Night Vision

[Bper]

Update on Night vision
I had my eyes tested today with 3 different scans including a peripheral light scan. The eye chart test result was 20/20 which surprised me following the visual problems experienced on Monday when driving through torrential rain and mist in the dark.

According to the optometrist, there is minimal change to my vision from last year. She recommended a prescription that may help but as there was such little change it may not make any difference. 
I was told that both my near, moderate and long distance vision will change as part of the natural aging process. However, I should manage my expectations regarding vision and perhaps "You expect to see better than you actually do."

After a long conversation it would seem that I may benefit from a glare coating which makes sense for driving. Now I only normally wear glasses for reading, however these glasses would be for driving only. So I'm in a bit of a dilemma. Should I try this prescription even though it may make no difference?

I could of course try the glasses recommended by members that have replied to the post as these are apparently good for glare.

Decisions, Decisions. 

[Bper]

41 minutes ago, FROSTYBALLS said:

Don't have any problems with small print - just never read it ......

Couldn't read your reply.😅

[Bper]

55 minutes ago, Markyswan said:

I've noticed my vision isn't as good as it was and have recently started to wear glasses for driving. I first noticed road sign's wasn't as clear as they used to be. Starting to noticed some problems with small print .

Unfortunately it seems to come to us all sooner or later😡

[Hornet3D]

9 minutes ago, Bper said:

Unfortunately it seems to come to us all sooner or later😡

I have been using driving glasses for about six years now even though I am not at the point where I need to wear them legally.  I had them checked in the last month and they do not need to be changed but then my normal reading glasses have not been changed for four years either as the changes to my eyes have been minor.  The problem that my eyes do not adapt well to bright light whether driving or walking so I do need good sunglasses on bright days and driving glasses at night.

[Rhymes with Paris]

Just got back from a short trip for essential supplies, mainly, garlic and stakes, the entrance to the car park of Tesco express and a dozen other businesses is pretty awkward.

It's a left at traffic lights on the A46, then a sharp right within 4 or 5 metres.

To add to this, there is a cycle lane right up to the traffic lights on the main road, with a cycle advance waiting box .

So I am looking intently at my n/s door mirror waiting for the lights to change, and of course most of the cars ignore this cycle lane and are on it waiting to turn left.

Some are indicating,all had very bright led type lights headlights, DRLs, dunno, do DRLs stay on with headlights?

The result is that looking in my mirror is useless as these lights are flooding it and as others have said ,completely washing out any vision, me being out of the cycle lane am offset from the others, so get the full effect.

So if any of the cyclists had been in the cycle lane, and could not be bothered to use lights in the dark, it would have been near impossible to see them.

Luckily, most of them are on the footpath terrorising pedestrians and never get near the cycle lane.

So would it be best to chance it and hope for the best,or drive straight on to the Asda where the garlic is inferior and the stakes a bit tough?

Will take a pic next time I'm down there as I've just realised this post is a bit long, and one picture tells a thousand words of waffling on.

[Bper]

On 11/30/2022 at 8:32 PM, Rhymes with Paris said:

Just got back from a short trip for essential supplies, mainly, garlic and stakes, the entrance to the car park of Tesco express and a dozen other businesses is pretty awkward.

It's a left at traffic lights on the A46, then a sharp right within 4 or 5 metres.

To add to this, there is a cycle lane right up to the traffic lights on the main road, with a cycle advance waiting box .

So I am looking intently at my n/s door mirror waiting for the lights to change, and of course most of the cars ignore this cycle lane and are on it waiting to turn left.

Some are indicating,all had very bright led type lights headlights, DRLs, dunno, do DRLs stay on with headlights?

The result is that looking in my mirror is useless as these lights are flooding it and as others have said ,completely washing out any vision, me being out of the cycle lane am offset from the others, so get the full effect.

So if any of the cyclists had been in the cycle lane, and could not be bothered to use lights in the dark, it would have been near impossible to see them.

Luckily, most of them are on the footpath terrorising pedestrians and never get near the cycle lane.

So would it be best to chance it and hope for the best,or drive straight on to the Asda where the garlic is inferior and the stakes a bit tough?

Will take a pic next time I'm down there as I've just realised this post is a bit long, and one picture tells a thousand words of waffling on.

Paul, I share your frustration, driving has become more of a task then an enjoyment now. With cyclist taking presidence over car drivers, being blinded by car head and tail lights and a hundred different can't does. Risks of hundreds of pounds if you make a mistake. It would also appear that the ULEZ charge will filter into most towns and cities as a norm and of course climate change and air pollution will be the future main taxation on drivers.

Of course altonomous cars will be exempt in the future but will be so expensive to use unless your rich, so looks like we will be left with remembering the times we had when driving was such a pleasure. 😢

[Cyker]

That's why I like going for a hoon in the countryside sometimes - Reminds me that driving can still be fun, it's just cities that suck!

It's one reason I'm glad I found that super cheap Abridge Shell (149.9p/L!!  ), as it gives me an excuse to go for a fun drive on the roads around Ongar; Nowhere near as nice as the roads those of you that live further north have access too, but a nice change of pace from the awful London roads!

 

[Roy124]

Lots of comments so I can't attribute them. 

The alternative to brake hold is shifting the gear to park or pressing the parking brake button.  That button is not easy to  find and using the park function partly negates an automatic. 

I would need to check DRL at night but I have an idea they are less intense when the headlights are on. 

As for stress, we drove down to Gatwick in March.  I think the journey plan is just about 3 hours and 150 miles. A1 to M25 then motorway to Gatwick.  It was daylight and the day before our flight, no pressure. 

It took just over 4 hours.  I handed the car to the valet parkers and checked in. In our room the stress hit.  I am usually laid back but that journey really hit me.  Add night and I can see why many of us don't like it. 

[Roy124]

39 minutes ago, Bper said:

Of course altonomous cars will be exempt in the future but will be so expensive to use unless your rich, so looks like we will be left with remembering the times we had when driving was such a pleasure. 

 

 

 

Toyotas with ACC and LKA are already semi autonomous.  You can go hands off for 13 seconds. 😁

Of course the ACC over reacts when the car ahead has actually moved onto a slip lane and the LKA randomly loses sight of the lane boundary. 

I wonder if semi autonous will be permitted on the main roads for instance motorways as a kind of half way house. 

[Cyker]

If I manually switch to sidelights, my Mk4 dims the DRLs to half-brightness and turns on the rear sidelights - It's quite a clever way to use what's there without using separate sidelight units and I don't know why more cars don't do this.

Sadly the auto-lights do not use this and keep the DRLs on until light drops below a certain level, then turns them off and jumps straight to dipped beams. This time of year there's an awkward grey area which somehow is always right about the time I start to go home, and causes it to flick between DRLs and dipped beams repeatedly .

[Bper]

15 minutes ago, Roy124 said:

Lots of comments so I can't attribute them. 

The alternative to brake hold is shifting the gear to park or pressing the parking brake button.  That button is not easy to  find and using the park function partly negates an automatic. 

I would need to check DRL at night but I have an idea they are less intense when the headlights are on. 

As for stress, we drove down to Gatwick in March.  I think the journey plan is just about 3 hours and 150 miles. A1 to M25 then motorway to Gatwick.  It was daylight and the day before our flight, no pressure. 

It took just over 4 hours.  I handed the car to the valet parkers and checked in. In our room the stress hit.  I am usually laid back but that journey really hit me.  Add night and I can see why many of us don't like it. 

Apparently a quarter of all drivers are nervous about driving at night so that must tell us something. Also drivers are prepared to go 25 minutes out of there way not to drive on country lanes. Unfamiliar roads and fear of collision are the main reasons. 

[Bper]

6 minutes ago, Cyker said:

If I manually switch to sidelights, my Mk4 dims the DRLs to half-brightness and turns on the rear sidelights - It's quite a clever way to use what's there without using separate sidelight units and I don't know why more cars don't do this.

Sadly the auto-lights do not use this and keep the DRLs on until light drops below a certain level, then turns them off and jumps straight to dipped beams. This time of year there's an awkward grey area which somehow is always right about the time I start to go home, and causes it to flick between DRLs and dipped beams repeatedly .

If tail and headlights are a big problem would it not be a good idea for manufacturers to make anti glare back and front windscreens .

[Cyker]

I would love that but not sure how that could be done without reducing normal visibility!

That said, if this trend of getting rid of mirrors and replacing them with screens extends to the front (And I can totally imagine that happening for 'safety reasons', ignoring the fact they are much less safe due to the loss of depth perception and the ability to move your viewpoint!), dynamic range compression, auto-contrast compensation and a hard cap on maximum brightness would help eliminate the glare, assuming the camera isn't blinded  

To be fair, my main issue is with overly bright and badly aligned headlights - Tail lights tend to be less of a problem as they are of reasonable brightness (Vs. say, rear fogs and brake light!)

I thought high-powered lights had to be self-adjusting but I see so many vehicles with LEDs that are clearly NOT adjusted correctly; If that could be fixed that would go a long way to helping the situation!

 

[Rhymes with Paris]

21 hours ago, Bper said:

Paul, I share your frustration, driving has become more of a task then an enjoyment now. With cyclist taking presidence over car drivers, being blinded by car head and tail lights and a hundred different can't does. Risks of hundreds of pounds if you make a mistake. It would also appear that the ULEZ charge will filter into most towns and cities as a norm and of course climate change and air pollution will be the future main taxation on drivers.

Of course altonomous cars will be exempt in the future but will be so expensive to use unless your rich, so looks like we will be left with remembering the times we had when driving was such a pleasure. 😢

 

 

 

Hello Bob, it's not so much that I don't enjoy driving anymore.

And I used to enjoy night driving more than day driving when I was young and cab happy as we used to call it.

But a combination of factors make it a bit more stressful at times, my age, and there being maybe 3 times the number of cars on the road now compared with the 1970s.

So spend a fair bit of driving time stood in traffic even here in the provinces.

But yes the DRLs and other what seem to be far too bright lights.

Re your post asking about glasses, after my cataract ops, which reduced glare a lot, I tried vari focals for the first time.

And after a couple of days,got used to them and find them fine for driving.

At the same time I ordered a spare pair of single vision specs which were only an additional £19 to keep in the car.

Dunno if you could get coated ones to try out at that price, but worth you asking.

 

[Bper]

10 minutes ago, Rhymes with Paris said:

Hello Bob, it's not so much that I don't enjoy driving anymore.

And I used to enjoy night driving more than day driving when I was young and cab happy as we used to call it.

But a combination of factors make it a bit more stressful at times, my age, and there being maybe 3 times the number of cars on the road now compared with the 1970s.

So spend a fair bit of driving time stood in traffic even here in the provinces.

But yes the DRLs and other what seem to be far too bright lights.

Re your post asking about glasses, after my cataract ops, which reduced glare a lot, I tried vari focals for the first time.

And after a couple of days,got used to them and find them fine for driving.

At the same time I ordered a spare pair of single vision specs which were only an additional £19 to keep in the car.

Dunno if you could get coated ones to try out at that price, but worth you asking.

 

Hi Paul,  it's funny because I had a retinal detachment a few years ago and over a year later an op for cataract removel . However I still get glare but I really feel it is the intensity of the led headights that I find can be blinding at times.

I am going to order an anti glare coating on driving glasses that have been recommended by the optometrist I saw yesterday even though I was told the small prescription may not make any difference.  Still got to try.

[Bper]

20 hours ago, Cyker said:

I would love that but not sure how that could be done without reducing normal visibility!

That said, if this trend of getting rid of mirrors and replacing them with screens extends to the front (And I can totally imagine that happening for 'safety reasons', ignoring the fact they are much less safe due to the loss of depth perception and the ability to move your viewpoint!), dynamic range compression, auto-contrast compensation and a hard cap on maximum brightness would help eliminate the glare, assuming the camera isn't blinded  

To be fair, my main issue is with overly bright and badly aligned headlights - Tail lights tend to be less of a problem as they are of reasonable brightness (Vs. say, rear fogs and brake light!)

I thought high-powered lights had to be self-adjusting but I see so many vehicles with LEDs that are clearly NOT adjusted correctly; If that could be fixed that would go a long way to helping the situation!

 

They don't make anti glare windscreens at the moment but they do make anti glare coatings along with anti glare film. I can't see any reason other then cost as to why they do not make it. However with the intensity of the glare from headlights that a huge number of car owners suffer from with night driving hopefully they will start to take this into consideration.
 

[JARC1]

23 hours ago, Rhymes with Paris said:

Just got back from a short trip for essential supplies, mainly, garlic and stakes, the entrance to the car park of Tesco express and a dozen other businesses is pretty awkward.

It's a left at traffic lights on the A46, then a sharp right within 4 or 5 metres.

To add to this, there is a cycle lane right up to the traffic lights on the main road, with a cycle advance waiting box .

So I am looking intently at my n/s door mirror waiting for the lights to change, and of course most of the cars ignore this cycle lane and are on it waiting to turn left.

Some are indicating,all had very bright led type lights headlights, DRLs, dunno, do DRLs stay on with headlights?

The result is that looking in my mirror is useless as these lights are flooding it and as others have said ,completely washing out any vision, me being out of the cycle lane am offset from the others, so get the full effect.

So if any of the cyclists had been in the cycle lane, and could not be bothered to use lights in the dark, it would have been near impossible to see them.

Luckily, most of them are on the footpath terrorising pedestrians and never get near the cycle lane.

So would it be best to chance it and hope for the best,or drive straight on to the Asda where the garlic is inferior and the stakes a bit tough?

Will take a pic next time I'm down there as I've just realised this post is a bit long, and one picture tells a thousand words of waffling on.

 "garlic and stakes"

I take it you suffer badly with vampires in your area .

Regards, John 

[Rhymes with Paris]

2 minutes ago, JARC1 said:

 "garlic and stakes"

I take it you suffer badly with vampires in your area .

Regards, John 

Oh John, it's bleeding unbelievable round here, the damn things are everywhere.

Swooping about like they own the place, turning into bats and flying off if you try to call them out on their behaviour.

Only the other day I was speaking to a good friend who had a couple of puncture marks on his neck,he looked very pale.

Lincolnshire hospitals have recently had an increased allocation of blood and plasma to try and tackle this problem.

Mind you, it's nothing compared to the amount of witches causing mayhem everywhere they go.

[JARC1]

17 hours ago, Rhymes with Paris said:

Oh John, it's bleeding unbelievable round here, the damn things are everywhere.

Swooping about like they own the place, turning into bats and flying off if you try to call them out on their behaviour.

Only the other day I was speaking to a good friend who had a couple of puncture marks on his neck,he looked very pale.

Lincolnshire hospitals have recently had an increased allocation of blood and plasma to try and tackle this problem.

Mind you, it's nothing compared to the amount of witches causing mayhem everywhere they go.

Paul

I think having the witches around would suit me better than vampires.

Best Wishes, John

[FROSTYBALLS]

18 hours ago, JARC1 said:

I take it you suffer badly with vampires in your area .

That sucks ....

[Bper]

Fang you very much for the posts but I should bring all these puns and references to vampires and witches to a close so....

First of all most of the puns had bad spell-ing and are a pain in the neck. I hope none of these posts have been in vein.
I do feel drained after reading them and I do not want to get cross if anyone else makes a grave mistake by posting another one.
Some of the puns have been !Removed! good but others stuck in my throat and do suck. However, on reflection I can't hold a mirror up to some of the better ones so I tried not to be jealous and had to bite the bullet and just bat-tle on.
I started to count the number of posts and some were quite crypt-tic but I was vlad they posted them as there was a lot at stake.
It isn't my intention to stoker up bad feeling and I am dead worried I could get sued and end up coffin up if I lose.
However witch way this goes it may be tricky and treated by keeping an eye on ball. I know it's been brew-ing for a while and was wand-ering what to do. I know it's witch-ful thinking but I don't want to get banished or ex-spelled off here.
I get this burning feeling that these trials are an hex-ample of things to come. 

So to finish, hats off to those that posted but there was no point. 😆

[Rhymes with Paris]

 That sums it up well Bob.

In fact, your post rocks, with the horror of it all, and shows just how things can be lost in Transylvaniation.

I was discussing this only yesterday with my friend Janet, I said "dammit janit, I love you".

And her reply was somewhat underwhelming when she said "No use in getting into heavy petting,it only leads to trouble, and seat wetting"

So that was me told.

I just hope that I am not uninvited to dinner on Sunday,we have planned to have Whitby scampi for a starter, followed by rare stakes and blood orange sorbet to finish.

Accompanied by Hungarian bulls blood wine (can you still get that? very 70s)

I am down for bringing the scampi, and cleaning up the gargoyles on the porch pre dinner.

 

 

[FROSTYBALLS]

19 minutes ago, Rhymes with Paris said:

..... and cleaning up the gargoyles on the porch pre dinner.

Are the in-laws invited as well?

[Rhymes with Paris]

12 minutes ago, FROSTYBALLS said:

Are the in-laws invited as well?

Unfortunately no, one of them is completely batty , and the other one haemophobic.

[Bper]

4 minutes ago, Rhymes with Paris said:

Unfortunately no, one of them is completely batty , and the other one haemiphobic.

Hi Paul, 

You mentioned bulls blood wine, this was featured recently in Witch magazine. 😂