[joshguy]

Originally Posted by Blue Thunder

Educating drivers on the usage of high-beam is one important issue...there is one other equally important one.

Let me explain with something that i have experienced quite many times (in slow-moving city traffic). Usually when some moron tails me with a blinding high-beam, i lower the window glass and signal to him to dip the beam. And they usually understand and do it. Once, when I did this, the guy behind switched to the high beam ( so , he was actually in low beam, which was itself blinding me ). Which brings us to the other issue : correct focussing of the headlight in low-beam. I have noticed many cabs which do duty in our company have the low-beam itself focussed in such a way that it serves as a high beam. It is focussed high, illuminates the road ahead beautifully and blinds the oncoming traffic. In high-beam, it shines into the tree-tops . I guess the high-beam is to target the bus/lorry drivers' high seat position.

So, in addition to creating awareness of the usage of the low-beam, it is also important to create awareness about the correct focussing of the head-light beam.

Originally Posted by yzfrj

Come to Chennai, here even in bumper to bumper traffic its "high" beam.

I'd have to agree its really due to sheer ignorance and 0 common sense.

Sometime back was stuck slow moving traffic. Government Bus come with high beam right in front of me, I have just enough room to let him squeeze pass me . Unfortunately I cannot move as I can't see anything (I have a Zen and the bus's light is at my eye level). I'm in low beam, flashes my light.

Bus guy starts honking. I roll down my window and tells the guy politely (with whatever tamil I know). He is asking what does light has to do anything with moving my car. I again calmly explains I "cannot see anything" as the light is blinding me. Finally he "gets" it.

Its an everyday thing here in Chennai, its really rare to see anyone driving around with low beam. Cab guys are the best, they does't even know there is a low beam.

Anyway, I'm done teaching the folks here. I'd rather drive slow than get hit head own by some mindless zombie.

Originally Posted by mathew1105

I work the night shift, So it happends to me everyday. I leave to work around 8:00 in the night and most of the cars drive on high beam. It gets even worse in the morning when I get back home. The road would be so empty and mostly these Cab drivers drive on High beam and it's really irratating when that reflects on your rear view and on top of that they keep honking.
I use to let them over take me and drive right behind them with my High beam, Most of them don't even care, I don't think they even know the difference.
These days I just have learned to live with it because
"Trying to teach some one a lesson, I don't want to end up learning a bad one" if you know what I mean

Originally Posted by aargee

Whoever agrees or disagrees, KL is one of the state where road rules are still far far better compared to any south states; this includes big cities like Thrissur & EKM. People lower their headlights (ofcourse a very few exceptions).

I'd 2 experiences; one on driving from Muvattupuzha - Kottayam on MC road & other Wadakanchery - Pattambi - Perinthalmanna route. Most of the drivers were courteous. I found the KSRTC (Govt bus) drivers the real morons, anyway, their headlights were also weak, so it didn't matter much.

++++++++++++++++++


My chennai folks have put across what ever i though of.

I get wild when ever i come across a car and a educated dirver coming with high beam on,a lot of times i have scolded/abused them but they make a scene as if they were right and i am wrong.(what to do the entire world is so)

Most of them dont know the use of high beam as far as its cars and when it comes to taxi,cab and lorries it is pure head weight !

in fact i was thinking of opening a thread on this and someone has done it.

ONE WAY IN WHICH TEAMBHP CAN CONTRIBUTE REDUCE THIS IS BY COMING OUT WITH A SUPERB ATTRACTIVE STICKER(like Live to Drive) WHICH SAYS "USE YOUR HIGH BEAM JUDICIOUSLY,THERE ARE OTHER ON THE ROAD TOO"

[rajeev k]

One thing is sure, most of the guys on high beam doesn't know the nuisance this can cause; they simply believes that this quite ntural. They are also not bothered at all even if some one hits it back to them.
The campaign as suggested in the above post is a campaign Team Bhpians have to be seriously take up.

[ByDesign]

I think this is a wonderful thread. When I go out for a night drive, I always keep my headlights on low. But every single time I see folks with high beams coming in the opposite direction it annoys me. Some are just plain road rule illiterate, and I'm sure some have no idea what's going on. For some I'm sure it's "Oh I can see more clearly with high beam".
Some drivers dip their headlights when they see me coming with low beams. I mean, is there a better way of spreading this message?
Can T-BHP add a sticker to their collection which says "DON'T DRIVE WITH HIGH BEAM" or something?

[NFS]

nice idea Team-bhp sticker No to HIGH Beam.

Again people need to be literate.

[jeevmenon]

Nice thread. Its the driving schools which need to instruct students / train during nights - atleast one session. I was never taught this. But I learnt it with experience and tips from Dad, old-timers.

One other example of the dipper is once whence traveling through ghat road during night - say 12-15 yrs back, the driver at each bend just dipped it so beautifully and I could see at times the light changing in front of me (sitting next to the driver) indicating there is an oncoming vehicle. No horns at all. It was so tacit and nice. Does this still happen?

Another thing I have tried to practice during the last month is not to honk (in memory of TRRK,) or use it at the minimum, so much so that even if a cycle is in the middle of the road and there is not enough way on either side, be patient, just follow him - dont bully him, you will get your chance. It works. And the time lost is 10-15 sec. Thats all. Try it. They are humans too. One goes to the western world, stop at a zebra-crossing and allow pedestrians to go over but the same person has no patience in India. Why? We cannot probably go to the extent of stopping at zebra-crossings (though I have seen it work in Kandy and was amazed - SL being a third-world country like India.) we can definitely reduce if not eliminate honking. You might lose 10 min max - not more. No big deal. But it would make it so much more better!

[NFS]

Originally Posted by jeevmenon

Nice thread. Its the driving schools which need to instruct students / train during nights - atleast one session. I was never taught this. But I learnt it with experience and tips from Dad, old-timers.

One other example of the dipper is once whence traveling through ghat road during night - say 12-15 yrs back, the driver at each bend just dipped it so beautifully and I could see at times the light changing in front of me (sitting next to the driver) indicating there is an oncoming vehicle. No horns at all. It was so tacit and nice. Does this still happen?

Yes on highways, ghat sections, heavy vehicles do this to other heavy vehicles. If a car flashes its headlight on a big fellow, they may NOT respond all the time, but 70% times they oblige.

Infact many of the signalling happens over lights. On a straight highway, if you flash your headlight behind another fellow, they will signal "overtake" or "not now" using their turn indicators. Once they think it is safe for us to pass him he will return the signal promptly.

Originally Posted by jeevmenon

Another thing I have tried to practice during the last month is not to honk (in memory of TRRK,) or use it at the minimum, so much so that even if a cycle is in the middle of the road and there is not enough way on either side, be patient, just follow him - dont bully him, you will get your chance. It works. And the time lost is 10-15 sec. Thats all. Try it. They are humans too. One goes to the western world, stop at a zebra-crossing and allow pedestrians to go over but the same person has no patience in India. Why? We cannot probably go to the extent of stopping at zebra-crossings (though I have seen it work in Kandy and was amazed - SL being a third-world country like India.) we can definitely reduce if not eliminate honking. You might lose 10 min max - not more. No big deal. But it would make it so much more better!

Absolutely correct "Do NOT bully him".

IMO, honking is used to let the person ahead know that we are behind or let them know that we are overtaking etc. I choose to honk on these occations with a very very short beep, so that we are not bullying him. After which I will follow him for the next opportunity to let me pass.

Stopping zebra crossing, two issues here. In western countries, people do NOT cross the road anywhere and everywhere. They use zebra crossing. In india we built high dividers in city roads for discouraging people from crossing over, but now they jump over such installations.

Motorist never stop by the stop line here in India, they think getting out first of a traffic light makes them F1 drivers, that attitude needs a change. I always stop at RED signals well before the stopline and allow people to use zebra crossing.

When I am a pedastrian, I strictly use zebra crossing, or if it is a two lane small village road, I will cross the road by walking perpendicular to the road.

[ByDesign]

Originally Posted by jeevmenon

Another thing I have tried to practice during the last month is not to honk (in memory of TRRK,) or use it at the minimum, so much so that even if a cycle is in the middle of the road and there is not enough way on either side, be patient, just follow him - dont bully him, you will get your chance. It works. And the time lost is 10-15 sec. Thats all. Try it. They are humans too. One goes to the western world, stop at a zebra-crossing and allow pedestrians to go over but the same person has no patience in India. Why? We cannot probably go to the extent of stopping at zebra-crossings (though I have seen it work in Kandy and was amazed - SL being a third-world country like India.) we can definitely reduce if not eliminate honking. You might lose 10 min max - not more. No big deal. But it would make it so much more better!

Wonderfully written sir, I simply must say. I promise not to honk as much from this day on. I think if each one of us can just answer for oneself, we can start making a difference. With respect to your comment of Indians following rules abroad and not doing so here, it goes a little something like this. I was in England for 3 years doing my Bachelors Degree in Automotive Engineering, and I got a good idea of what the immigrant population thinks like. Let me tell you, 99% of Indian immigrants thought their mother country was an absolute dump. They made remarks every which way about how people are all illiterate disease ridden villagers who ride elephants and camels to work and don't speak a word of english. While I'm generally immune to this kind of rubbish, what really shocked me was Indians badmouthing the traffic ethic, the queue system and the littering problem in India while they themselves were party to it and probably contribute heftily to it.

Since we all like to be so selfish these days, can we be selfish in a good way?

• I will not honk unless I REALLY need to.
• I will not jump a queue just so I can get my job done faster, there are other people in front who have the way of right.
• I will not litter the streets just because 'everyone does it'
• I will not drive with my high beam on just because 'they all do it'

I know I can. Join me in this. Our simple decision of joining T-BHP means we can think and act together rationally in doing what's right in helping us as a society to move forward.

~ByDesign

[noidea]

The first driver I hired used to drive within city limits with the lights on hi-beam.
When I asked him to put the lights on low beam he very politely told me that one is supposed to use the dipper at night. "Had I never seen "use dipper at night" written behind trucks and buses?!!". So naturally my next question to him was "What is dipper?" He gave me a look that said a lot more that "How stupid can you be?" and told me that the hi-beam position is the same as the "dipper" specified on the behinds of the trucks.

PS. He still works for me (as a driver. I might add)

[praful]

Forget High Beam... There are some morons around here who drive/ride at night with No beam and that too in your oncoming lane!

And if something were to happen to these brainless idiots, the law would consider 'us' to be guilty.

[bharani]

In bangalore once they banned head lights in one particular road but they did not provide proper street lights and it failed.

[ptushar]

Time: Yesterday (28-Nov-2010) about 8:30 PM
Place: MPEW somewhere between Khopoli & Lonavala (Ghat section)

Event: I was driving on in the middle lane. Traffic was relatively sparse. The road in this section is sometimes at different levels which makes driving relatively easy as the beam from the oncoming traffic does not hit your eyes. But there are sections when the road is at the same level and during turns the beam from oncoming vehicles hits you straight in the eye. On one such turn I got the benefit of evaluating the relative brightness of the full beam of atleast 3 to 4 vehicles. This blinded me momentarily and suddenly found myself staring at the rear end of a large, slow moving and pretty dark truck WITH NO TAIL LIGHTS! Not even a reflector.

I guess this was part of a larger plan to ensure that the ABS on my car are thouroughly tested. Thanks to the sparse traffic and the fact that I was not really fast, I could quickly move into the rightmost lane and overtake. Not without the customary skip of the heartbeat though. Well, actually, a lot more than that!

Now the moot question:
"How much does that silly piece of tail light on a truck cost? Why can not these guys spend that little money and buy that light bulb?"

I then went about counting and surprisingly more that 50% of the trucks on MPEW DO NOT HAVE TAIL LIGHTS. Some have a small little reflector, some don't even have that.

[AVR]

Originally Posted by Sudipto-S-Team

I have worked out a solution and it works most of the times except with some really annoying and uncouth drivers. I have upgraded my light and drive on low beam. When the oncoming driver is blinding me I place myself on his route and turn to high beam. Most of the time they take a quick lesson and switch to low beam instantly.
I don't really know if they learn any long term sustainable lesson from this but on the road it works for me most of the time.
We as a race don't know where to stop. We do the same thing with horns also. Louder and more ear splitting, the better.

Originally Posted by joshguy

++++++++++++++++++
ONE WAY IN WHICH TEAMBHP CAN CONTRIBUTE REDUCE THIS IS BY COMING OUT WITH A SUPERB ATTRACTIVE STICKER(like Live to Drive) WHICH SAYS "USE YOUR HIGH BEAM JUDICIOUSLY,THERE ARE OTHER ON THE ROAD TOO"

While I have been using the method suggested by Sudipto quite often lately and it does work most times, I think the idea of a sticker that conveys the message effectively would be a better option.

We as a forum should have a sticker that conveys our displeasure about this practice.

[ece2k2]

While driving on highways I normally use high beam and I make sure to switch to low beam whenever I see some oncoming vehicle with low beam.

Driving constantly with the low beam is pretty dangerous on our highways, where trucks (obviously without reflector/tail-lights) are generally parked on the road and we might easily miss to see them with just low beam at high speeds during nights.

[libranof1987]

I agree.

On Indian roads, we'll have 2-wheelers, bullock carts in the right-most lane, there won't be dividers on most highways, highways themselves can spring surprises (like sudden diversion, divider etc.).

Due to such conditions, it becomes imperative at times that you use the high beam; because ultimately it is you who'll be held responsible for bumping into someone driving without a reflector or a tail-lamp.

I myself use the high beam on most highways (strictly highways though) and shift to low beam as soon as I see an oncoming vehicle.

[ExtremeTorque]

Ok. I will let the abuses pile up on me. I am ashamed to admit that until a couple of years back, i used to use high beam all the time, even during city drives. This continued till a friend (Non-TBHP) educated me about it. I dont remember reading about it during my license test 10 years back. Though i learnt to drive cars 10 years back, i starting driving full time only about 3 years back and never did anyone educate me about the use of high beam. Now that i drive full time, i realize the hazard associated with driving on high beam - thanks to my friend. The issue, ladies & getlemen, I think lies with general public awareness. Like me there might be many more our there, waiting for someone to make them aware.