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Today you can see for miles, many cars still are still lit up like Blackpool, or mabe they are Christmas lights.
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And some are still driving round with no lights on at all, or feel that just having sidelights on somehow makes them either invisible invincible or noticeable.
EDIT - amended incorrect wording
Edited by Dynamic Dave on 13/12/2009 at 00:06
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It`s probably me. I tend to use headlights on the motorway when driving into a low sun - so that drivers I am overtaking can see me overtaking in their mirrors. It`s easy then to leave them on coming off the motorway...
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I drove down from Norwich to Stansted and back yesterday - although we had clear blue skies in Norfolk there was fairly dense fog after Thetford. The traffic was fairly heavy. In view of the various thread about fog lights, dazzle, lack of lights etc. I made a point of looking how cars were lit . Virtually all had dipped headlights, most were using fog lights. I only saw one vehicle without lights. At no time was I dazzled by fog lights, front or rear.
Perhaps the problem is not as bad as sometimes imagined!
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It amazes me that people feel the need to have rear fog lights on when stopped in traffic, end of queue, yes, (and brake lights), otherwise why, when the car behind is only a few feet away?
Ah, I know, fag in one hand, phone in the other, no hands left for light switches.
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the need to have rear fog lights on when stopped in traffic
More than once have I been in a traffic jam, idly reading the name of the supplying dealer on the car in front's rear number plate, when they have switched their foglights on.
Here in the East Midlands last night it was moderately misty, visibility in places was down to about 8 streetlights - ie good for 70mph but not much more. Around half the vehicles had their rear foglight on, even though it was perfectly possible to discern the make and model of the car half a dozen ahead at motorway speeds.
I treat my rear foglight as a warning signal rather than as a marker - I am equally aware of what is behind me as what's in front, and use my foglight only when I think my tail lights alone are insufficient to allow the vehicle following me to determine my speed and location. Even when I drove 100,000 miles a year I reckon my foglight was switched on for a cumulative total of less than half an hour every 12 months.
Edited by Dave_TD {P} on 12/12/2009 at 21:56
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"Around half the vehicles had their rear foglight on, even though it was perfectly possible to discern the make and model of the car half a dozen ahead at motorway speeds."
So they didn't strictly need to use fog lights but can you honestly say that those cars with fog lights were a problem to you? I guess a lot of people prefer to err on the side of caution in these conditions especially when fog can thicken very quickly. I do think the problem of fog light over use seems to be exaggerated by many.
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>>>> but can you honestly say that those cars with fog lights were a problem to you?<<<
Yes I can, but in all honesty it's the vehicle manufacturers fault and not the drivers.
We travelled the M11/M25/M20 route on Friday morning and hit Harlow around rush hour.
It was very misty but not what I would describe as foggy.
Almost all the cars had rear fogs on and we both remarked that the problem was with 'twin' rear fogs.
In heavy traffic and reduced vision you still need to check mirrors and instruments and when you glance back at the traffic ahead the 'twin' rear fogs look immediately like brake lights.
On the other hand, the single rear fog is immediately recognised as just that.
Another example of more is less.
Pat
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I can remember crawling at walking pace, at tick-over in 1st, on main roads around here (near Leeds) in the late 60`s. At night, you were desperate to keep in sight of the tail lights in front of you, because if they receded there was just nothing to see.
One night, I can remember a `crocodile` of us ending up in a big yard, by following the kerb and later, seeing a car pranged against a street lamp, where it had turned onto the kerb where it lowered.
All that heavy coal burning smog went years ago of course (but HK smelt just like it last year) but rear fogs would have been great then - just to give a better fix on the car in front.
Note that I`m writing about first gear crawling, not motorway driving.
I had a big yellow beam fog light, mounted on the Mini van`s bumper and it cut under the fog like nothing I had seen. Although likely that was due to comparison with the headlights of the day.
Or was it? I quite liked the sealed beam headlights I fitted to the Mini and the bulb equipped headlights in a new Fiesta in 1982, seemed retrograde and less efficient.
Edited by oilrag on 13/12/2009 at 07:28
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"On the other hand, the single rear fog is immediately recognised as just that."
Or as a car with one brake light u/s! The Peugeot 206 single ones mounted centrally are easily identified as rear fogs.
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Or as a car with one brake light u/s! The Peugeot 206 single ones mounted centrally are easily identified as rear fogs.
Unless they're being used on a wet night when there's no fog, in which case they reflect off the road into the eyes of following lorry driver who calls them something else, can't put it on here or I'd trigger the swear filter!
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Almost all the cars had rear fogs on and we both remarked that the problem
On the other hand the single rear fog is immediately recognised as just that. Another example of more is less.
Now... Ive always had a problem with one (not centrality) mounted fog lamp.
we as a nation now have a lot of trips to and from the continent, where they drive on the wrong side of the road.
that causes problems in fog - the lamp being on the wrong side of the car!
I feel you have to blame the car designers for putting foglamps where they can be mistaken for brakelamps.
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And here (Cheshire) but very patchy. I missed the turn for our lane and I was only doing 20! But in the clear bits, was it really necessary for Mr Micra (why is it always a Micra?) to do just 25 and brake to 20 or less whenever oncoming appeared?
JH
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I always understood a single offset rear fog lamp was the preferred option.
Approaching from the rear in fog, this gives a distinctive 'two dim and one offset brighter' red light pattern, identification then possibly helped by an illuminated rear number plate.
Rear fogs must be the most over-used lamp on the car, exceeded only by front 'under the bumper' spots.
Often on the way to work I will get my usual first glimpse of Durham Cathedral from just under two miles away while the car in front of me has its rear fog light on.
If I can see a grey unlit building, albeit a large one, on the horizon, visibility cannot be that bad, can it?
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