Topic: Driving in heavy rain/low visibility

[mmret]

Auto headlights on the Benz are weird. They work fine but don't allow you to flip the lights to highbeam. You have to manually turn the light switch from "auto" to "on" for the highbeams to work. 

Yeah, its irritating. But at least it prevents people from accidentally hitting the high beams and never noticing.

What bugs me more is that I can't turn on the fogs without turning the lights to ON instead of Auto, and they aren't Auto-off if left in the ON position with key out. Got a flat due to forgetfulness. Newer models are fine I think as they fog switch is de-linked from the main light switch.

[Patrick_D1]

Hyundai -- at least the older ones did, not sure about the newer ones.

As far as I know, only our front lights are used as DRLs. I've never checked if the lights come on with the wipers, because I always drive with full lights on anyway.

[TheHire]

Not modern by any means, but my 1989 Camry AllTrac 4WD had the tails come on with the DRLs. In fact, that car didn't really have a concept of lights going on/off. You turned on the car and the low beams, tails, parking lights, and interior lights came on no matter what time of day it was.

Damn, I don't miss any other cars I've ever owned as much as that one 

[random006]

Headlights - auto or not - are only part of the equation.  If the weather gets bad enough, I turn on my hazard lights as well.  The flashing lights really draw attention to a vehicle in a way that the constant glow of the other lights do not.

Whether it is because tail lights are red or because they no longer stand out owing to being in a steady state, I don't know.  What I can say is that when I look ahead, trying to see though a wall of rain/snow/fog/... the only thing that cuts it for me are the flashers.

Also, keep it on low-beam setting and add your fog lights, if you have them.

The final piece of the equation is:  slow the fack down.