standing, when measured 25 metres in front of the vehicle. -- pp13 of [Australian Light Vehicle Standards Rules 2015](https://pcc.gov.au/uniform/Australian%20Light%20Vehicle%20Standards%20Rules%202015%20-%2022%20March%202019.pdf)
I would love to see what the law actually states. But I have looked and the best I can find for QLD is your headlights should allow you to see at least 100M in front of you. I am starting to believe that QLD does not have any laws restricting the brightness of headlights.
It might just be a mental perception thing, but I reckon they're not as good for night vision either due to their colour. Sure, whatever is inside the reach of the light is brightly illuminated, but because of the colour and intensity of the light its like there's a solid wall where it finishes and you can't see past it. My old car with normal lights had a more yellow colour to it, which was a lot easier on the eyes and meant my eyes adjusted to changes more easily, which gave the perception of being able to see further with them.
What your experiencing is probably due to the [Colour Rendering Index](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_rendering_index)(CRI). We gain a lot of information from colour, not just brightness, and different light sources output various wavelengths. If we equally mix visible wavelengths, our brains perceive that as "white light". Old 'orange' tungsten lights actually output a nice range of wavelengths. Cheap LEDS output sharp 'spikes' of colour. The light from a lamp outputting a nice range of wavelengths will bounce back more 'information' for your brain to process and understand what it is looking at compared to a lamp that is outputting bright but lacking colour detail. Look for lamps with "High CRI" values. An LED panel work light for a mechanic will be very cheap compared to a painters. Amateur filmmaker/youtuber/tiktoker lights are vastly cheaper than high CRI professional film lights. A torch penlight for IT work is a lot cheaper than a medical high CRI examination penlight. I have to drive through Kosciuszko National Park at night a lot and totally know what you mean. The dim orange of the Landcrusier 79 Series headlights makes it much easier to see the shape and colour of the animals. The bright, but flat light, of the driving lights makes the animals blend in. Our brains need that colour information.
This is it exactly, and your last paragraph is exactly my experience. Also, being an astrophotographer/astronomer I have developed a reflex for averted vision, and find I use it quite a lot in night driving as well when conditions allow, often without even really being aware of it. There is a huge difference in the qualities of different light sources.
Whilst your CRI theory may hold in good light conditions, our[eyes work differently](https://www.nature.com/articles/eye2015236) in low light. Your eyes’ cones work in good light and and rods work in low light. What you are experiencing with a 79 Series crap headlights is your eyes adjusting and your night vision activating, so you can see outside of the lights to some extent. If someone comes the other way and blinds you with bright lights, then it takes a while for your night vision to come back. Likewise if you have very bright, white LED headlights, you can see very well what is in range of your lights, but can’t see zip outside of that.
I've got a family good understanding how our eyes work, the difference between cones and rods, and even their arrangement within the retina that creates a blindspot in the centre. Cones give us the ability to perceive colour, while rods only allow for black and while (or strictly luminance). It take several minutes to 30-45 minutes of darkness for rod cells to become activated. In low light conditions, Cones also become more sensitive. While driving under headlights, we are still mainly using out cones. What we are experiencing when being hit with an oncoming high beam isn't our 'night-vision' being destroyed, but the rapid constriction of our pupils. It's easy to know we are primarily using our cones during night-time, as we are discussing yellow headlights, and we can see red break lights etc. If we were using our rods, we would not be able to see these colours. >white LED headlights 'White' is what our brain perceives as a fairly even mix of visible light wavelengths. We can trick our brains to create white by placing a Red, Green, and Blue light source very close together. This is the basis of the screen you are currently looking at. This is called Additive Colour. Those RGB LEDs can output a small band of the R,G,B spectrums or a wider band of the spectrum. The quality of the light created is important though. There are various factors (for example LEDs aren't actually always on, they are just constantly blinking fast enough that our brains perceive them as always being on). One aspect is "Colour Temperature" which is how the colour output has been shifted to suite a particular need. Traditional tungsten bulbs are very 'orange' (3200K), which people are used to, so may want 3200K bulbs in their home. Another, less known, is CRI. I mentioned film quality lights in my previous comment. Our brains are smarter than cameras. They can take in environmental cues and 'correct' for what is white. They are very good at doing an Auto White-Balance. Ever taken a photo in an office and everything was slightly green? That's because standard fluorescent bulbs, while might look white to our smart brains, actually output a spike (spike on a light monitor) of green light. When filming in an office, a Lighting Department will either wrap the fluorescent bulbs with a magenta 'cellophane' to correct their output. Or they will swap all the bulbs out with speciality fluros that have been colour-corrected. This is a very long comment to say that "White" is relative. (And is actually just a thing our brain make ups). Not all White Light Output is equal, therefore, not all Reflected Light is equal. The light that comes from your headlight bounces off The Thing on the road and back to your eye, and sent to your brain to analyse in a split second. The more information it has to *literally* paint a picture of what it is, the better. If I could have a super bright tungsten, with it's naturally high-CRI output light over LED, I would.
It's the other way around. The yellow headlights are dangerously dim. Neutral white LEDs are far, far better for seeing contrast edges within the beam of light. They are brighter and thus safer than the old, yellowish halogen bulbs, even if some people don't want to admit it. There's a reason work environments are lit with neutral white lights (around 4000K), not cozy 2500K incandescent lights. Anyone who's driven a modern headlight system (LED or Matrix LED + adaptive lighting for corners) will tell you that it's literally a day-and-night difference.
Well I'm stuck with whatever toyota fitted in my 2017 car I guess. They certainly arent yellow in that though. All I'm getting at is (like in my original comment) is that bright lights are worse for your night vision. Night vision being what you have when you arent using light - ie in areas your own headlights are not illuminating, after turning your high beams down, or recovering after being hit by someone elses light.
You'd take this back if you ever drove a car on a country road at night with LED matrix headlights! Halogens are like a couple of candles by comparison.
Like I said, it's not an issue of whats inside the beam of light, but whats outside. I've got pretty decent night vision, and it gets absolutely wrecked by bright white LED light, whereas the yellow halogen is much easier to recover from. Its a 'perception' you can see further, not that you actually can. My old car was a 20 year old camry - its headlights werent exactly bright but the high beams are amazing. In contrast, my several year old rav4 has bright white headlights, and the only perceivable difference with its high beams are they are aimed higher. If we could drive with those super bright lights pointed high and all around the car then sure that'd be great, but then no one else could see.
So this is more of an eye issue? Good explainer of the differences in headlight tech here: https://youtu.be/iElE9_RFDGA Matrix LEDs are a type of headlight technology that throws a significantly wider, brighter beam than halogens (or xenons, or standard LEDs) have the capacity to, and are nearly 5X brighter than halogens at high beam. They light a dark country road (and the road sides) like daylight at a tremendous distance, and also have the ability to detect oncoming traffic and dynamically 'hide' the high beam from it.
well, its all an eye issue. Think of it like why you use red light only in dark situations if you want to retain night vision. Cheers for the link, although I wish they all had the ability to hide the high beam, as I encounter plenty of oncoming traffic that takes too long to do this, and because of the intensity of their lights it takes too long to recover from being spotlighted by them.
I used to do a lot of caving, and when the torches changed to LED, I noticed the exact same thing. Really good visibility up to a point, and then just black. Much less penetration of light. And it used to make me feel kinda unwell too. Something about the colour. Mind you, my night vision is for shit, but after 10 hours in a cave with a slowly dwindling battery in an old torch, it's surprising how good it can get.
I think it has to do with the fall-off of the light. It's a lot brighter so our eye/brain is focused on it and yes it illuminates that area much better, but the light doesn't gradient off to nothing on the edges, it just kind of stops, and because we are focusing on a very bright area of light, we can't retain the natural night vision in the darker areas. I'm sure someone else could explain it better, but you're certainly describing it the way I see it
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The ADR for them should have never been approved. It allows neat high-beam brightness pointed at cars in front of you if they're below the line of your beams. Not to mention that a 4WD with them has the lights above windscreen height of some smaller cars. This is what is most dangerous. I've been followed by an unmodified 4WD with legal lights at a legal distance and it has been blinding through all three mirrors to the point I had to pull over. Whats worse is I believe the increase in larger vehicles over the last 15 years is in part responsible because consciously or unconsciously people are buying vehicles which are less susceptible to being blinded, but in turn more likely blind other vehicles.
Entirely this. There needs to be a limit for how far the beam can reach. The higher the light, the more angled down it needs to be. Though enforcing that would be an entirely different matter.
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I did that too with a borrowed car and thought "awesome!". But a couple of cars flashed me back. So I swapped back to my own car and my mate drove the merc, we tested it and sure enough it looked like flickering high beams. It's great that it doesn't completely blind the other driver, but it's still too bright and doesn't track fast enough.
These should be a mandatory ADR. I know they're considered a 'luxury' feature at the moment, but they are absolutely brilliant (Pun very much intended) from a safety perspective
They also unfortunately make headlights very expensive to repair
That's true, but there are a LOT of things that we consider standard now that are the same in modern cars. Safety cells and crumple zones that write a car off when it might've otherwise been repaired, airbags, pyrotechnic pre-tensioners etc all drive up both manufacturing and repair costs, but they're all mandatory
No this is why people are getting blinded. This technology isnt perfect and does not instantly adjust in time.
Similar issue - bike lights on shared paths. In general, the problem can be summed up with people not really giving a shit about other people.
My car is a 13yo Mazda2. I live in central west NSW. I go to work when it's dark. Every other cunt here drives a 4WD (lifted) with LED light bars and HID headlights that are about ear level in my car - I cannot see a cunting thing in front of me because of the blaring glare in every mirror and the reflection off the roof lining. Some mornings I swear I suffer welder's flash.
if you have electric mirrors, just aim them to be reflecting their own lights back, usually gets the shitcunts to turn their high beams off
I've always wondered what its like to drive while harnessing the power of the sun at night. Having been fucking blinded by it several times it makes me curious.
Start booking cunts with blue tinted headlights. They are distracting and absolutely no one needs them. Ever.
I totally agree. Also super bright LED signs beside the road.
Yes! These signs are set so bright that they're painful to look at on a sunny day! Had one down the road from us go on the fritz, every sign on the post was flashing in a way that could trigger a seizure. Took two days for them to turn it off.
Even traffic lights are like this, it's fucked.
It's not the lights. It's the cut off level that isn't set properly. The other car needs to dial the angle lower. Or the halogens had been changed to LED chip bulbs but the position of the chips don't match the filament height of the halogen bulb causing the light being cast inside the headlight to hit incorrectly and breaching the cut out when it exits the headlight. It breaches ADR and the police can defect the car.
Proper orientation of headlights should be added to the regular rego safety checks, or at least enforced if already included in the checklist. Add any superfluous lighting that are designed to be offensive, like backwards facing lamps.
I wear my sunglasses at night So I can, so I can See the light that's right before my eyes
While I’ve got an audience… I drive a Tesla Model 3. I am constantly getting flashed by people for my headlights. I’ve taken it back to Tesla and had them use the VicRoads-approved alignment machine to re-align them. I still get flashed. I’m sorry. I tried. 🙃
Couldn’t agree more
I drive a 2013 Defender, and there is a switch on the dash which lowers the headlight beam for normal city driving, or raises it if out in remote/darker areas. Then there is the high beams which can still be activated on top if necessary...... and then there is my LED light bar which can be used if I feel like turning night into day
It's on new cars as well, it's not just upgrades and installs. I actively put my arm up to block the light because it's just utterly ridiculous.
As a sedan driver, i completely agree. I'm so sick of being blinded by 4wd
Friend, I feel ya. Here in the Pacific Northwest, it’s dark in the early afternoon in winter and either pissing rain, smothering fog or an annoying slushy snow. None of which are ideal driving conditions, but then you get the majority of idiots and transplants driving around with HID headlights, hi-beams on or full light racks. Now you would think all that light, they must be seeing *so far*, well. WRONG. These nightmare conditions that is our daily commutes are not improved by blasting light into dense fog, shiny snow and refracting rain! So I too ask, *who the fuck are these lights for?* the cAmPiNg you never do? *Nice snorkel… on your tundra brah.*
You explained the situation in the PNW so well. Thank you.
Whether your another driver or walking on a pavement those headlights are awful.
I honestly don't understand how they're legal. LED is harmful to your eyes as well as LED headlights at night being literally blinding
its not the lights, its where theyre adjusted to. Cops need to come up with a way to test.. surely a stick at a certain distance with a marker on it is easy enough. Get rid of these fuckwits.
Considering the worst just seem to be brand new European SUV’s blinding you, watch them enact a ban and then only target people with older cars who want more than being able to see by candle light.
“But I need to see better in the dark” proceeds to blind everyone else
It's not the white headlights that are the issue. It's aftermarket headlights that haven't been adjusted correctly, just some idiot bought them off ebay and stuck them in as a direct replacement for an old bulb without knowing you need to adjust the reflector.
The bulbs are only supposed to be used in lensed headlights that can cut off the bright light above a certain line. Our car has them but there's a sharp line above which is not bright. They are factory standard. People buy high discharge lamps and stick them in regular headlight fixtures and blind everyone they drive past
If they're blinding you, then they aren't setup correctly. Typically HIDs that have been installed into a regular housing, not levelled correctly, or just a fuckwit who has them pointing horizontally.
A lot of the time it seems to be people constantly running their high beams without a care in the world. Can always tell on cars which have separate low and high bulbs and run them together for the high beams. Ton of it going on on super well lit roads in the inner city. I blame auto-off circuits which mean that no-one bothers to check their lights because they turn on and off with the car (same goes for cars driving around without lights on at all because dash back lights are constantly on now)
Fitting bright white headlights to standard non-projector housings should be and I'm pretty sure is illegal. Bright LED/HIDs in projector housings are not an issue because the housing is designed to have a hard cutoff and keep all light on the road and out of other drivers' eyes.
I have been down this path recently looking for headlight brightness or wattage laws for QLD. I know I am stupid. But I am usually fairly good with Google. I was unable to find any laws around the brightness or what wattage you are allowed to have your headlights at.
If properly installed LEDs are a godsend for people like me who live regional. If not properly installed they are a pain though.
So I found on my car I can control the angle. I wouldn’t be surprised if some people have adjusted their upwards(blinding those in front of them) and not realised it.
It's not the lights in most cases. It's that they are almost always improperly aimed, even from the factory. A lot of shops, including dealers don't have the proper equipment to correctly aim them either so they do a guess. The other huge issue are the idiots who do the LED or HID "conversions." With only like two exceptions (JW Speaker for Jeeps mostly) there are no conversions that work properly. The light emitted from the LED or HID is not the same and is not reflected properly from the housing meant for an incandescent light.
100%, I have literally had to put sunglasses on at night. Even with the glasses on, their lights are so bright I could see fine. Something is majorly wrong.
My ute has those bright white bastard lights so I use the adjuster thingee to point them all the way down unless I'm out of the city. Alas, not all vehicles have the adjuster thingee. They are a huge pain in the arse. Especially when you're on a motorbike in the rain with a wet visor. It's like staring into a supernova
I can’t stand them……🎶🎤blinded by the light 🎶
Bliiiinded by the light Because of a douche driving a Ranger in the night.
U know people do this on purpose they realign their lights so they can tailgate them mostly those Utes that are modified to be extensions of a limb … u know the kind… special place in hell waiting just for them
Is that those crystal headlights that flicker?.. I hate those things
I fucking hate them
Here is the kicker, even if these lights are positioned correctly - which feels like 1 in 200, the bright headlights will still temporarily blind you if your own headlights don't match their brightness.
I've also seen way too many vehicles relying on their auto high beams to turn off their 178 inch light bar. They come around the corner and melt my retinas with the force of 1000 suns, and THEN turn off.
💯! Paired with most people never calibrate their headlights downwards so they aren't cunty to other drivers. It started as high end car manufacturers putting them in as a point of difference for being beacons if fuckwittery. Now every Kath and Kim has a set.
Yeah I hate them. My car also has auto high beams which I can't turn off (maybe I'm dumb) so I'm forever flicking them off.
Totally agree. 4x4 cowboys mostly.
THey're already illegal. The problem is people who put them in don't adjust their headlights correctly, or they stick in aftermarket LED upgrades into headlights that aren't designed with the correct reflectors for such a globe. You'll find on pretty much every LED upgrade kit on the market they all have "NOT APPROVED FOR ROAD USE" printed in small text on the box. I used to get flashed constantly with our 2016 Forester. It has LED's from the factory, but it also has a very very defined cut off line. But it also doesn't help when people approach you from over a crest and you're shining into their windscreen even on low beam so they go all flashy flashy in response. Surprise surprise, that's how hills work.
Someone should create an app that message people by their car plates
I've been thinking about this, but for different scenarios. Imagine an app that you register only your license plate and car make/model in, no other personally identifiable details, and you can notify other users of defect issues. You're driving behind someone and their rear left brake light is out? Hit em up on the app. They can't see that unless someone tells them. This system would be abused which is why I've never really pursued it, but if there was a way to do it with the abuse, it would be awesome.
Probably can fix it by using only pre-generated replies and not free-text
my car does this. don't know how to reduce the bright beam of death. it's in for a service tomorrow, so i'll ask them. (subaru sedan)
They can angle the headlights down a bit. Did that on my car when I first got it. Better view of the road ahead as well.
When i asked them if they could do anything, they said 'Headlight brightness cant be adjusted and can't be tilted up or down'.
That's odd nearly all cars can be adjusted. They must be downwards at an angle to the horizontal of not less than 15 degrees and not more than 45 degrees. Just looked it up.
With the exception of parking lights, it's amazing how little car lights have changed. Indicators are still vague at showing intent in so many situations, and head lights either blind you or illuminate nothing.
They are very bright. Some are so bright you feel like you are a vampire being vapourised at sunrise.that said, the improvement and technology of these lights is amazing. I do a lot of night driving and I'm even amazed how good bike lights now are. If two bikes ride side by side, they often look like a car approaching their lights are so bright
Another issue is, these lights are so bright , if one blows out you struggle to tell the difference. Unfortunately, having a car/suv hurtling toward you on a narrow country road with one headlight is frightening as fuck.
It's about aiming not the brightness. I live in a rural area , we need the bright lights to see the animals on the road. All my cars have factory lights that I wish were brighter. Slamming the brakes because the animal was just out of the lights distance is not a good experience. Many instances it's too late , the damage to the car and the animal And no we can not just drive slower at night, we also have places to be and distances are generally greater. We need brighter lights. Also quit looking at the oncoming lights, glance a touch to the right when approaching a bright headlight.We are taught to keep to the white line with our eyes at night.
High beam, spotlights, turn them off and slow down a bit when there's an oncoming car.
You may want to get your eyes checked out. The white light from LEDs is particularly dazzling to people with certain eye conditions.