I've always wondered this. Why are the on just when it's raining? Why not all the time? What is the justification for operating a car on the road without lights on?
saving a few bucks on the bulbs I guess. No real reason not to have them, owning a car is already expensive, the added cost from headlight bulbs being replaced more frequently is a rounding error.
Really the main reason is gonna be that that's how things are done and so there is no political will to change it.
I think I've had to change bulb once every ten years and I live somewhere they're turned on during the day. It's probably the cheapest part of car ownership.
The corolla I had 20 years ago had auto lights. It was not a fancy trim. Literally the base model with a standard transmission. I don't get why other manufacturers are so far behind.
I'm gonna stop you right there chief. We don't pass useful laws here. We only pass laws on congress dress code and play speaker of the house shuffle. Maybe you were thinking of some other country.
Let's not act as if this is a good solution. Constantly running your headlights fucks them up. Plenty of cars on the EU roads with one headlight not shining, really dim ones etc. And the LEDs you mention do fuckall since they aren't even close to the required intensity, they are lit up to satisfy the law and nothing else.
I rarely ever see a car with defect headlights here in austria and didn't have to change mine once over the past 200k kilometers.
Also LEDs not only run with significantly higher efficiency (meaning they shine brighter, on less power); they also have a much longer lifespan. They use up less space and they are more resistant to damage from vibration than its two competing technologies. They are the superior lighting source in most every aspect.
You were thinking of halogen lamps, which are the old standard that is currently being removed.
And yet I see those all the time in Poland, where a lot of people have older cars.
No, I am talking about daylight LED's, the one that turn on when you start the engine. Most of the ones that are on cars I see are just a glorified LED strip. They simply exist so you don't have to use the main ones. And again, they do fuckall. They're just there so the cops don't ticket you.
And the LEDs you mention do fuckall since they aren’t even close to the required intensit
In the U.S., this isn’t currently a requirement. But data suggests that maybe it should be. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) found that daytime headlights use reduced daytime crashes from light trucks and vans by 5.7%.