Timmers Loc: San Antonio Texas.

Unfortunately, it is a big yes to "think out side the box" stuff. Head lights for low illumination and night driving was one of the critical subjects for that guy Edwin Land, you know, The Polaroid Guy. He took his 'idea' of polarized light and applied it to car head lights. Gosh, he even tested it by fitting every car ion an isolated island environment. The test produced an interesting result, not night time accidents and the illumination for drivers was far in excess of any high beam illumination with his equipment.

Results, the auto industry was NOT interested nor the Federal or state governments. That pretty much answers your question I think.

Oh, and by the by, Land also showed scientists and engineers that their notions about color theory and how we perceive color with our brain is vary incorrect. That is where the 3D viewers and photographs have their origin. No wonder that only far-sighted individuals like Ansel Adams could understand the genius of Land and his observations and ideas.

PhotogHobbyist Loc: Bradford, PA

fantom Loc: Colorado

David in Dallas Loc: Dallas, Texas, USA

I believe that Land equipped cars with headlights that had diagonal polarization (at a 45° angle) and windshields and rear windows with similar polarization. The light from one's car was polarized properly for coming through its windshield, but greatly diminished that from cars heading toward it. The rear polarization prevented blinding from cars behind. The problem with it was that it was frightfully expensive -- making windshields and rear windows that were polarized all over costed a lot of money, and the benefits only resulted if every car were so equipped.

Timmers Loc: San Antonio Texas.

Yep, "the benefits only resulted if every car were so equipped", sort of like mandatory seat belts and air bags on automobiles. Then there is that issue of removing lead from gasoline; saving lives, and reducing injuries can be expensive, or not.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Too funny! Offensively bright headlights that don't help the driver. 🤣

Mr. SONY Loc: LI, NY

[quote=JCGammack]One of my early cars was a BMW 2002. There was a spacer between the strut mount and the body on the front.

So that's what that spacer was for.
I had a 1971 2002 and I lowered the front of my car by cutting off half a coil.

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

When I converted my Merc to HID, I did one light at a time and took a picture of halogen vs HID. Also measured the brightness - the HIDs measured Almost 3x the brightness, but due to the sharp cutoff at the top, they weren’t a hazard to oncoming drivers. Note the “ear” on the right to illuminate the roadside.

Lucian Loc: From Wales, living in Ohio

Back in the 80s when I lived in the UK, I shipped my Porsche 911 over to the US to my sister. I came over on holiday and went to collect it from the port. It had to have a number of changes done to it before they would let it on the US roads. They made me change out not just the headlights but also the chrome surround on the headlight, to an ugly looking thing.

They made me change the seat belts as well, who knows why that was. The converting company but royal blue straps in there to replace the black that Porsche fitted. Soooo ugly again. And finally, they made me change the bumpers front and back, from the sleek looking and efficient for the rest of Europe and the UK to these ugly stubby sticking out pieces of crap.

It cost me close to $2,000 dollars for basically nothing. If the car was safe to drive in Europe especially when I could drive 150mph or more, if I wanted, on the autobahn, then why was it unsafe to drive in the USA with the standard lights, safety belts and bumpers. That pissed me off to no end. Plus, the converting company kept all my parts! I'm sure they had a thriving after sales market going on.

One thing in the USA makes no sense to me, you don't seem to have any standards for turn signal colours. I see some orange and some red, why is that? You'd think there would be a national standard.