this post was submitted on 29 Sep 2024
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It’s not because they’re LED. It’s because they’re aftermarket: illegally colored, and poorly aimed or not aimed at all.
1000% this. Aftermarket, fucked colors, and/or no alignment is the cause of the problems. I would add that a lot of aftermarket lights are also way too bright. Sure, the owner can see (a tiny bit) better but everyone else gets blinded. Even then, it's not bad unless they're not aligned properly. (Well, it'll still blind you if it's a truck directly behind you but that's just trucks.)
I own a '97 Honda. The last owner had LEDs in it. The lenses weren't designed for LEDs, they were designed for halogens. So one of the first things I did was revert the headlights to halogen bulbs. And they work perfectly fine. I drive in a suburb so the streets are already fairly well lit. I don't need to cast a beam 5 miles out to see where I'm going.
Also, it's that soft yellowish white light. Not that harsh daylight bluish light everyone and their mom is obsessed with. I don't get it. Anyway, the best thing you can do in 99 times of 100 is to consider what equipment you have and stick to OEM spec.
Or if you do legitimately want to upgrade, consider swapping in something that was OEM spec on a higher trim level/fancier related car model (e.g. Acura stuff on your Honda).
You don't want blue light anyway because it messes with your night vision.
This isn't always correct. I have a 2021 Toyota and the lights are factory installed and way too bright. I've had the lights lowered by a mechanic, but I still blind oncoming traffic and frequently get people flashing their brights at me. I feel terrible, I don't want to blind anyone. I had someone yelling at me about my aftermarket lights and I had to tell them they were factory, he was still mad at me. It drives me crazy, I hate these lights too! Replacements are over $1,000.
Thanks for sharing this. I'll try to remember there are at least a few people out there like this when my blood pressure starts to rise, and I wish painful deaths upon the presumed assholes blinding me on my way home from working for 14h straight.
Emissions checks need to have strict headlight inspections and tight regulations on aim and intensity. Permits should be required for all these additional spots and bars that truck owners love to slap on too. It's too far out of control.
Yeah, I hate them too. When it's late and I'm on a 2 lane and a sedan is coming towards me I've gotten in the habit of turning my lights off to give them a break (not when it's too dark), but I don't do it for trucks, we just blind each other.
I'll look into a film or something I could try to dim them.
Can't you stick some material over the lights to dim them? Or is that illegal?
Bullshit, Tesla headlamps blind everyone else on the road straight from the factory.
"tesla" and "build quality" do not match, even before the cyberstuck
Yeah, he already covered "poorly aimed or not aimed at all."
Unless they were aimed poorly from the factory (with how bad their cars are built I'd lean towards that being very probable) they should not be blinding. I know someone with a very early model 3 that had poorly aimed headlights, but he eventually got it fixed. But the 5 other people I know with Teslas are not at all blinding. My Outbacks slightly fucked up headlight is more blinding than their cars.
And most cars involve a good amount of work to aim them manually which is time-consuming and possibly intimidating.
That's because there is no governance for aiming headlights properly. It's usually done by dealers who don't care.
Most headlight issues are because people have retrofitted improper lights into their factory casings. different light sources project light in different patterns so if you put an LED or an HID bulb in a halogen housing it will blind the fuck out of everyone.
But at the same time if headlights aren't aimed properly they'll just blind anyone anyway regardless of the light pattern.
On top of that really tall vehicles, even when aimed properly, still aim their headlights directly into your eyes just because of how high above the ground they are.
Very little of the blinding headlights issues are due to the source of the light.
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There's enough fuck heads in minivans and civics that do this shit too
Often this is the case, but there's also a not insignificant number of times I'm convinced a car with shitty aftermarket bulbs ends up being a new Acura, infinity, or Mercedes when I get close enough to determine the make.
New doesn't mean no aftermarket
Every car that blinds me is some extremely new 2020-2024 year car. I get blinded by every third car on the road. The amount of people that get aftermarket headlights installed is very much not a third of all car owners. I can get behind poorly aimed by the dealer but you are wildly overestimating the number of people who have aftermarket lights.
Are they all trucks? If not, maybe you need to get your eyes checked if they're all blinding you that badly. Or do they just not aim headlights properly in the US anymore? In EU, low beams are supposed to have a dipped beam.
Your last question, no they do not aim them correctly. Cost savings.
Yikes. Wouldn't pass inspection in my country even.
Most states here don't even have car inspections lol
Car inspections sound like a pipe dream here in the states. I think its a great idea personally.
I don’t understand how LEDs were ever allowed with the same sockets. What legitimate use could that be.
… plus this has somehow gotten so popular that my garage, part of a major regional chain, offered to replace my headlights with LED replacement bulbs
… although I can see the personal motivation. When everyone else seems to be causing so much glare, you need all the help you can get
On the basic end: because they're cheaper, use less energy, are more reliable, and last longer.
On the fancy end: have you seen demonstrations of Audi's matrix LEDs? They have the ability to dim specific areas dynamically, so that they can track incoming traffic and keep them in a dim-zone while still keeping the road and shoulders well lit.
Keep in mind that there is nothing special about LEDs that make them brighter; they can make LEDs dimmer and they can make halogens brighter, but the manufacturer has chosen not to.
Sure, but making them with the same socket, so they fit in the same place, despite having different beam shape and reflector requirements, is entirely wrong.
My car has LED headlights and they fantastic. They also have a very sharp cutoff meant to keep it from blinding others, assuming correct alignment. It also claims to have the hardware for active matrix and will turn that on as soon as they get approval
My older car that I keep for my team has noticeably dimmer lights. I’d really like to convert to LEDs and I know there are some that fit and are sold as replacements. But I know they’re not. Those manufacturers need to be fined for every kit sold like that
I think the key part is "the LEDs could be made dimmer, or the halogens brighter, the manufacturer chose not to".
It makes sense for plain ol halogens to share the same socket as plain ol LEDs, because they function in the same way and are the same brightness.
But bulbs of different characters probably should have different sockets, so that high-intensity bulbs of any kind (eg xenon, laser, led) cannot be used in a regular lighting fixture without the necessary hardware to make it safe.
But here we have another problem - standardizing car parts is very beneficial to the owner because it makes repairing much easier and cheaper; if every manufacturer uses their own connectors for everything, then vendor lock-in would get that much worse and replacement parts would get that much harder to find and more expensive.
If manufacturer we're encouraged or forced to use standards, and we're instead encouraged not to, then they'd all make their own proprietary connectors for everything forcing you to get all maintenance done at official dealership where they can charge extortinat prices.
So it's kind of a damned if you do, damned if you don't scenario. I think all we can do is regulate the behavior we want to see, and fine manufacturers, garages, and drivers that violate it.
That explains it to me. Never understood the hate for LED headlights, they're great. Aftermarket is illegal here, you don't see any.