Avoiding blinding drivers with a helmet light
 

Hi guys,

How do you angle your helmet light in order to prevent you from blinding drivers in front in their rear view mirrors?

I guess angling it down would help with this but wouldn't that also reduce the effectiveness of the light?

Thanks

Daven

Depends on the brightness of the light I guess. When you put a light on your steering bar you're not pointing it straight forward either right?

The whole point of lights is to see others, and be seen by others. Providing others carrying their own lights, you won't have to be able to look 100 meters in front of you what's going on there. 10 To 20 meters will do just fine. Myself, I only have 5 meters of vision with the lights I carry, but it's bright enough to be seen by others perfectly.

Though, if I were to be riding more on badly lit roads, I can imagine people wanting brighter lights...

Well it is a fenix torch on high / turbo. No on the steering bar it is usually pointed slightly down.

Although I commute on fairly well lit roads I find it hard to see potholes etc with my current set up so I am going to either build / purchase a high powered system, and when this is done the fenix will become my helmet light for directional lighting. I thought that it should be pointed straight in order to light up where I am looking.

Thanks

Are you kidding? Not only do I NOT worry about "blinding drivers in their rearview mirrors", I intentionally look directly at drivers at stoplights. Helmet lights are nowhere near as powerful as car headlights, and those are pointed at rearview mirrors...

Well that was my initial thought as I am often blinded by car headlights while cycling. But I also thought that at around 175 lumens the fenix on turbo would be a bit rude! Although on high it should be ok I guess!

Thanks

+1

No, they're not, unless it's a truck with high beams on behind a smaller car. I've been in that situation, with truck lights shining straight into my mirror, and it's NOT the same as a car behind you. Either of my bike lights, the Dinotte 200L or the Trailtech HID, when pointed straight at someone, is far brighter than the cutoff beam you usually get from a car.

Car headlights have shaped beams which are designed to illuminate the road, not other cars. For some crazy reason, manufacturers of bike lights generally available in the US give us round beams, not shaped ones (shaped/cutoff beams are required in at least some european countries). I think this is because in the US, bicycles are thought of as toys and not intended for road use.

+1000
Drivers blind each other all the time with lights far brighter than whats on your helmet, they can handle a little flash in their rear view to let them know your there. Most drivers could use one more reminder that there is a bike behind them. They have a cage to protect them if they can't see their surroundings perfectly. Forget rude, I have no problem being rude if it means not being smacked by a car.

Count me in with Schwinnrider as well.
Until cars stop blinding me I will do what I please.

+1 here. I've found it's one of the best ways to be seen.

I've never had a problem with blinding drivers. Drivers here are quite vocal, and the only response I've gotten from my 225 lumen helmet light is the occasional 'thumbs up' from drivers.

There are helmet lights that can put a LOT more light into a drivers eyes than a car headlight does on low beam.

I saw a rider the other night with no light on the bike and what I'm guessing was 6-800 lumens on his head. He was a huge distraction. Some here would take that as a positive, but I feel that he, and the drivers around him, would have been better off with a bike-mounted light. If you have that much light (I do too), you don't need to shine it in someone's eyes to be seen.

+1003 (to make up for the +'s added to the comment about car headlights being more blinding ;) )

Even my own car's headlights, with their decent-but-not-class-leading cutoff pattern, barely illuminate anything above the bumper of the car in front.

Someday I'm going to have to take some pics to reiterate this fact.

Anyway, about the OP's question --

Don't stare into their mirrors longer than you need to. Chances are your helmet light is still fairly directional (HIDs spray a wide pattern unless they have a glare shield, though). If you're close enough to be truly blinding, you're also close enough to aim your light past -- or above -- their mirrors. But, most of the time you aren't spending enough time near them to be truly annoying or harmful anyway.

Having driven at twilight and lost track of a cyclist I had just passed because he didn't have a headlight, I'd much rather deal with a bit of glare in my mirrors than wondering where the heck you went.

What about blinding other cyclists? On the (dark) MUP the other night, I had a rider tell me to "dim my light" as she passed me coming the other way. Under those circumstances, do y'all cover or otherwise dim your lights to avoid blinding oncoming riders?

In my observations, the problem is reversed.
I run a Dinotte 600L on my bars and a 140 on the rear.
Time and again I encounter on-coming morons on country roads who notice me, so they SWITCH FROM LOW TO HIGH BEAM to get a better look, blinding me until they have passed.
I have considered adding the most powerful helmet light I can find, just to return the "favor".

(nobody should be riding on a MUP anyway, you lunkhead!)

There, now that that's out of the way... ;)

Yup, I either point it farther down or shield it with my hand. My non-dynamo headlight is a Dinotte 200L with the O-ring mounting, and it's easy to re-aim it on a whim. I point it straight on the street and all the way down just ahead of my front wheel on the MUP.

I've seen at least one BF'er say that he installed a piece of foil in the front of his Dinotte to try to prevent unnecessary upwards glare. I have to say that I've considered doing the same.

They're retaliating, not trying to see you better. Your 600 is creating more glare than a car's headlights on low beam.

B*llsh*t!!!
I run it pointed down toward the road, and on the LOWEST setting.
The only time I run it on a high setting is when I am descending a fast hill.

Ok, then, they're seeing that you're just a bike and turn their high beams back on so they can see the road better.

I dunno about you, but rear view mirrors have this the glare reducing tab that you flip on your rear view mirror to reduce that annoying glare you get from overly bright headlights behind you.


in a car, if you have an SUV or truck behind you, it's damn bright. helmet lights are placed higher than this, I'd have to say a handlebar light is more likely to blind someone driving a car in front of you than your helmet light.

SUV, trucks and other cyclists will be blinded by your helmet light.

I have a wimpy Vega headlight- my dream is to buy one of these:
http://www.lightonlights.com It's 900 lumens!

Word. Had no idea what the cutoff was like until a buddy with an Lexus 350 showed me his HIDs on the garage door. The top-of-beam cuts off was pretty slick, as was the self-leveling feature.

My bike HID (and a whole lot of user-installed ones on cars around here) just spray big round beams all over the place.

I keep it aimed pretty low, since the objective of the bright light for me is mostly to see potholes, and a couple seconds notice is sufficient.

Right, but side mirrors don't, and whether they're adjusted correctly or not (odds are they aren't..), they're in just the right spot for getting glare from cyclist lights.

Fair enough. But that was my first thought too, reading your initial post.

I've had people high-beam me over a puny 30-lumen light. Some drivers just are random like that.

Yeah, exactly. Aftermarket automotive HID kits have been deemed illegal for that reason. For my car, an '02 Honda Civic hatchback, the most preferred headlight upgrade has been German OEM Civic Type-R HID projectors. Japanese- and UK-market headlights are made with a bit of upwards flare to illuminate signs on the left side of the road -- which would instead shine right into oncoming drivers' eyes here in the US. Since they drive on the same side of the road in Germany as we do, the cutoff pattern and flare of the German lights are appropriate for our roads. Plus, they have a sharp cutoff with very little glare and come with manually-operated leveling motors.

You have to level your own lights?