I’ve been seeing this a lot lately and saw it twice on my way home from work last night, once on an expressway. It seems to always be newish SUVs from US manufacturers. The cars are driving at night with headlights and even fog lights on (with no fog in sight) but no tail lights! They are completely blacked out from the rear which seems really dangerous. I understand that this is just a case of idiot drivers but why would any manufacturer enable this practice by allowing such a light setting for any vehicle? Are they trying to improve gas mileage by eliminating the power drain required to light up the tail lights???
You must log in or register to comment.
People always say the reason is that the dash is always lit now. If it’s true, it’s going to keep getting worse with digital dashes, which can’t turn off completely.
Saw this same situation recently while driving in the rain. Newer Mazda SUV, front headlights on, front and rear wipers on, dash lit up, taillights on? Nope!
The headlights can’t be on if the taillights are off. You meant DRL’s, not headlights.
This is a huge problem, nearly 25% of every newer car is driving with no lights on.
No it’s just fucking idiots using daytime running lights at night.
It really boils down to the average driver being too stupid to properly operate a car.
Those are just morons who don’t know how to use their lights. They’re running DRLs because their lights are set to “off” even though cars have had an “auto” setting for the last 20 years.
Also, how would battery powered lights affect the gas mileage?
cars have had an “auto” setting for the last 20 years.
Not all cars in the last 20 years have auto headlights.
Daytime running lights in combination with digital dash. I don’t understand how automatic lights are not mandatory.
It’s daytime running lights without automatic headlights equipped (or at least turned on).
100% not a manufacturer issue, it’s completely a dumbass driver issue.
It seems to always be newish SUVs from US manufacturers.
I don’t know where you’re at, but it’s always Japanese and Korean cars here. Pretty much everything made by the big-3 has automatic headlights at this point.
The worst part about this is that those idiots get away doing things like this but I get ticketed for going 10 over the speed limit. Fuck!
I have too, people are very dumb.
Toyota drivers are the worst offenders, Nissan takes second place
A lot of DRL comments here so I have a question, why DRLs are so popular? what is the deal with them?
I’d assume even in old cars with “standard” bulbs cost of keeping lights on all the time is negligible when compared to the total costs of having a car and maintaining it…DRLs are so popular because a lot of teenagers think that running DRLs with fog lights makes their cars look cool
Everyone mentioning daytime running lights, but there’s another issue that’s also fairly common. For some reason, auto manufacturers at some point in history began putting taillights on a separate fuse from the headlights, so often the taillight fuse will pop, but the driver doesn’t realize because the headlights are still working.
A big part of this issue is that Physical Dashboards used to be dark at night, then light up along with your full Lights once turned on.
Now that we have Digital Dashes, there’s no icons, and no reminders that your full lights arent on.