night driving difficulties

alleycat`

If it isn't the onset of a cataract it might be a function of your pupil dilation (in the dark) and the ability of your eye to focus light (correctly).

Most peoples eyes do not focus light equally and it is quite possible you have higher order aberrations at the outer limits of your pupil that you become more aware of in low light conditions.

You may also have a lens that has hardened so doesn't focus as well in the dark.

Badly aligned lights don't help much, nor do after market bulbs.

On A side note:-

At least they bother to turn their lights on.

10% of cars, as a guess, exiting the local mutli-storey haven't managed to turn their lights on by the time they've travelled the 800+yards to the traffic lights.

Strider590

Inactive wrote: »

Highway Code;

94

At night or in poor visibility, do not use tinted glasses, lenses or visors if they restrict your vision.

Yeah I read it a while back....

It's a kind of broad generalisation though, because people also wear photochromatic lenses in their prescription glasses, which would leave those people driving unsafely with those glasses on at night if you simply said "no sunglasses".

Then they can't say glasses because obviously some people need them to drive safely, so instead they say "tinted" glasses and leave it at that.
Joe public are sadly so stupid that they can't just think "oh it's a bad idea to wear glasses that impeded my vision".



It's kinda like the dress code at a party:

No jeans or trainers

It means not to turn up looking like you've been on a building site all day, but you'll have no issue in designer jeans, smart shoes and a collared shirt.

Note how neither dress codes nor HWC say "no hats" to stop baseball hat wearing chavs, the reason for this? certain religions require headgear to be worn at all times.
If a religion stated that sunglasses had to be worn at all time, the HWC would have to be changed.
I do see a lot of young lads driving about with baseball hats pulled down to their eye's.....

Yellow driving glasses do improve your vision at night, they also reduce the blue glare from HID headlights. I can say this from past experience.

The reason it would be frowned upon is because if some idiot saw a guy wearing what looked like sunglasses at night, he might try to do the same thing......

Inactive

Strider590 wrote: »

Yellow driving glasses do improve your vision at night, they also reduce the blue glare from HID headlights. I can say this from past experience.

They may have seemed helpful to you, however that doesn't mean they will be helpful to all.

Most eye specialists seem to think that they are a bad idea and should not be worn.

Reggie_Rebel

Just as annoying as those that run around with fog lights on all the time are those that run around with only one headlight working

Strider590

Suck it and see then I guess, horses for courses, what works for one, might not work for another

joyfull

Thanks again to those who have given useful feedback in a polite and constructive manner.

I will explore the cataract possibility asap. I don't think, in my case, that my long range vision is a factor here. When driving at night with no oncoming traffic I'm fine and can see the road clearly. It's the dazzle from the oncoming lights, the glare and 'halo' type effect that bothers me. I will also give the windscreen, inside and out a really good clean.

There are places in my regular nightime journey when I safely pull over to let people behind me pass if they clearly want to.

cyclonebri1

joyfull wrote: »

Thanks again to those who have given useful feedback in a polite and constructive manner.

I will explore the cataract possibility asap. I don't think, in my case, that my long range vision is a factor here. When driving at night with no oncoming traffic I'm fine and can see the road clearly. It's the dazzle from the oncoming lights, the glare and 'halo' type effect that bothers me. I will also give the windscreen, inside and out a really good clean.

There are places in my regular nightime journey when I safely pull over to let people behind me pass if they clearly want to.[/QUOTE]


So you still ignore the fact, that by your own admissision in your 1st post there are times when you cannot see the road in front of you, how can you continue to drive given that???

How the heck you expect anyone to reply to you in " useful feedback in a polite and constructive manner", really does escape me:(:(:(

And I think that sums it up

Can't see so have to stop?, get off the road please.

nedmundo

leosayer wrote: »

Try some night time driving glasses like these:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/NIGHT-DRIVING-GLASSES-SUNGLASSES-YELLOW/dp/B001N8N54G

Actually, it's illegal to drive at night with a tint darker than 15% absorption (which is only just noticeable). I'd give these a wide berth if I was you.

Cool_Mint

joyfull wrote: »

I have to drive 2-3 times a week at night and don't enjoy it one bit. I'm troubled in particular by the glare of oncoming headlights. They seem so bright and I'm unable to sometimes even see the road in front of me. At times I feel unsafe and of course driving slower inevitably attracts the tailgaters.

I plan to get my eyes tested, so putting this aside, do others have this problem and does anyone have any suggestions please?

I drive a small low car and find larger vehicle's lights can shine 'down' on me. Are headlights brighter these days I wonder.

I'd be interested in your thoughts.

Thanks

It's not your eyes, of course you might actually need to wear glasses but that's not the issue.

Modern car lights are brighter, they are hugely, enormously, incomparably brighter and more powerful than they were 20 years ago so of course they cause dazzle at night. Even the rear lights on some new cars are so bright that if you look away for a second you have a ghost-image floating in your field of vision.

It's not you, it's them. At least 90% of drivers are too stupid to realize that they can't see where they are going so they just plow on into the dark regardless; with oncoming traffic on an unlit road your range of clear visibility can be reduced to just 50ft and yet they drive at a speed that requires 350ft of visibility! :wall:

It's waste of breath trying to explain to people that it's not just the car in front of you that you have to be able to see, it's everything between you and the car in front plus the stopping distance of the car in front.

On my local out-of-town roads I can only see about 200ft directly ahead without main-beam so I reduce my speed to compensate. There are very few other drivers on the same roads who do but I know what I can see and what I can't, I don't care how many carrots they've been eating, if all I can see is a dark blur after 100ft then that's probably all they can see too.

Getting a check-up at the optician is a good idea and cleaning your lights and the inside of your windscreen is good practice but the reason most people drive like they have no problem seeing where they are going is because they are reckless twits, not because they can actually see where they are going.

Article on seeing pedestrians at night:
http://www.visualexpert.com/Resources/pedestrian.html



:xmassign:

Strider590

nedmundo wrote: »

Actually, it's illegal to drive at night with a tint darker than 15% absorption (which is only just noticeable). I'd give these a wide berth if I was you.

Absorption of what? which colour in the spectrum?
They're not sunglasses, they don't reduce the light the driver see's, they simply filter out blue light, which is the colour that causes glare from headlights etc. This has the side effect of increasing your reception of other light and increasing overall visibility.