I don’t mean the people who just forget they’re on full beam, I’m sure we’ve all done that on occasions, a quick flash and it’s usually fine.

It’s the situation when you are going round a left hand bend, and for the driver coming the other way it is of course a right hand bend, and they start flashing their lights because they have failed to realise that your dipped lights point down and left, which due to the bend is at some point going to be pointing fairly straightish at them.

Not a rant – it’s easily ignored – but I was just idly wondering last night if other people had noticed this? It seems like they are quick to flash at you but slow to think.

Never noticed it are you sure your headlights don’t need adjusting?

Erm….but it should still be dipped though. And I think it’s mainly the dipped bit that stops you blinding oncoming drivers.

Are you sure your beams aren’t a bit high? I know that certain cars seem worse than others, although not sure if it’s through headlight design/bulb choice or what?
My brother owned a MkI Audi TT from new and was always complaining that people were flashing him as if he had his headlights on main beam. He took it in several times to have the alignment checked and it was always fine, but he still used to get flashed.

Can’t say I’ve noticed particularly getting dazzled on right hand bends.

I find most modern car headlights about 50% too bright (for other road users) even on dipped – to the point I’m not even sure if they are on dipped or full beam a lot of the time.

There are a lot of overly bright lights out there these days as well, so increasing the problem of being dazzled.

What car do you have?

Haven’t noticed the OP’s problem. What I did notice was that despite me painstakingly sticking my headlight deflectors on the exact position on my headlights, German drivers were still not impressed. 🙂

Well I had wondered that, but I’ve had mine checked before and they were fine, and I drive lots of different vehicles at work and it’s not just when driving my car that I’ve noticed it. Maybe it’s the stroppy drivers we have up here!

Do you carry loads of heavy stuff in the boot for work? Perhaps you need to twiddle the levelling thingy, if you do?

I have a fiesta and a zafira, at work I drive Astra, focus, 3 series, transporter depending on the day.

No heavy stuff in boot. It’s definitely the corner thing, no one flashes when approaching straight on.

Weird…

Do you accelerate through the corner perhaps, lifting the nose of the car?

Just trying to think of a reason for this, as I can’t say I’ve ever experienced it either from the point of view of being a dazzled driver or being flashed at while negotiating a left hand bend….

Not generally as far as I know! I’ve noticed the same thing as the ‘other’ car too, although I wait until they’re onto the straight before I permit myself some righteous indignation! Maybe it’s very dependent on the road? My commute and the roads I drive for work are the same ones, so I spend an awful lot of time on them.

Cars that have automatic headlight dipping are the answer. It always seems like a cool gadget to me when they dip.

What I did notice was that despite me painstakingly sticking my headlight deflectors on the exact position on my headlights, German drivers were still not impressed

I had this in France earlier this year. Deflectors fitted but about 50% of cars coming the other way flashed me.

Never encountered this myself, used to get it a bit on the motorbike due to all the orientation changes (or I assumed that’s what it was all about, maybe they just thought I was riding like a ****)

My current bugbear is my automatic headlights- they come back on in whatever mode they went off in, the last part of my drive home is country roads so tends to be fullbeam, then they switch themselves on at a whim on full beam at some later point- under a bridge in daylight or whatever. Irritating.

Have you tried a car with automatic dipping headlights. Cool (and of course completely unnecessary gadget!) every time they dip.

No, if it’s me your asking. Does it work well? Presumably some sort of oncoming light sensor? Must be tricky to make it work well in all circumstances, a road with dips an crests for example. Sure they know what they’re doing though.

Have you tried a car with automatic dipping headlights. Cool (and of course completely unnecessary gadget!) every time they dip.

I’ve been a front seat passenger in one and they’re very good from that point of view.

Meeting one coming the other way on a road with lots of bumps and dips is horrible as you tend to get full beamed while they adjust, when a manual system would just be left in dipped rather than trying to adjust up and down all the time.

Wait for the darkness to arrive,park up on a level unlit road or quiet area, facing about 30 foot off a wall, switch lights off, then see where the top of beam hits wall, adjust beam leveler up or down, usually a button on dash,also flash lights a few times to check bulbs are working,

DO NOT FLASH INTERIOR LIGHTS, it attracts the wrong sort of attention

The OP is right, when a car approaches showing its right side the ramp up in the beam pattern for the kerb can dazzle you a little but it doesn’t last for long. Cars parked on the left facing you with their lights on are annoying becasue they dazzle you.

You need an Audi with adaptive ‘turning’ headlights 😀

Yep I see this. Also happens when a cars parked facing oncoming traffic. One beam is straight and one points to the kerb, so the straight beam will be straight at you if it’s on the wrong side of the road.
Happens when going over a brow as well, as you’re in effect raising the front of the car.

do you have those irritating Xenon or LED lights, that dazzle regardless of the angle.

In my opinionated opinion, they are illegal as are very distracting even dipped! (the LED ones strobe, i reckon i must be the only person in the world who can see this flashing!)

that or your level is wrong.

Rear wheels of the car in front please. Dont like seeing my own shadow on motorway roadsigns!

do you have those irritating Xenon or LED lights, that dazzle regardless of the angle.

Never had anyone flash me with mine.

No, old skool halogen here

Its not your lights – they’re frantically trying to warn you about the manic with the axe sitting in your back seat.

This makes far more sense

The only way around this at the moment is fully adaptive Led systems that use camera based light detectors to actually aim the light beams around oncoming vehicles ( you can get these on high end Audis, BMWs and also next years Mondeo too among others) when you see it operating its very cool and works well but it’s currently expensive and not everyone can afford an Audi A8.

Xenon systems as a rule need auto light levelling and additional beam control to prevent excess glare to oncoming vehicles, this is only a legal requirement on 35w systems, lower power Xenon systems don’t require this though. A lot of issues of glare actually come from poorly set up halogen based lights and/or people using high power blue/white bulbs in normal lamps, also glare can be a subjective issue, it depends on the driver, the road, the weather, the state of the windscreen etc.

People think Halogen lamps are better because they are cheap but the bulb performance degrades over a worryingly short amount if time (long before the bulbs actually fail) whereas Xenon is far more robust, lasts longer and uses less power so less CO2 emissions but its a lot more expensive. Most new cars should be using LED headlights within the next ten years or so though as the car world catches up with what cyclists have known for years.

Some companies are working on GPS based light aiming so the cars lights actually aim into corners and down into dips on the road but at the moment such systems are illegal to sell or use on public roads.

Yes, I design car lights as part of my job.

Oddly enough I was talking to someone from the UN ECE Global light legislation ( automotive lights are done under a UN legal framework) earlier this year about very high power ( read 1500 lumens and higher) bike lights….these are starting to be recognised as a potential road safety issue as the lights beams have none of the beam control a car light has to have. Legislation may follow…

…hang on, it’s Friday night….must….not….think….work….must….drink….wine 🙂

I was once driving on a straight road and the oncoming cars lights were far too bright, I was flashing like mad to try to get him to dip his lights convinced they were on full beam.

He then stuck the lights on full beam. It was like a nuclear explosion.

The bright halogen light arms race has gotten a bit silly.

I helpfully flashed an Evo to tell him his fogs were on. He unleashed hell fire with two rows of four dinner plate sized lasers duct taped to his grill.I couldnt see anything other than retina burn for about a mile! Penis

What about fog lights?….. They are for night time and rainy days right

Perhaps they don’t have a beaker to dip them in?

[rant – apologies]

“Yes, I design car lights as part of my job.” – presumably testing now involves making sure the lights look nice, are different from every other car, and look fantastic in marketing brochures – I’d guess you don’t work at night.

Here are some tests you might want to try – drive behind a car with integrated rear cluster (e.g is it the audi with a thin pillbox indicator hidden in the middle) dark, wet, follow the car and make sure the driver always brakes before indicating.

Same conditions, but this time busy road, this time you are driving towards the test vehicles, lots of cars with lights, shop lights etc, now get a car where they have saved large amounts of money on the orange coloring in the indicator lens – make sure the test driver makes last second (ie no road positioning) but indicator on turns across you at mini/midi/ roundabouts.

Get a test car, make sure that there are at least 3 intensely bright high rear clusters and that the car is automatic and needs to be held on the brakes at every junction, then follow it in traffic.

If you want to invent something – I want a rear red light (about 50,000 lumens), not at all wired to the brakes but autoactivated by headlights behind in a speed/distance related manner so that all the r-soles who persist in sitting 15ft behind me at 50mph with mega bright dip suddenly see the light …….

ps I think I’m of the opinion that the UN bloke has left it a bit late

I had a funny thing the other day – I was coming down a very steep road into Hebden, and my lights were dipped. A car coming up the hill stopped for a short while even though there was space to get past. He finally came past but wound his window down and told me angrily that I should have my lights off so as not to blind people coming up.

Not dipped (which they were) but off completely! Never heard that one before. Anyone else?

The only way around this at the moment is fully adaptive Led systems that use camera based light detectors to actually aim the light beams around oncoming vehicles ( you can get these on high end Audis, BMWs and also next years Mondeo too among others) when you see it operating its very cool and works well but it’s currently expensive and not everyone can afford an Audi A8.

These are banned in the USA at the moment.
Very oddly they haven’t any regulation for them so they can’t be sold.

Never really noticed the op’s issue. The bigger issues to my mind with car lights are

– Getting people to use the right ones for the road conditions
– Getting people to replace blown bulbs

Until we cure these two ills anything else is a minor issue

Actually… Considering my car has wee warning lights for bloomin everything, it does strike me as a bit odd that there’s no failsafes/warnings for headlight bulbs failure, should be simple enough shouldn’t it? Just a case of monitoring resistance.

(No, before some keyboard warrior goes mad, I’m not saying it’s essential… But it couldn’t hurt. And I will happilly admit that I drove for a fair time with a blown headlight bulb as modern headlights are so damn good that one lights the road better than I’m used to with a full set anyway)

The last three cars I’ve owned have told me when a light’s gone somewhere. But my van, newer than two of them, can’t be arsed. Whereas it can be perfectly arsed to tell me I have 637 miles in a full tank when I’ve never got more than 500 out of it.

So I do a weekly bulb inspection. We all do that don’t we? 🙂

This time of year is often the worst for people forgetting to turn headlights on in the early evening. And if it rains.

Dipped beams do kick up to the left, presumably so you can see signs, pedestrians, cyclists, etc. That’s why you need to use adapters when you go abroad.

I’ve never particularly noticed the OP’s problem, but I regularly use an off-road cycle path that requires cycling on the right hand side of a busy road, and it’s often hard to see anything at all in the face of oncoming lights.

I’m surprised by the amount of people who dip their beam when heading towards you, but flick their lights back onto high beam before even getting level.

It happens too often to be an accident, but I have no idea why someone would think it was a good idea