Car light usage in Ireland

djan

As the evenings get shorter it has become more noticeable how few people of those without automatic headlights bother to turn on their lights as it gets darker.

In light of this (heh), why don't people use either dipped or day-time running lights at all times? It's mandatory to have them on in most of Europe so why not here 🤔

As a sidenote, DRL should also really include rears being on as well...

cnocbui

They produce more CO2 emissions. Somehow I have managed to see every single vehicle on the road I have needed to see during daylight hours that hasn't had any lights on, since I started driving. And conversely, other drivers have managed to see me also.

I remember in the 80's there were some complete morons in Australia advocating cumpulsory day time running lights because Sweden had them and claimed they reduced accidents.

sameoldname

For the same reason so many can't or won't indicate, stay in lane, correctly use a roundabout, use the left lane on a dual carriageway, switch their fog lights off, park within the lines, dip their headlights and so many other seemingly simple things. They are ignorant and/or incompetent.

djan

@cnocbui Their consumption, especially given that at least DRL are mostly LED is absolutely miniscule compared to the likes of radio, opening windows or AC. It has been proven through numerous studies that lights on allow for people to spot cars quicker as it creates higher contrast and our eyes are sensitive to light sources like that. For example, greyish cars in rain on a road is often hard to see through a rainy window so why not minimise that?

@sameoldname Fair enough, the mind does boggle with those who actively turn all lights off including DRLs, maybe its for the "savings".

Interestingly, the RSA does recommend lights at all time usage:

Can a dipped headlight be used if there is no DRL system fitted?

Yes. If your vehicle is not fitted with daytime running lights, you should drive with your dipped headlights on during the daytime...

shane b

I think its partly because its not mandatory, but good practice. Also car engineering/safety has come a long way in the last 20 years.

Plus the risk of a dead battery by leaving the lights on can be a factor. When i started driving 25 years ago, generally cars were not fitted with a lights on warning buzzer, so i never would turn on my lights unless it was dark. Finishing work at 1 am, an hour from home and finding a flat battery is not fun.

I do agree that that DRLs should include the rear light as well, ive been caught a few times in poor weather with people driving with DRLs only.

AndrewJRenko

Once the dark evenings come in, I see one or two drivers on each commute driving with no back lights, because they don't know how to use their DRLs.

They generally seem hugely surprised if I get to point this out to them. 

It might be a good idea to check in with drivers in your house or family to make sure they know how to operate the basic equipment in the car.

Quitelife

On a different note are the lights on new SUVs etc extremely bright bordering on blinding at times ??

Del2005

Why can't the EU make manufacturers fit soft off switches for lights and have auto as the default setting, you can turn the lights off but next time you start the car your lights are back to auto.

There's way too many people driving around with only DRLs. It's ironic that a rule for supposed safety, making cars more visible during normal daylight, makes them more dangerous in the dark and inclement weather

JohnC.

"the mind does boggle with those who actively turn all lights off including DRLs, maybe its for the "savings"."

Are there any cars where the DRLs can be turned off? I thought they are always on when the car is running?

Also, people need to learn to turn on lights in fog. I find auto doesn't work so well in fog, but I don't blame that. Many of the vehicles I see without lights won't have an auto setting. Just stupid drivers.

hoodie6029

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121022501#Comment_121022501

Wasn’t mentioning fog lights in any manner a straight banning offence (on boards) once upon a time.?

mikeecho

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121022749#Comment_121022749

Yeah.. but there's less traffic on boards than a boreen, there's very few to be bothered anymore.

cnocbui

You use an example of low visibility and heavy rain depicted in a poor photo to construe a need for lights on in sunny conditions with good visibility... nice one.

The driver of the car without their lights on should have turned them on, but that isn't a legitimate argument from which to conclude all cars should have lights on at all times they are being driven.

As someone with an interest in photography, I'll also add that using photos to assert human visual problems is something you shouldn't do in good faith because we humans have far better visual systems than any camera. I took that image and popped it into PS and it was underexposed. here's a histogram of it:

Shadows on the left and highlights on the right - that single pixel tail on the right is an indicator the photo was underexposed, making it darker looking than it should have been. Having corrected for that and the colour imbalance and, it looks less dire:

Also, is there a motorcycle without it's lights on to the left (right in image) of the car?

But even allowing for the technical deficiencies in the photo, the real issue is that the human visual system is still far better than any camera sensor in terms of dynamic range, so can capture and register far more detail in the darkest and brightest areas and would have perceived that scene as having greater contrast than the image has. Just look at how flat looking the grass is!

Increasing the contrast based on the grass and things look less dire, but it's still not a good approximation of how much better a human eye would have seen things.

[quoted post snipped]

coolbeans

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121024034#Comment_121024034

Yeah, just use lights during the day. It clearly would have made the driver in the mirror more visible.

kirving

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121023736#Comment_121023736

To be honest you're trying to apply a scientific method to something which is far more complex than you're trying to distill it down to, to prove a point, when your position was already clear by calling DRL advocates morons in your first post.

You're talking about dynamic range, where humans have the advantage, but not about low light sensitivity where a modern camera can do far better than the human eye. Not saying that this is the case here, but a photo of the mirror demonstrates the point fairly reasonably. In any case, numerous studies show that DRL's do aid in minimizing collisions.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0022437523000099?via%3Dihub

DRL fitment can reduce the overall risk of being involved in a non-nighttime multi-vehicle crash where vehicle visibility may be a factor in crash causation by a statistically significant 8.8 %.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2850978/

Minnesota vehicles equipped with DRLs were associated with a statistically significant lower crash rate compared to vehicles without DRLs from 1995 to 2002

The paper below shows less conclusive results, but also does not prove that that DRL's are bad.

https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/811029

DRLs seemed more likely to reduce daytime target fatal and injury crashes.  

My biggest contention with DRL's, particularly from Hyundai / Kia, and more broadly Japanese manufacturers is that the rear lights are not activated when the wipers are used. I spend a lot of time on the motorway, and on a bright rainy day a grey car can become very difficult to see with no rear lights.

On top of that, every manufacturer has their own interpretation of "automatic lights", and what the dashboard symbol should be. In my F30 3 Series, no light is shown when the DRL's (and potentially real lights are on), but if I turn on the dim parking lights, I'm shown the same symbol as when the dipped beams are on.

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121024144#Comment_121024144

I called DLR advocates in Australia morons, a country where you wear dark glasses to reduce the brightness of everything on purpose, most of the year, but let's not worry about accuracy here when a slur will do.

kirving

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121024198#Comment_121024198

I didn't make any slurs. The first study refers to Australia, and an 8.8% reduction was seen with DRL's. Even in sunny times, dark cars can blend into shadows, or if the sun is behind them in early morning or late evening, DRL's can certainly make a difference.

I've a fair interest in photography too, and while bright sun can be fantastic to shoot in, you have to be far more aware of orientation so that you can control backlighting, but in the real world, roads can be any orientation, and so a bright low sun behind the subject (vehicle) can make things more difficult to see versus when it's overcast.

notAMember

The assumption that all humans have identical vision with good light perception is also flawed. Plenty have some level of nyctalopia, particularly with age, which is neither tested for, or corrected by lenses.

Best practice, keep the lights on.

Henry Ford III

I've auto lights and auto low/high beam also.

A good innovation.

djan

I think its fair to say that having lights on (of any sort) substantially increases visibility of vehicle in all conditions. Given the huge push towards lower road collisions, I really don't understand why they are not mandatory at all times. Thankfully post 2011/12 cars have them as standard but and usually work but as someone else stated, really it should be default both front and back lights on with potentially switching to dipped in lower light conditions. All done automatically as people cannot be trusted.

Still no valid argument not to do so as all that was proposed was emissions and those morons in Australia...

hoodie6029

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121022873#Comment_121022873

Like yer man in Life of Brian shouting ‘Jehovah! Jehovah!’ I can now crib about fogs to my heart’s content 😂😂

The usage of them is way down since DRL’s became standard equipment anyway

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121021727#Comment_121021727

I'm not sure you'd even be able to calculate the CO2 emissions difference from use of LED DRLs - they are likely to be in sub 10w level. My 2x 55w halogen dips are going to make more of an impact but its still not huge.

In summer they can make light coloured cars more visible in glare conditions.

_Kaiser_

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121021727#Comment_121021727

I actually thought this was going to be an ironic post when I read it....

The reasoning is obvious (as in fact illustrated by your post above of cars in the rain) - they make other vehicles easier to see, not just in bad weather, but roads with overhanging trees, generally cloudy days, just after rain when the sun is reflecting/glaring off the surface water, and every other condition. My own experience over the years as well is that pedestrians are less likely to step out in front of you (even in Dublin CC) if you have lights on.

But on a side note, this nonsense of "emissions" to justify/defend everything nowadays has to stop. We're a small island off the endge of Europe with a population less than most major cities. When the likes of Russia, India, China, the US and elsewhere do what they want in this regard, our impact at global scale is so small as to be virtually nil - yet we have the Greens and others making out that we Irish will save the World if we watch our emissions (and tax/restrict/ban our way to success!) It's a completely ridiculous argument that only undermines any possible validity the original point may have had.

Auto lights AND "scandavian" mode DRLs (where the rear lights are always illuminated as well) should be mandatory - the EU can come up with all sort of other nanny state interference but rarely something that would be actually useful like that.

In the absence of that though, turn yer bloody lights on!

masterboy123

I have the new hybrid Tucson and auto lights are working fab including rear horizontal bar light (only in Executive Plus model).