Tiggs

well?

either lights are needed or they arent...seen loads of ppl today in the rain with sidelights on....they may as well have held a *** lighter out the widow!

t

ps- whats with sidelights and foglights at night? are these drives mentaly ill?

yoza

Side lights and fog lights are cool.......and you know it.

Your just not cool enough to carry it off.

Combined with neon washer jets and dust caps, and ''your the man".

Later Yoza (coolest of cool)

Scooby96

Side / parkign lights perhaps??

BLACK V5

There for all the volvo drivers who forget to turn there headlights on. This way you get some chance of seeing them.

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

Side lights are for the fools who don't know how to switch on their main lights

You'll see them every night squinting and complaining about the poor street lighting and not realising the light switch has two notches.

andypugh2000

sorry guys you are all wrong, they are for chavs in nova's who use a combination of sidelights and front fogs to look "cool"

OllyK

Funnily enough they are as their name indicates - "Side Lights" they indicate where the sides of the vehicle are. Not so important these days as most cars have the rest of the lights at the edges as well, but think way back to the older cars when they had the main lamps on a bar in front of the radiator and the car had big flared wings. Cars coming the other way wouldn't know how much car was to the left or the right of the main lights, hence by putting side lights at the far left and right, people would know where the side was and would avoid clipping other cars. It's all a throw back to the old days, but then my old man has a 1934 Riley so I guess it all makes sense to me

akshay67

Side lights also allow you to operate the fog lights without putting the main beams on, which looks really cool.

what would scooby do

FYI Saabs (and possibly Volvo's) have a fuse which if plugged in means the headlights are on permanently when engine is running - lazy *******...

OllyK

Yup Volvos as well - Sweedish law ya know! They also have to leave their house lights on all day

Leslie

Parking of course!

Les

StickyMicky

novas dont come with foglights

OllyK

Nope but Halfords do a nice line in foglights that will fit them!

Brendan Hughes

Well done Tiggs, my pet hate for some years now.

I'd campaign for a European directive that says all new cars should be built so it's not possible to have sidelights only while the engine is running. Parking lights yes, dim lights no. Loved my Terzo with the button on the top of the steering column which allowed you basically to leave your lights on all the time but they switched off with the ignition.

Too many crumblies (or just ignorant prats) driving round in the dark, in new cars, with sidelights on "because it saves the battery". 1980s car yes, modern car no.

Spoon

I read some posts on here and really think wtf.

Side lights even during the day if visibility is impaired can only be a good thing surely?

The impreza classic side lights are particular good as they aren't part of the headlights.

The times when you look left and right at a junction and spot a light or lights moving and think to look again surely has it's benefits.

Motorbikes without their lights on are actually scarily difficult to see and I know you were originally referring to dim sidelights but I think any light is better than no light. Well, not quite any, fog lights excluded.

Brendan Hughes

Dipped beam on during day - yes.

Sidelights on during day - why?

Spoon

Some cars only have side lights or head lights that's why.

Brendan Hughes

Eh? Headlights is dipped beam. You're not saying cars (built after, say, 1980, or even 1970) have only sidelights or main beam?

My point is that dipped beam does all that sidelights do, without being dangerous when people use them in the dark. I've got no problem with sidelights in the day, but I hate them at night, and my above suggestion is the only way I can think of to get around this.

Tiggs

to clarify:

side lights...useless unless parked

dipped main beam......for when you need to see more (in the dark) or be seen more (wet, dusky or on a bike)

main beam......when its dark and no one is coming towards you.


the light switch on new cars should be for main beam only.....if you need to park and put some sides on then there should be a seperate button.

T

Spoon

No I'm saying that there are are cars built with sidelights, headlights and main beam only and as headlights aren't necessary for day use sidelights could happily be on all the time.

I thought you were referring to cars that have sidelights,dipped lights,headlights and main beam.

I'm not sure people actually mean to drive at night with their sidelights on though merely a potentially dangerous oversight. I also think headlights during the day isn't necessary.

Spoon

Disagree, as said the Impreza classic sidelights for one are quite visible without being in your face like headlights would be.

Brendan Hughes

Spoon, what do you mean by headlights? I use the term as a collective one indicating either dipped or main beam. Looks like you don't? I don't understand your four types of lighting.

Spoon

The same as you but there are cars built with 2 stages of headlight and the 1st stage isn't sidelights but a more "dusk friendly" driving light for when the stronger more intense headlights aren't required.

That's why I said that cars with only sidelights and headlights have no choice but to use their sidelights during the day because they have no alternative and headlights are too much.

Chris L

Sidelights are really designed for low speed manoeuvres and parking where having your dipped beam on could cause a distraction to other road users. For instance if you are parked on the 'wrong' side of the road, your dip beam lights will point out directly into the the oncoming traffic (dip beam lights do not point straight ahead, they are angled slightly to the left (if correctly setup)) - therefore the effect of being parked facing oncoming traffic with your lights on is even worse.

Last time I looked at the Highway code, it goes into quite a lot of detail about this. As far as I'm concerned if I am driving and the conditions are bad enough for lights, then the dipped beam goes on. There is no point in using sidelights. Lighting is as much about being seen as seeing where you are going.

Chris

Spoon

They are 2 seperate issues, being seen does not have to mean you need to see where you are going.

I'm off out now before it gets dafter.

MooseRacer

dafter or darker Spoon