In my experience, while Tesla is a prime offender, it isn’t only Teslas headlight that are too bright. Honda Prologues are another specific model that blinds me all the time.
While we’re at it, I’m convinced auto-headlights and the general dumbing down of drivers mean a lot of people are simply driving around with their brights on all the time. Don’t know how to fix that one though.
Back when I still used Nextdoor, I once posted a picture of the regular (green) headlight dash icon and the blue high beam icon, and spelled out what they’re used for and that people should know the difference. I got flooded with hearts or whatever the Nextdoor equivalent of upvotes is, I’m sure all from people who already knew and were also frustrated. There are definitely some people who are either ignorant or oblivious; I wonder if any of them saw my post and learned something? Can’t say the problem got any better.
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I hate Tesla cars as much as the next guy, but this goes for every brand out there.
Literally everything about cars has enshittified, including headlights. Those were a problem solved back in the 1930s and we quickly understood that you need lights that give enough to see, but don’t blind the other side.
Then came the 2000 era engineers who forgot everything we learned in the 1900s and refused to relearn them and everything has been going to shit ever since
I blame the Internet tbh. Vast amounts of information at your finger tips with no real curve to learn any of it, skipping official books and documents on the subject and the learnings of the past.
Quick answers no friction and no learning
You’d think they’d have lights that can self adjust their direction based on the vehicle’s angle and if it is turning. I’d love to have headlights that show me where I’m turning for things like pedestrians crossing in unlit areas. They had these on the 1948 Tucker.
I’d very much like every truck out there to have the headlights pointed away from my eyes and be less bright thanks.
I’m very close to putting a mirror over my rearview window to shine the light back at them.
Trucks need to have semi levels of regulations for headlights
I see plenty of trucks with headlights well above semi trucks, and I’ve yet to be blinded by any semi headlights, even the stupid white blue colored ones due to their regulations of height and angle actually being enforced
Mirror doesn’t work, hang emergency visibility jacket over your seats. Sometimes those do when they reflect back and catch their eye, and they won’t net you a ticket
In older cars, where you could manually flip the rear view mirror to dim it, my dad would flip it back and forth trying to flash the person behind him so they’d get the hint about their high beams. Not sure it ever worked…
Presumably the mirror was angled toward his eyes so he was just flashing himself
A thought occured to me the other day: there is absolutely no reason that headlights have to be on the upper part of the front grille. Mount them as close to the ground as possible. (Like busses and some cargo trucks) At least it will address a situation where pickup truck / SUV headlights are at eye level for drivers of anything smaller.
Those headlights are just improperly adjusted. Normal headlights point down, especislly on the driver side. Brights are often bright because they point forward.
Now, if you replace your headlight, for example, or decide to lift your truck, and don’t adjust your headlights…well now you’ve just got your brights on all day long.
I think they have to be kind of close to the drivers eye level for other vehicles reflektors to work.
I drive a giant motor home with headlights about five feet lower than my eye level.
Other cars’ reflectors work fine.
Sometimes it’s hard to read reflective signs above way over the highway, but retroreflective stuff at road level is definitely working
Having had to drive Vail Pass at night, I’d say the bright headlights are the most dangerous thing I have encountered in years of driving, way ahead of drunk drivers and speeders.
yep. there’s a route I drive regularly that has hills and turns. it’s so fucking dangerous at night because of these assholes with blinding headlights.
The bright headlight thing has been a pet peeve of mine for a while. So, I’m glad to hear that government is apparently trying to fix it. That being said, why would anyone assume that a company like Tesla would comply with this regulation? That company has a long history of violating and flouting laws without consequence. I just have no confidence that US society does “laws” anymore when it comes to corporations.
I found it weird there are about 20,000 vehicles of concern for models that sold millions. I wonder what happened, how are those relative few different?
That being said, they are really bright but now that we finally have the adaptive beams enabled, it seems to make a huge difference
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That’s a lot of work/cost to just find out whether something needs to be done.
Almost makes you want each part to report an id ……. Until you think about vendor locks and surveillance
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Manufacturers supercede parts in the middle of a model’s lifecycle all the time, sometimes doesn’t even coincide with a facelift
Could be that they replaced the parts with a newer design already
Brightness is obviously an issue … Id be happy with them pointed at the fucking road, there is nothing at other drivers eye level you need to see
Saw a pickup on I10 not long ago had a light bar on the roof lighting up both side of the highway. It was fucking absurd. What a total and complete dick head.
For real. Those light bars are for when you are out back in Bumfuck, Mississippi. Not the damn interstate.
In Colorado at least, you’d get a ticket for not having physical light covers installed on any lights other than your standard headlights and (possibly, I can’t remember the details) fog lights. light bars and anything else had to be covered if you were on a public road. I know of at least one case of a person actually receiving a ticket for it. that should be a law everywhere.
I don’t know why the manufacturers have such a hard-on for super bright headlights. It isn’t like anyone is basing their buying decision on it. I guess when you are an executive who never drives themselves you don’t get blinded by them. I hope the NHTSA finally sets limits on headlight brightness and the gov bans aftermarket lights that exceed limits also. Now if we could just get enforcement to crack down on the a-holes who blast backward facing lights to harass other drivers also.
I’m probably in a significant minority, but if I was buying a new car (
lol why would I do that), I would specifically avoid anything which has blinding headlights.
Matrix headlights solve this.
no they don’t and stop with that fucking bullshit propaganda
They actually kinda do? Any oncoming car with matrix headlights doesn’t blind me and when I had them (well, projector based adaptive lights actually), I never got flashed at.
IIRC they even blocked out cyclists and pedestrians though I could be wrong.
And unlike simply having dim lights, they still illuminated the roadside enough that I could see the animals before they’d jump onto the road.
Good, include the other blinding shits too.
It didn’t use to be this way.
I hope they ban loud exhausts and aftermarket noise exhausts next.
wild that there are two people who downvoted this, as if they have the right to pollute our neighborhoods with their exhaust and noise. what a bunch of entitled pricks
The thing that always blows my mind is that there are laws against loud exhausts. Which is fine, i don’t want a loud as car, it’s silly. But what is point of these laws when they don’t count if you spend enough money? No, your honda is not allowed to be that loud, now make room for the v10 asshole who is twice as loud.
My ford ranger has lights that can tell where an oncoming car is, and it dims that specific area. It’s really cool.
cool, but not effective enough at addressing the problem and useless when pointed at anything other than a vehicle
That’s a legit complaint, this doesn’t help cyclists or pedestrians. Though selectively dimming lights is definitely cool as fuck and a good idea.
I think with further development this could in fact be a good solution.
Another strategy could be, rather than trying to identify various non-road objects, and avoid blinding those, to instead try to positively identify the road, and only illuminate that. If it’s actively trying to not shine on anything it isn’t certain is road, that could work. It’s at least an avenue worth exploring.
Also, if you’re already putting lidar in vehicles for collision avoidance, the headlights are one more area where that capability could be utilized.
It detects those too. As long as they have a tail Light or headlight
Please don’t mandate computerized light dimming
A bill introduced into Congress earlier this year—the LIGHT (Limiting Intense Glare for Highway and Two-lane) Safety Act—directs the U.S. Secretary of Transportation to study and establish an overarching maximum allowable brightness for low-beam headlights in the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards. Right now, there are rules around the intensity of headlights at different parts of the beam, but no limits on the overall brightness.
Oh, a good bill.
