Postby hfrez » Thu Jan 12, 2012 11:23 am
The research does make a lot of sense. Car manufacturers put a lot of thought into their design and the lighting is part of that. Car lights were never designed for optimum use but for safety while driving at night. The average distance that any OEM light will shine is about the same distance it would take you to stop from 50mph to 0. If you go any faster you are driving beyond the visual of the light beam.
In other words, a car traveling at 50mph would see a dear entering the light beam ahead of the car at a distance of about 80ft and have enough time to bring the car to a stop, where at 60mph the stopping distance may be 115ft but you would not see the dear until it enters the beam 80ft away.
The only reason why some people want more light and distance is so they can drive faster. Safety is in the speed of the vehicle and not in the distance any particular light can shine.
That is why fog is such a pain because it limits vision and we are forced to drive slower. No amount of light will penetrate fog since it is made up of tiny water droplets that reflect any light into all directions including blinding the driver’s eyes. Fog lights are used because of their positioning at the low end of the bumper to shine along the bottom of the fog where it is not as dense. More light there would also be useless since your vision is already obstructed from the fog above it.
All Aftermarket lighting is, is to feed the ego of man and make money for the manufacturer & distributors. Of course, there is lighting for off-road driving but that is not where I or 99% of the other drivers out there drive 99% of the time.