Yeah I’ve noticed over the past few years I’ve gone from not really minding night driving to actually worrying about it and it’s largely due to the amount of headlight glare out there now. It’s...
Yeah I’ve noticed over the past few years I’ve gone from not really minding night driving to actually worrying about it and it’s largely due to the amount of headlight glare out there now. It’s bad enough for highway traffic, but for city driving it makes it so I literally just cannot see cyclists or pedestrians on dark clothing. My night vision is completely shot and my own car’s headlights don’t light up the periphery enough to see people at intersections. (Let’s not even get into the fat fucking A and B pillars giving drivers giant blind spots right where people or cyclists are likely to be.)
It’s also why I’m leery about getting a sedan despite preferring them to suvs and crossovers. Those lifted truck headlights will blast straight into your retinas at that height, so it’s a real arms race to avoid it.
That reflective back windshield mentioned in the article was a cool idea and I’d like to invest in some sort of active countermeasure that mirrors the headlights right back at the eyeballs of the...
That reflective back windshield mentioned in the article was a cool idea and I’d like to invest in some sort of active countermeasure that mirrors the headlights right back at the eyeballs of the driver. Fuck it, apparently we live in a world where civic responsibility is for cucks so if it’s gonna be a war of all against all let me arm up.
What I've long wanted to mount in my windows is an octahedral retroreflector, similar to the octahedral radar reflectors like this or this used on boats, but with highly polished mirrored surfaces...
What I've long wanted to mount in my windows is an octahedral retroreflector, similar to the octahedral radar reflectors like this or this used on boats, but with highly polished mirrored surfaces for optical reflection instead of radar.
Basically, eight optical corner reflectors joined into a ball so that they'll throw light back 180 degrees no matter where it comes from.
No need for an active countermeasure when a passive one can do the job perfectly well.
I doubt a BB would do anything to a modern plastic headlight. I'd go with paintball. Not permanent, but extremely effective at reducing blinding sources immediately.
I doubt a BB would do anything to a modern plastic headlight. I'd go with paintball. Not permanent, but extremely effective at reducing blinding sources immediately.
Helicopters are a testament to mankind's hubris, as a whirling death contraption with hundreds of interlinked moving parts vigorously beats physics in to submission. But more seriously - I'm not...
Helicopters are a testament to mankind's hubris, as a whirling death contraption with hundreds of interlinked moving parts vigorously beats physics in to submission.
But more seriously - I'm not sure relative to cars, but helicopters have far higher accident rates per mile/per flight hour than standard aircraft. This actually comes up a lot when talking about military system safety records and the V-22 Osprey. Many people complained about the Osprey's safety record and how it was worse than most military aircraft, but miss that it's not meant to replace something like a C-130, it's meant to replace a Blackhawk. It ends up sitting somewhere between the two, which makes some sense as a craft that somewhat splits the difference between the types.
Per hour traveled, helicopters are a little more dangerous, but they are much safer per mile. So for the same trip, a chopper is safer, though I suspect many helicopter trips aren't really 1:1...
Per hour traveled, helicopters are a little more dangerous, but they are much safer per mile.
So for the same trip, a chopper is safer, though I suspect many helicopter trips aren't really 1:1 substitutes for automobile travel.
I'm pretty sure my wife is sick of me ranting about people who have their high beams on all the time as well as poorly aimed headlights, such as on Teslas or large trucks. I'm also not a fan of...
I'm pretty sure my wife is sick of me ranting about people who have their high beams on all the time as well as poorly aimed headlights, such as on Teslas or large trucks. I'm also not a fan of having crazy bright lights with electronic controls to avoid blinding people. I recently drove a subaru while on vacation that had high beams on by default, but it would turn them down to regular beam if it detected another car ahead. It definitely wasn't fast enough, and I'm pretty sure a lot of oncoming cars saw a quick flash of blinding light before the high beam turned off.
The end of the article made me wonder if I'm autistic too. I also have a single "Edison style" incandescent bulb above my kitchen island for decorative purposes. I feel like it adds a kind of mood to a late night of drinking wine and eating charcuterie that's similar to the glow of a campfire or something like that. I also have some flashlights that have color temperature ramping, so I can light my nighttime dog walks with a light character that fits my mood.
A lot of the autism spectrum things aren’t solely experienced by people on the spectrum, they’re just more sensitive to them and/or have more difficulty suppressing or ignoring their discomfort...
A lot of the autism spectrum things aren’t solely experienced by people on the spectrum, they’re just more sensitive to them and/or have more difficulty suppressing or ignoring their discomfort than a neurotypical person. But it’s probably more useful to think of it as a sort of canary-in-the-coal-mine indicator that something is amiss that the rest of us are overlooking rather than a thing where if you’re in the spectrum you’re like this and if you’re not you’re like that.
I have been seeing so much of this lately. Like, they're in a fucking residential neighborhood, that's not what brights are for.
I recently drove a subaru while on vacation that had high beams on by default, but it would turn them down to regular beam if it detected another car ahead. It definitely wasn't fast enough, and I'm pretty sure a lot of oncoming cars saw a quick flash of blinding light before the high beam turned off.
I have been seeing so much of this lately. Like, they're in a fucking residential neighborhood, that's not what brights are for.
Except that it’s not that dark, and your eyes are great at adjusting to the conditions, and by having your lights brighter you make it even harder to see anything that’s not lit, so you’re making...
Except that it’s not that dark, and your eyes are great at adjusting to the conditions, and by having your lights brighter you make it even harder to see anything that’s not lit, so you’re making the problem worse for yourself
(Not actually addressed at you, in particular, just creating a rebuttal to that kind of argument)
Interesting article, enjoyed reading it. I've wondered about this, but it's nice to see the numbers and hear from some people really involved in this process. As a minor anecdote, I recently...
Interesting article, enjoyed reading it. I've wondered about this, but it's nice to see the numbers and hear from some people really involved in this process. As a minor anecdote, I recently purchased a used car which had it's rear windshield tinted and I hardly notice or get annoyed by way too bright headlights anymore while driving. It makes me wonder if smart glass which can locally tint a bright light source might be an "eventual" solution.
How dark is your tint? I've got a compact suv that sits higher than a sedan but lower than anything else and keep getting flashbanged with a tinted rear window. I wind up with my mirror darkening...
How dark is your tint? I've got a compact suv that sits higher than a sedan but lower than anything else and keep getting flashbanged with a tinted rear window. I wind up with my mirror darkening switch (not sure what it's called) on most nights I'm driving.
I wonder if there’s like light sunglasses you can wear, then, for night driving. I do find the headlights obnoxious. The worst is when you’re doing a left turn and there’s some bright ass cars on...
I wonder if there’s like light sunglasses you can wear, then, for night driving. I do find the headlights obnoxious.
The worst is when you’re doing a left turn and there’s some bright ass cars on the other side. Sometimes I just have no idea where I’m even turning.
Most mirrors in the past several years have included auto-tinting. It's not localized, but when everything is dark except the headlights, it doesn't much matter if everything else is slightly...
It makes me wonder if smart glass which can locally tint a bright light source might be an "eventual" solution.
Most mirrors in the past several years have included auto-tinting. It's not localized, but when everything is dark except the headlights, it doesn't much matter if everything else is slightly darker. It all just appears black other than the lights.
This is already a thing on higher trim level cars, sort of. I mentioned this in another thread recently, but I just upgraded my car to pre-owned Civic Sport Touring. In addition to having tinted...
It makes me wonder if smart glass which can locally tint a bright light source might be an "eventual" solution.
This is already a thing on higher trim level cars, sort of. I mentioned this in another thread recently, but I just upgraded my car to pre-owned Civic Sport Touring. In addition to having tinted windows, and a lower ride height that puts your line of vision below some trucks' lights instead of right in line with them, it has an auto-dimming rear-view mirror. It electronically measures brightness of light behind you compared to the ambient level and adjusts to compensate before you even notice.
It's basically a gel sandwiched between two pieces of glass that changes color and reduces reflectivity when an electric current is applied.
I have a rearview dimmer and it just makes me lament how my side mirrors do not have the same functionality while I'm blinded in one eye. (Half)Joke aside, it do be good. It makes it much less of...
I have a rearview dimmer and it just makes me lament how my side mirrors do not have the same functionality while I'm blinded in one eye.
(Half)Joke aside, it do be good. It makes it much less of a problem. While it does trade one problem for another, it gets really dark and removes all detail, it's the lesser of two evils.
The 2025 Rivians have adaptive headlights and it’s a trip to see them in action. They appear to do a good job of leaving other cars in an unlit cone, but I’ve never experienced what it’s like to...
The 2025 Rivians have adaptive headlights and it’s a trip to see them in action. They appear to do a good job of leaving other cars in an unlit cone, but I’ve never experienced what it’s like to ride in front of one or as oncoming traffic (to my knowledge).
My understanding is that they are only on the 2025 models of the R1S and that they were just recently activated with a software update. Also, they are not turned on by default, I think.
My understanding is that they are only on the 2025 models of the R1S and that they were just recently activated with a software update. Also, they are not turned on by default, I think.
Ah if they're not on by default, I might not have seen them yet. But I'm also not sure I'd be able to tell the 25s apart from previous years. But there are lots of R1s around. Ill keep an eye out...
Ah if they're not on by default, I might not have seen them yet. But I'm also not sure I'd be able to tell the 25s apart from previous years. But there are lots of R1s around. Ill keep an eye out for the lights
Glad to know it's not just me. Night time driving is such a mess these days. I live in a very hilly area, which makes it even worse because you get blasted by the lights coming over a hill even if...
Glad to know it's not just me. Night time driving is such a mess these days. I live in a very hilly area, which makes it even worse because you get blasted by the lights coming over a hill even if they are properly aligned.
My car is almost 20 years old. I've tried brighter, whiter halogen bulbs and defogging the lenses. But relative to the amount of light I see newer cars putting out, I often wonder whether my headlights are even on or not.
I'm curious if folks with newer cars with brighter headlights still feel blinded by the brighter oncoming headlights, or whether the larger amount of light your headlights put out balances things out. I hate the idea of being "part of the problem", but I also need to be able to see while driving at night.
I get that it's hard to point to specific instances. But the over all trends seem maddeningly in line with each other....
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety’s data shows that headlight brightness has roughly doubled since 2015.
Despite the increase in headlight brightness, data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration shows that fatal crashes in dark conditions remain relatively stable. In fact, crashes on lighted roads have risen slightly over the past two decades. It raises the question: Is all this extra brightness actually doing anything?
I get that it's hard to point to specific instances. But the over all trends seem maddeningly in line with each other....
Imagine my surprise seeing that article mention the Carmudgeon Show podcast and Jason Cammisa. I'm a fan but didn't expect that reference! Anyway, yeah, it's a super annoying problem. I'm hopeful...
Imagine my surprise seeing that article mention the Carmudgeon Show podcast and Jason Cammisa. I'm a fan but didn't expect that reference!
Anyway, yeah, it's a super annoying problem. I'm hopeful adaptive headlight technology can help, but I also hear those matrix modules are obscenely expensive to replace. (Which makes sense, I suppose.) Even a fender bender can get costly if you or the other car have them.
One criticism the article mentions that I agree with:
Headlight alignment is certainly Stern’s primary foe—and he is not a fan of the likes of Baker and Morgan, either, whom he described in an email as having a fervor that “greatly outstrips their topical expertise and understanding, and likely qualifies them for IRS classification as religious entities.”
I didn't think their thoughts added much real substance to the article. That both seemed much better than Paul Gatto, though. (And maybe the quote was supposed to reference Gatto and Morgan not Baker and Morgan.) Being a complaint-subreddit's mod isn't exactly a major qualification for expertise.
Yeah I’ve noticed over the past few years I’ve gone from not really minding night driving to actually worrying about it and it’s largely due to the amount of headlight glare out there now. It’s bad enough for highway traffic, but for city driving it makes it so I literally just cannot see cyclists or pedestrians on dark clothing. My night vision is completely shot and my own car’s headlights don’t light up the periphery enough to see people at intersections. (Let’s not even get into the fat fucking A and B pillars giving drivers giant blind spots right where people or cyclists are likely to be.)
It’s also why I’m leery about getting a sedan despite preferring them to suvs and crossovers. Those lifted truck headlights will blast straight into your retinas at that height, so it’s a real arms race to avoid it.
I keep (somewhat jokingly) thinking of a Miata or something similarly small to be nimble and below the line of fire.
That reflective back windshield mentioned in the article was a cool idea and I’d like to invest in some sort of active countermeasure that mirrors the headlights right back at the eyeballs of the driver. Fuck it, apparently we live in a world where civic responsibility is for cucks so if it’s gonna be a war of all against all let me arm up.
What I've long wanted to mount in my windows is an octahedral retroreflector, similar to the octahedral radar reflectors like this or this used on boats, but with highly polished mirrored surfaces for optical reflection instead of radar.
Basically, eight optical corner reflectors joined into a ball so that they'll throw light back 180 degrees no matter where it comes from.
No need for an active countermeasure when a passive one can do the job perfectly well.
This would make a hell of a hood ornament
I've been thinking for a solution like that too, or a mirror and some kind of arduino contraption to reflect it back
I've daydreamed of rear-mounted BB shooters that aim at light sources.
I doubt a BB would do anything to a modern plastic headlight. I'd go with paintball. Not permanent, but extremely effective at reducing blinding sources immediately.
Lasting damage is an integral part of the daydream.
Probably also generally safer if you miss, too.
If you get a helicopter, you can just fly over the headlights.
Don’t helicopters manage to have a worse safety record than our highways? Either way, they sure are cool.
Helicopters are a testament to mankind's hubris, as a whirling death contraption with hundreds of interlinked moving parts vigorously beats physics in to submission.
But more seriously - I'm not sure relative to cars, but helicopters have far higher accident rates per mile/per flight hour than standard aircraft. This actually comes up a lot when talking about military system safety records and the V-22 Osprey. Many people complained about the Osprey's safety record and how it was worse than most military aircraft, but miss that it's not meant to replace something like a C-130, it's meant to replace a Blackhawk. It ends up sitting somewhere between the two, which makes some sense as a craft that somewhat splits the difference between the types.
Per hour traveled, helicopters are a little more dangerous, but they are much safer per mile.
So for the same trip, a chopper is safer, though I suspect many helicopter trips aren't really 1:1 substitutes for automobile travel.
Lotta rich and famous people have died in helicopters, they're the great equalizer haha
Miata is always the answer. You should buy one. They have the best price-to-fun ratio of anything with four wheels.
I'm pretty sure my wife is sick of me ranting about people who have their high beams on all the time as well as poorly aimed headlights, such as on Teslas or large trucks. I'm also not a fan of having crazy bright lights with electronic controls to avoid blinding people. I recently drove a subaru while on vacation that had high beams on by default, but it would turn them down to regular beam if it detected another car ahead. It definitely wasn't fast enough, and I'm pretty sure a lot of oncoming cars saw a quick flash of blinding light before the high beam turned off.
The end of the article made me wonder if I'm autistic too. I also have a single "Edison style" incandescent bulb above my kitchen island for decorative purposes. I feel like it adds a kind of mood to a late night of drinking wine and eating charcuterie that's similar to the glow of a campfire or something like that. I also have some flashlights that have color temperature ramping, so I can light my nighttime dog walks with a light character that fits my mood.
A lot of the autism spectrum things aren’t solely experienced by people on the spectrum, they’re just more sensitive to them and/or have more difficulty suppressing or ignoring their discomfort than a neurotypical person. But it’s probably more useful to think of it as a sort of canary-in-the-coal-mine indicator that something is amiss that the rest of us are overlooking rather than a thing where if you’re in the spectrum you’re like this and if you’re not you’re like that.
I have been seeing so much of this lately. Like, they're in a fucking residential neighborhood, that's not what brights are for.
But it's daaaark and I can't seeeee! -them, probably
Except that it’s not that dark, and your eyes are great at adjusting to the conditions, and by having your lights brighter you make it even harder to see anything that’s not lit, so you’re making the problem worse for yourself
(Not actually addressed at you, in particular, just creating a rebuttal to that kind of argument)
Interesting article, enjoyed reading it. I've wondered about this, but it's nice to see the numbers and hear from some people really involved in this process. As a minor anecdote, I recently purchased a used car which had it's rear windshield tinted and I hardly notice or get annoyed by way too bright headlights anymore while driving. It makes me wonder if smart glass which can locally tint a bright light source might be an "eventual" solution.
How dark is your tint? I've got a compact suv that sits higher than a sedan but lower than anything else and keep getting flashbanged with a tinted rear window. I wind up with my mirror darkening switch (not sure what it's called) on most nights I'm driving.
You know I'm not certain since it was bought used, but in my state it can be at most 35 in the rear, so its probably somewhere between 35-50.
I wonder if there’s like light sunglasses you can wear, then, for night driving. I do find the headlights obnoxious.
The worst is when you’re doing a left turn and there’s some bright ass cars on the other side. Sometimes I just have no idea where I’m even turning.
I know a couple people who have blue light filter sunglasses for this exact purpose. It's definitely a thing.
Most mirrors in the past several years have included auto-tinting. It's not localized, but when everything is dark except the headlights, it doesn't much matter if everything else is slightly darker. It all just appears black other than the lights.
This is already a thing on higher trim level cars, sort of. I mentioned this in another thread recently, but I just upgraded my car to pre-owned Civic Sport Touring. In addition to having tinted windows, and a lower ride height that puts your line of vision below some trucks' lights instead of right in line with them, it has an auto-dimming rear-view mirror. It electronically measures brightness of light behind you compared to the ambient level and adjusts to compensate before you even notice.
It's basically a gel sandwiched between two pieces of glass that changes color and reduces reflectivity when an electric current is applied.
I have a rearview dimmer and it just makes me lament how my side mirrors do not have the same functionality while I'm blinded in one eye.
(Half)Joke aside, it do be good. It makes it much less of a problem. While it does trade one problem for another, it gets really dark and removes all detail, it's the lesser of two evils.
The 2025 Rivians have adaptive headlights and it’s a trip to see them in action. They appear to do a good job of leaving other cars in an unlit cone, but I’ve never experienced what it’s like to ride in front of one or as oncoming traffic (to my knowledge).
Here’s an article about them: https://www.theautopian.com/the-rivian-r1s-is-americas-first-car-with-this-special-headlight-technology-and-it-is-amazing/
As I live in Rivian land, I haven't noticed this yet, but also that might just prove that they're working
My understanding is that they are only on the 2025 models of the R1S and that they were just recently activated with a software update. Also, they are not turned on by default, I think.
Ah if they're not on by default, I might not have seen them yet. But I'm also not sure I'd be able to tell the 25s apart from previous years. But there are lots of R1s around. Ill keep an eye out for the lights
Glad to know it's not just me. Night time driving is such a mess these days. I live in a very hilly area, which makes it even worse because you get blasted by the lights coming over a hill even if they are properly aligned.
My car is almost 20 years old. I've tried brighter, whiter halogen bulbs and defogging the lenses. But relative to the amount of light I see newer cars putting out, I often wonder whether my headlights are even on or not.
I'm curious if folks with newer cars with brighter headlights still feel blinded by the brighter oncoming headlights, or whether the larger amount of light your headlights put out balances things out. I hate the idea of being "part of the problem", but I also need to be able to see while driving at night.
jj
I get that it's hard to point to specific instances. But the over all trends seem maddeningly in line with each other....
Imagine my surprise seeing that article mention the Carmudgeon Show podcast and Jason Cammisa. I'm a fan but didn't expect that reference!
Anyway, yeah, it's a super annoying problem. I'm hopeful adaptive headlight technology can help, but I also hear those matrix modules are obscenely expensive to replace. (Which makes sense, I suppose.) Even a fender bender can get costly if you or the other car have them.
One criticism the article mentions that I agree with:
I didn't think their thoughts added much real substance to the article. That both seemed much better than Paul Gatto, though. (And maybe the quote was supposed to reference Gatto and Morgan not Baker and Morgan.) Being a complaint-subreddit's mod isn't exactly a major qualification for expertise.