I have a headache cuz my brain tried to implode (or: Winter Driving for Jacka$$es)

[Jammer]

This weekend we got hit by a one-two punch winter storm. 3-4 inches of slush followed by 4-6 inches of driving snow and 20-40mph winds polishing the new ice. Needless to say lots of people didn't show up to work on Monday when this was happening, and a lot of stores elected to stay closed. Visibility was between 1 and 50 yards on my drive to work.

What made my eyes try to jump out of my head was the 4-5 people I observed out and about driving WITHOUT THEIR LIGHTS ON! Especially whoever was driving the white Compensation-mobile. Seriously. . . WTF?
I'm trying hard enough to drive on this skating rink without the extra fun of playing dodg'em with a white blob in a white-out!

Kudos, though, to the group of college-age girls with the snow shovel who pulled over to help me push a truck out of a snowbank it'd gotten stuck in.

[blas]

I almost got hit (and it would have been my fault) on Saturday evening right around dusk because it was foggy/ice snowing and a WHITE car was driving around without their headlights coming right at me.

[mikoyan29]

This sucks. The people who drive with just htier parking lights suck just about as bad.

[protege]

The people who drive with just htier parking lights suck just about as bad.

Along those lines, the people who drive with 'daytime running lights,' and then don't turn on the headlights at night are just as bad. Why? Well, have you ever been on the highway, and come up behind a car with no rear lights?

[Shalom]

Along those lines, the people who drive with 'daytime running lights,' and then don't turn on the headlights at night are just as bad. Why? Well, have you ever been on the highway, and come up behind a car with no rear lights?

Yes I have. This past Monday night, in fact. Came up behind him and damn near didn't see him. I thought he was driving altogether blind, but when I got around the car I saw his headlights were on (albeit dimly), and I figured he just had a short somewhere. Now I understand how that happened.

Of course the DRL puts the bulbs in series so they are running on only 6.9 volts rather than 13.8, which is why they were so dim.

My '99 Blazer came with daytime running lights; I found out which fuse you have to pull to shut that off. The main headlights come on at dusk anyway, or earlier if you happen to have a pizza box on the top of the dashboard; there's no easy way to override that. (Not that I would under normal circumstances. I like the convenience of not having to remember to put on the headlights if I'm driving and it gets dark. I'd just like to be able to shut it off whilst backing out of the driveway so my lights don't blind the driver of the other car that parks there, who always backs in.)

(OK, yes, you can override by moving the pizza box elsewhere. Hush.)

[mattm04]

Yes I have. This past Monday night, in fact. Came up behind him and damn near didn't see him. I thought he was driving altogether blind, but when I got around the car I saw his headlights were on (albeit dimly), and I figured he just had a short somewhere. Now I understand how that happened.

Of course the DRL puts the bulbs in series so they are running on only 6.9 volts rather than 13.8, which is why they were so dim.

My '99 Blazer came with daytime running lights; I found out which fuse you have to pull to shut that off. The main headlights come on at dusk anyway, or earlier if you happen to have a pizza box on the top of the dashboard; there's no easy way to override that. (Not that I would under normal circumstances. I like the convenience of not having to remember to put on the headlights if I'm driving and it gets dark. I'd just like to be able to shut it off whilst backing out of the driveway so my lights don't blind the driver of the other car that parks there, who always backs in.)

(OK, yes, you can override by moving the pizza box elsewhere. Hush.)

AH GM and their genius idea of DLR's and auto head lights. Well, we can thank Greyhound for the drive w/ headlights in the day to begin with.

While it can be nice their are times when I want to have no lights on or complete control, like not blinding the neighbors at night or say idling the car in the driveway in the AM when it is cold out and not have it screaming "running car here." I have to remember to ask my mechanic more about that, supposedly it can be disabled completely and all manual because in order to sell to law enforcement they need to be able to black out the cars.

[Shalom]

idling the car in the driveway in the AM when it is cold out and not have it screaming "running car here."

On my car, if you apply the emergency brake before starting the car, the lights don't come on until you release the brake. Try this and see if it works on yours.

(Some moron on one of the newsgroups was advocating disconnecting the wire at the emergency brake pedal, so the lights never come on. This has the side effect of constantly illuminating the brake warning light, so he just took the bulb out, saying he doesn't need a light to tell him that the emergency brake was on. The fact that this light also warns of impending pressure loss in the hydraulic brake lines, and that he was thereby risking getting his dumb ass killed when his car doesn't stop the next time he steps on the brake pedal, seems to have gone right over his head.)

When I inquired at the dealer about the DRL, he said they were mandatory in Canada and that GM didn't want to have to maintain separate US and Canadian headlight modules so they put it on all of them. Not sure if this is true or not.

[Javarod]

The lack of headlights might be automatic headlights. I noticed the ones on our Cobalt not always coming on in rainy days, because it wasn't dark enough to trigger them. Bet there's a lot of people out there that neither realizes that nor knows how to turn the headlights on manually (should've seen me trying to figure it out on the company's fifteen passenger Chevy van).

GM was the first with DRLs? I know they were required in other countries before we got them over here in the US, and at first they were a great idea, since driving with your headlights on made you stand out... until everyone was doing it, now you only stand out by turning them off.

[protege]

GM was the first with DRLs? I know they were required in other countries before we got them over here in the US, and at first they were a great idea, since driving with your headlights on made you stand out... until everyone was doing it, now you only stand out by turning them off.

I think GM had them first in the US--quite a few European countries already had them, or had laws requiring drivers to have their lights on during the day. Now, everybody has their lights on during the day here. Well, except when I'm driving the MG--no DRL's for me As for my modern car, the only time the lights come on, is when I put it into gear.

[mikoyan29]

As I was heading back from the UP yesterday, I lost count of how many cars I saw without headlights on.

[Chromatix]

Most Volvos and Saabs have DRLs built in - since they're built (or at least designed) in Sweden, where running lights are a minimum requirement at all times (same law in Finland). If you don't have running lights, you use dipped beams. I'm pretty sure a lot of Volvos have got imported stateside since at least the 1980s.

[protege]

I'm pretty sure a lot of Volvos have got imported stateside since at least the 1980s.

They've been bringing them in since the 1950s But, I don't think the old ones had DRLs--the '79 264GL sedan and '81 DL wagon my parents owned didn't have them. I do know that the wagon's speedometer had 55mph painted in orange though It might have been a Sweden/Finland thing only--the newer Volvos sold here don't seem to have them either.

[Ironclad Alibi]

I had a '76 Volvo that did not have DRL.

As for the highlighted 55 on the speedometer that was a Federal requirement implemented in 1979 and ended in 1981.

[DGoddessChardonnay]

Mom and I encountered a dumbass just the other day (Thursday I think) when we went to WM to get gas . . . idiot in a mid 90's Lincoln Town car driving without their lights.

Good thing Mom was driving slow or he'd have hit us from the side.

Friday's commute to work wasn't much better . . . we were driving down Cone Blvd heading toward Church Street in the middle lane of 3. Snowplow was on the far left lane closest to the median . . .we were having snow showers/freezing rain combination that morning so Mom was driving a bit slower to allow for the road conditions as well as trying to stay as far away from other vehicles as she could.

I counted 3 cars in a row that flew past us on Mom's side so fast that they sprayed slush/road salt/snow all over the driver's window and the windshield. All because they couldn't be bothered to follow in the same lane behind the snowplow.

And don't get me started on how many people insist on riding our rear bumper as close as they can when it's slushy on the roads . . . I lost count of how many fools I saw doing that over the past 2 weekends now.

If you're in that big of a hurry, then GO AROUND US or stay the Hell back. You see how bad the roads are . . . either learn to drive slower or sell the damn car and WALK!

[LadyAndreca]

I have a silver car, so I tend to turn my lights on when it's a 'grey kind of day'. It's just the way I feel about having a car that color--when I feel like I'm blending into the world around me, I want to make sure people can see me. The lights also get turned on fairly early into dusk, because I lose track of grey and white cars in twilight first. I just consider it a bit of defensive driving.