I don't want to go all Daily Mail

So many are basically forced into an SUV because most mainstream car manufacturers have decided that’s what is being made available.

Whilst true for newer cars this wasnt the case for the buyers for the last few years. Whilst the suv are more profitable if no one had brought them they would have had to give up on the idea.

"find me an estate car from Ford, Toyota, Honda, Volvo, etc. They don’t exist"

https://www.toyota.co.uk/new-cars/corolla-touring-sports/build

https://www.parkers.co.uk/ford/focus/estate/review/practicality/

VW, Skoda, Seat, Vauxhall, BMW, Audi, Peugeot, King, MG...there are literally hundreds of the things!

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-search?advertising-location=at_cars&body-type=Estate&moreOptions=visible&postcode=m437qz&radius=1500&sort=relevance&year-from=new&page=8

“ MOT failiure to put LED bulbs in a non LED “festoon” or whatever they are called”

Is it? It certainly never used to be but does fall foul of Construction and Use Regs. That one's a police stop.

Matrix heads are amazing to drive at night. Much better for the your view and the driver coming the opposite way. Although I appreciate they are not common and pricey. But definitely the best solution. Much better than auto dipping lights.

Also as mentioned before, driving a really low car is a major PITA now. I avoid driving my Elise at night for long drives.

^Humblebrag

Great. Of course, in this scenario, you only control one of the two cars.

Correct.  So you slow right down when another car is coming and even stop the car you are in control of completely to avoid driving off the side of the road.  We are talking about rural narrow roads here where traffic is very light so it is an exception to have to do this.

I have been driving on these sorts of roads in winter/dark for over 20 years and have never got a puncture from driving off the edge of the road so getting 4 punctures is a few months is frankly down to shit driving and nothing else.

Can we talk about the people who don't bother to dip their full beam for walkers / cyclists / runners at night on dark roads?

1. It's pretty bloody inconsiderate to ruin someone's night vision on a country lane.

2. When you blind them they're more likely to stumble or fall in front of your car.

3. When it's narrow, dipping your lights is the ONLY indication that you've seem them. If you don't want a convenient rock thrown at your car as a reminder that there's pedestrian in the road, dip your beams.

I once gave a ‘hand signal’ to a driver who didn’t dip their lights. They took the trouble to drive back down the road and demand to know why I was waving my finger at them.
CBA to dip their lights, plenty of time for a confrontation.
Oddly they apologised and drove off quickly.
These days on a bike I guess I could return fire with a 20000 lumin trail light instead.

Speaking of which, riding around with 1000 lumin lid light around traffic is a good way of getting flattened.

@squirrelking

Retrofitted LED headlights are not road legal in the UK, and will fail an MOT. This has been the case since 2021, when the MOT inspection manual was updated (previously it was a grey area).

It is now permitted if the entire lamp unit is replaced.

Flaperon

Full Member

Can we talk about the people who don’t bother to dip their full beam for walkers / cyclists / runners at night on dark roads?

1. It’s pretty bloody inconsiderate to ruin someone’s night vision on a country lane.

2. When you blind them they’re more likely to stumble or fall in front of your car.

3. When it’s narrow, dipping your lights is the ONLY indication that you’ve seem them. If you don’t want a convenient rock thrown at your car as a reminder that there’s pedestrian in the road, dip your beams.