Auto headlights, yes or no?

[cactus_kid]

Everybody knows DRLs are a safety feature, are you under the impression that this is being argued?

Once upon a time, DRL's were effective. They were few and far between so the caught one's attention. No so now days. There are simply way to many distracted drivers. It is SOP at any accident scene to park a responding fire engine on a angle across the affected lane. Behind is an arrow truck. Finally, no less than 3 patrol units with all lights on ........ High vis reflectorized safety cones going back 100'. Meh! I've watched people drive around the cones ........ down the shoulder ............ "I didn't see the lights." or, "I have a hair appointment ............. I needed to get around the backup !" The best one to date is the dumbass that drove weaving his way around the cones, patrol cars and, arrow truck. Only to lodge the front end of his Mercedes into the rear wheel well of the Hi-Vis yellow and red crash response fire engine the local dept had just taken delivery of. Go Figure !

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[cactus_kid]

After 20 yrs of dealing with perverts in both the military and civilian life, I finally called it a day.

 

[1958cyclist]

Now, the only other addition that would cap the "laziness chart" would automatic dimming. My wife's Subaru has these, and I must admit, they're kind of nice on busy suburban/country roads with minimal external lighting and wandering critters.

 

[Joe B.]

I don't need the headlights going on automatically in the garage during daytime only to switch off 2 minutes later, so I turn them on manually at night, the old fashioned way.

 

[cactus_kid]

And then I looked at your avatar...

Emmy is no pervert.

 

[Bikeman315]

Emmy is no pervert.

Are we still talking about “headlights”?

 

[cactus_kid]

Are we still talking about “headlights”?

My CA Special is named Emmy ...............

 

[Rapid Red]

Auto lights ....No capable of headlight management.
Rear view camera..Those nifty rear view mirrors work very well. The electric adjustment provide plenty of on the fly viewing. Do not trust the back up camera , view is limited (peripheral). However it does assist backing straight and distance to curb.

So I use all 3

Display DARK mode is always set, only activated when backing.

 

[Norm Peterson]

If it works well, and almost always does it when I would have, why would I not use it?

Unlike driving a manual transmission, there's no extra driving involvement or fun in switching lights on. If it didn't have auto lamps, I'd turn them on as one should, but I definitely won't shy away from a consistent and good tech.

To me, it's more than a little insulting for somebody else to insist that they do things for me when I am fully capable of doing them for myself. Been that way since Truman was in the White House, for all kinds of things besides this.

For auto headlights, even if the tech would switch the lights on exactly when I would; I'd still notice - I'd have been reaching for the switch, the tech would have just barely beaten me to the punch, and I'd be annoyed. At myself for forgetting to shut the lights all the way off like I really should be doing with lights in general, and at the tech for making it too easy for me to get slack about turning the lights off when I'm done needing them.


Norm

 

[Norm Peterson]

We are talking about the headlights, not the tri bars. The headlights are on as the DRLs by default. You can turn this feature off, leaving only the tri bars as your DRLs (which looks better)

Tri-bars as DRLs I could at least sort of live with, like the LED accent lighting on our WRX. Leave the headlights out of the DRL function.

The Subaru Legacy GT that we had before the WRX used the high beam bulbs at roughly half voltage for DRLs, and since they were halogen bulbs they darkened over time (running them at half voltage/quarter power apparently doesn't run them hot enough for the halogen cycle to work properly). So yeah, there can be a definite downside to headlights as DRLs. Oddest thing happened on that car, too . . . some heavy-wattage voltage dropping resistor mysteriously fell off it.


Norm

 

[shogun32]

So the the recent F150 has auto-highbeam dip across the platform but ONLY when the light switch is Auto. It is also a toggle option on the menu. But the Mustang doesn't have the feature at all. Why? Can Ford PLEASE figure out how to sing from a single freaking sheet of music?

GM's solution to this is to make auto-mode the default. You can manually select just markers and main beams if you want using detents on the stalk-mounted switch no different than if you were selecting wiper speeds. Turning the lights OFF though is a spring loaded twist below 'auto' and the switch rebounds back to home position. Ford has a gigantic knob on a dash panel, which on the F150 at least is placed in an awkward location. Another case where GM has an actual human factors engineer on their team and Ford employs some unimaginative bumpkin.

As me grand-pappy used to say, "just because you've done it a thousand times doesn't mean you haven't been doing it wrong the whole time." I think this was during 'The Talk'.

 

[Tseg]

Well, while we are on it, for those owners bitching about auto up windows from their fob.

What does that knob do^^^^^^^?

 

[ice445]

The headlights go on, then they go off. You can't explain this shit. Just like you can't explain this thread getting to be 6 pages long

 

[Michael_vroomvroom]

So the the recent F150 has auto-highbeam dip across the platform but ONLY when the light switch is Auto. It is also a toggle option on the menu. But the Mustang doesn't have the feature at all. Why? Can Ford PLEASE figure out how to sing from a single freaking sheet of music?

Mustang has it too. Works quite well on my 2020.

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