OT DoT Buries Bad News

[Jethro_uk]

I doubt it. I was impressed to see C&U regs specify acceptable wavelengths for red and amber.

[fred]

Fog lights came in to being in response to the very poor headlight availabl e in the early to mid 20th century. These poor headlight gave a lot of boun ce back of light which blinded the user. Fog lights were better designed to control this bounce back, and, crucially, because they were to be used in fog one could fit them below the regulatory minimum height for head lamps. (Lights fitted beneath this minimum height would have to have their beams t ilted up above the horizontal to get adequate throw, thus blinding on comin g cars ) As the fog light was only to be used in fog it was felt the user w ould be interested in seeing only the limited view offered by fog so there would be no need to achieve throw.

What we have today is automotive jewellery. Pillocks who think they look ni ce. Pillocks who say 'I paid £xx.xx for them as an extra so I'm going to get some use out of them. Pillocks attempting to get throw from a light no t designed to give it and blinding all on-coming traffic.

The real idiots to me are those in cars (Mercedes and BMW i.m.e.) where the fog lights reset to off when the main lights are turned off. While there m ight be some excuse for someone driving a vehicle where the fog light switc h is independent of the main light switch, and where conceivably the fog li ghts have been left turned on in error, these titheads have to actually tur n the damn things on every time.

Oh whats the point! The only hope as far as I can see is that they are now being replaced by led daylight driving lights.

[Chris J Dixon]

lights reset to off when the main lights are turned off. While there might be some excuse for someone driving a vehicle where the fog light switch is independent of the main light switch, and where conceivably the fog lights have been left turned on in error, these titheads have to actually turn the damn things on every time.

Quite!

I have to say that I don't find what I presume are the standard symbols for the front and rear fog lights too easy to differentiate from each other. I have to remind myself that the one with the beam angled down must be the front.

I haven't had factory-fitted front fogs before, so either I didn't have a choice, or it was a switch I had fitted myself.

Chris

[bert]

+1

[bert]

I've had them and found them the biggest waste of space ever - maybe because when you do come to use them they are completely covered in shit, and they don't have wash-wipe.

[dennis]

I wouldn't buy a car like that, but as you can tell, there are people that don't have a clue.

[dennis]

Are you sure they are broken? the buses around here have led clusters where half the leds are on normally and the rest when the fogs are on.

[Dave Liquorice]

Pretty sure that all front light symbols have the light beams going from the "lamp" right to left and all rear light symbols have the beams going left to right from the "lamp". Front or rear fogs have a vertical wiggly line(s) through the light beams.

[Tim+]

Funnily enough, the question "Are the indicator lights in the middle of the tail/brake lights?" isn't always at the top of a purchaser's mind when it comes to deciding what car to buy.

Maybe it ought to be but most buyers assume that manufactures fit legal lights. I don't like 'em either and I think the appropriate standards people should be getting on to manufacturers to stop them as I think they don't meet the strict standards of the lighting rules.

Tim

[Chris J Dixon]

I do believe you are right :-)

Chris

[Tim+]

For someone like me who struggles with left and right, it doesn't seem intuitive at all which direction should indicate the front or back of the car. Up and down would be better.

Tim

[Scott M]

For multi-bulb 3rd brake lights there was a rule brought in that more than half have to be working. Whether it was just these or applied to any multi-segment light, I know not.

[Andy Burns]

Yes, they use all of them on dim (or more likely low duty cycle flickering) for tail lights, the central ones come on brighter as brake lights - it's a random mishmash of which ones work or not.

[John Williamson]

One of the biker forums has this alleged quote from VOSA:-

"LED lamps An acceptable alternative to standard bulbs, these lamps tend to use multiple LEDs. The MOT requirement is that at least 50% of the LEDs must illuminate. If not, the lamp will fail for being ?so damaged or deteriorated that its function is impaired?."

[polygonum]

Page 6

[bert]

Some unfortunate sod did near me - and got a V8 Defender up her arse for her trouble a few years ago. 'Twas icy and didn't see the indicator soon enough.

[Tim Watts]

On Monday 25 March 2013 20:00 John Williamson wrote in uk.d-i-y:

Seems reasonable...

[GMM]

I think it goes further than that: I had a Scenic (probably the same as a Megane) and the Haynes manual gave a long description which, if I'm remembering properly, involved stripping out the suspension on one side for headlamp replacement. At teh end of the section it pointed out that it may just be possible to fiddle the new bulb in directly. a tight squeeze, but I managed it, fortunately....

[Dave Liquorice]

What has High-Definition Multimedia Interface got to do with Hydrargyrum Medium-arc Iodide lighting? B-)

I don't think theatres use much HMI, if at all. HMI doesn't dim very much and they are a bugger to re-strike when hot. Pretty sure it will all be filament lamps of one sort or another.

[Chris J Dixon]

I came across a problem with using LED replacements for filament bulbs in a railway application. The existing installation used current sensing to detect bulb failure. With the LEDs, because of the multiple series/parallel matrix, with associated resistors, even if a significant proportion of the diodes had failed, the current drawn would be little changed, and the detector would not spot this.

The regulatory focus when evaluating the change had been only on the specified light distribution, the bigger picture had been missed.

Chris