The Darwin Award for cars

Wig

I've noticed -or rather not noticed- a new breed of new cars with rear indicators as small and insignificant as they can make them.

One is the Honda Civic
Another is a 2011 VW Passat
I think I saw another on a Vauxhall hatch of some sort but don't know what it was.

Paradigm

One of the Audi models (A3?) has the smallest rear indicators I've ever seen.

Stephen_Leak

No-one (else) seems to use them nowadays, so why should manufacturers waste good money on them?

gilbert_and_sullivan

Award must go to Audi of recent design and some VW's, blinding stop lights too bright to judge the rate of deceleration, with pipsqueak indicators dwarfed into insignificance beside or incredibly inside them.

Light designs are getting silly now, bling and rather too camp in some cases.

Furrtiv

Oh I have to agree, maybe it's that I grew up and learned to drive when no cars had halogens or LED lights, but I find myself almost blinded by the brightness of rear brake lights - particularly so when waiting a long time at traffic lights. I always put my handbrake on when I know or believe that I'll be waiting a long time at lights, as I don't want to be pressing the brake pedal for ages, but it does seem like no-one else uses their handbrake for anything except parking up.

Indicators are also not on the corners of cars these days - my older Honda Civic (1997 model) has the indicators on each corner of the car, the most sensible place for them, but modern cars seem to have them placed on the inside of the front headlamps - not great unless you're approaching the car from the front, as they're very difficult to see from either side-on or rear view. And rear indicators appear to be buried amidst other parts of the light cluster, making them more ineffectual.

That being said, I used to drive a Morris Traveller up until about three years ago, and the extremely low mounting of the rear brake lights didn't half make people back off, as they couldn't see them if they were within a certain distance. No reversing light, either, and hazards were fitted but they were added well after the car was made, for which I was grasteful as I had to use them for when I wanted to reverse!

Gloomendoom

The front indicators on my car are mounted in the headlamp unit. It's ok during the day but at night with the lights on they are practically invisible.

Crabman

gilbert_and_sullivan wrote: »

Light designs are getting silly now, bling and rather too camp in some cases.

Rather like the sorts of people who choose those cars.