Turn signal synchronization teaser

My father wrote and re-wrote AEP's state estimation algorithm for 30 years. All in Fortran. Once when I mentioned that yesterday was the hottest day of the year, he responded, "We knew that six months ago." It was his job to know, and to make sure - at a high level - that supply would be available to equal demand at any given time. His "desktop" computer in 1972 was, IIRC, an IBM 370. Or some such.

Chevy family. I like it! :) Ive always loved the volt and never had the chance to own one. I almost bought one but ended up going for a second hand regal instead because I wanted a chance to own a manual transmission car before they disappear forever

Suffice it to say too much. However, the much bigger problem is how much of a safety hazard that was!

Our Acura TL would actually have that (as well as reverse lights) if it were trailer-ready as per the owner's manual. Sad when a SEDAN does that by default on trailer-ready trims, and not large automobiles where towing is one of the main things that'll be done with it!

One of the pins was marker lights. They usually just tapped into the combined stop/turn lights of the car. If the car did not have combined lights, there was a little adaptor you could buy.

nobody

Yeah, those are probably lenses on the end of a fiberoptic cable. My '86 Park Avenue had something like that too. Great until the cable breaks...

In the 80s and 90s, those 4-pin trailer connectors were really common. They had L/R/Both/Ground, to accomodate the amber side-signals on trailers, even if the rear signal is combined.

Stephen Gillie

Spot the LED vs incandescent bulbs :) And yeah on the combined lights, and on trailers, too! We've always wired our trailers with a dedicated brake and turn lights. It doesn't cost THAT much more. But that's not standard or included in any wiring connections even when the tow vehicle has separate lights.

Turn signal, headlights, high beams. On Doug Demuro's 1977 Cadillac El Dorado review, these look like ancient LEDs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxHfrc60k8M&t=2m45s Wasn't this the era of the high beam switch being on the floor between the emergency brake and the radio seek button? Cars were almost like pipe organs, with all the foot pedals. Later in that video (8:20) is a feature that hasn't come up in these dicussions - Cornering Lights. These are, like, a side-headlight to illuminate the road to the side where you're signalling.

Stephen Gillie

You're really, really heated about that disconnect switch. How many thousands of dollars did it cost you?

Stephen Gillie

If I had to choose between ensuring every driver has perfect vision and changing car standards to require separate lights, I know which is achievable.

achoo

Ken Waters, it is when I am sitting in queue for a left turn signal, not when I am driving. Given the brightness of the yellow flashers, their range far exceeds the distance at which they need to be seen.

There were cars back in the 70s, I believe, that had indicators on the front fender that showed weather the headlights were on. These were driven by fiber optic cable that lighted the indicator with the light from the headlight.

Same here, Sean, as it should be (*cough* *cough* Maryland).

None of the three new cars I've bought for my family in the last six years have any indicator for a broken light. And I have no idea how long my daughter was driving around with a burned out combined brake/turn signal on her Accent before I noticed.

Overdriven LED's. One thing I HATE about room lighting bulbs.

That last line, absolutely 100%. After the disconnect switch in the multifunction control lever in our Lumina (RIP) failed, leaving both brake lights permanently disconnected (until we got that expensive switch replaced), I'd have to say I'd prefer the still-ambiguous separate RED turn signal over any combined signal, regardless of color. Obviously, separate amber FTW (one of the few things I like about our Acura 3.2TL, the other being it's in pretty good condition despite its age), and I'm going to try putting ambers in the turn signal illumination chamber on our Town & Country, but NEVER combined again. You're not alone in taking this issue to YouTube, though.

Experience dictates otherwise. We used to own a 1998 Chevy Lumina (died on the first of the month), and it had the signals combined. One day, the disconnect switch in the multifunction control lever failed, leaving both brake lights permanently disconnected. That switch was expensive! It also doesn't exist on cars with separate turn signals (whether red, like our Town & Country, or amber, like our Acura 3.2 TL, otherwise known as our Canadian car). Our Acura 3.2 TL, like the Odyssey in the original turn signal video, has a light on the instrument cluster that says when *any* of the 6 brake lights is/are burnt out (it has 2 per module).

After what happened to our Lumina (disconnect switch failed, and killed both brake lights, leaving the CHMSL as the sole signal), I have to say it's just as bad.

Gives a whole new meaning to "don't overdrive your headlights".

Stephen Gillie

I know I wish my own car had them! I'm planning to upgrade in the near future, and I was really glad to see that Tesla finally updated the Model 3s made for the US market to have amber turn signals last year. It'll have a (minor) influence on whether I get another Model 3, or go with a different EV.

coredumperror

Can I be proud to accidentally own a world car that has amber rear signals?

Stephen Gillie

Of course if they're LED bulbs and they're not overdriven, they'll never go out and you'll never need to replace them. But I bet they ARE overdriven because capitalism! (writing this while staring at a monitor that has gone blue after five years because the LED backlight is needlessly overdriven to save 10 cents in LEDs)

Daniel Cassidy

Don't cars nowaday tell you when a bulb is out? I had a 20 year old Volvo which had an instrument light that indicated that a headlight, taillight or brake light bulb was out.

Most cars now tell you when a bulb goes out. Not specifically electric ones. I’ve got an EV now, but my ICE before had headlight and taillight warnings on the dash and in the manual

Joshua Doades

This is a good counterpoint. And I've been in old luxury cars with an LED on the dash foreach driving light, to tell the driver that one of their bulbs needs replacing. But this seems to have fallen by the wayside of automotive technology. Do modern electric cars detect and inform on burned-out bulbs?

Stephen Gillie

It's almost as though they each have the same limited selection of suppliers to use to meet the same very specific set of requirements.

Stephen Gillie

Good one. I always suspected all the car manufacturers were in cahoots.

Robert McCullough

Fog lights are much brighter than tail or brake lights, easily enough to dazzle in normal conditions. They came about at a time when thick heavy fog or even smog wasn't unusual in the UK. When visibility is down to under 100ft then the fog light is often the first clue that there's a car somewhere ahead. They also work well in heavy snow. Outside of heavy snow or thick fog their main use is warning you that a particular driver is a clueless idiot. This they do by leaving the bloody things on all the time, which dazzles any one unfortunate enough to be near them.

Gavin Rea-Davies

I think combined signals are the best!! When a tail light goes out, the fast blinker tells you. When they're separate, you won't know when your brake lights are burnt out. Combined=safer! :-)

Michael, that's good for you. Truly! But there is research out there, using the same model of car in which mid-generation the indicators were switched from red to amber (and in that case they weren't even combined!) and there was a significant reduction in rear-end collisions. Frankly, with all those driving years, I'm surprised you haven't been bothered by the combo stop/turn. I've been in countless situations where the car in front of me had the third brake light out, and then using the signal along with tapping the brake led to a completely unclear situation. Sure, I didn't hit them, but the lights were literally useless at that point. Also, whenever one of the side lights goes out, well now you don't have a signal OR a stop lamp on that side! Especially great if they are using the signal on the opposite side. Now it's the third brake light or nothing. All of those scenarios get fixed if the signal is separate, and the ambiguity is solved when it's amber (except for the case of colorblind folks, but they still get the benefit of separation). There's no reason other than aesthetic preference to put red lamps only in the rear. If you really feel like the amber lamps ruin your night vision, I don't know what to tell you. That's never been a concern of mine.

Technology Connections

I drove a hundred miles a day in New Jersey for thirty-one years. I know how to keep from getting hit. Both times that I was hit, tail lights did not come into play.

@Gilgamesh, Rear fog lights are generally on European vehicles. All it is basically is a brake light that always looks like it's illuminated whether you're slowing down or not. It's supposed to make your car more visible to cars behind you in the fog. On the Cherokee the turn signals simply blink orange, no orange/red/orange. The only way you're know if they're slowing down when their hazards are on is if their center brake light turned on.

Scott Kemp

How does this work with hazard blinkers and coming to a stop? Does it just flash orange/red/orange/red? (Might not be all bad.) What the heck are rear fog lights for? Guessing they're to help other drivers see your car? Or maybe if you need to go backwards very fast?

Stephen Gillie

If your car has electric acceleration, you can simply accelerate to create a gap between yourself and the person behind you, especially if they're in a Ram Cummins (known for towing capacity not acceleration). Getting a car with partial self-driving, and having it drive with the "default" follow distance of ~160 feet was eye-opening to me. Before, I was one of those people who followed ~20 feet, even on freeways, since that's a Seattle thing. But the car's shortest auto-cruise follow distance is easily twice that, enough for an SUV to fit between me and the car ahead - and I still get cut off occasionally when someone decides to test this.

Stephen Gillie

Cover the entire car with old LCD computer panels. Then just have the entire right side of the car flash when you're turning right.

Stephen Gillie

Here in Ireland, we also need to indicate to overtake a vehicle, in which case the car would be speeding up.

Seán Byrne

No, they don't.

Tom G

All the world does, except North America.

Tom G

Jeep does something weird with the new Cherokee. The brake lights of course are red, but if you turn on the turn signal those red LEDs switch to orange. They managed to both have orange turn signals AND remove a brake light when signalling. https://youtu.be/fiqhe917YLk Another thing that sorta related but not really, that confuses many drivers, is rear fog lights. I was following a Volkswagen the other day and it had its rear fog light on and to anyone not in the know it looks like their rear lights are all messed up (one bright and one dim on the left, and only one dim on the right.)

Scott Kemp

There's plenty of evidence that yellow/amber indicators are safer than red ones. So even if there is a negative impact from impaired night vision caused by yellow indicators, it's still more than outweighed by positive factors.

Michael

It's been a fantastic car!

Technology Connections

You realize, though, that you can't dictate how closely the person behind you is following, right? This isn't a comment on how you drive, it's about protecting yourself from others. Given that we know there are people who follow too closely, a signaling system which can introduce a delay in reaction time is flat out stupid.

Technology Connections

I drive the same black Volt as you.

Travis Whatley

If time to discern is an issue, YOU ARE FOLLOWING TOO CLOSE. Also, even if it is a flasher instead of a stop signal, you should still be either slowing or preparing to stop. The car in front is going to either stop or slow down and turn. Just take your foot off the gas pedal and cover the brake. A good defensive driving course will do much more that separate and differently-colored lights. As to the comment from Ken Waters, all humans have temporarily diminished night vision when exposed to bright lights; more so if the light is not red which affects night vision the least.

There's an older video of mine that I'm gonna guess you haven't seen... It's not about being able to see the indicator. It's about the ability to discern the *instant* that indicator lights what it means. Sharing the stop and turn function introduces ambiguity and creates many, many situations where the meaning of the signal cannot be confirmed until you have observed whether it's flashing or not. And that takes time. Time which can result in a collision. And frankly, I don't buy the night vision argument. If you're in an area where there will be cars queuing for a turn, you're probably somewhere with roadway lighting. When I'm out on the country back roads around here, I can barely make out a signal over the glare of just the low beam headlights. Bottom line, though, it's about eliminating the potential for confusion. There should be no circumstance where an illuminated red light means anything but "this vehicle is slowing down" because when there is ambiguity people delay decisions and hit each other.

Technology Connections

If separate amber/‘yellow’ turn signals are too bright, it’s probably because you’re following too close.

Kenneth R Waters

Uhm. No, not at all. If anything more modern cars are making the indicators too small and hard to notice. If the amber indicators are offending your eyes perhaps it is _you_ who needs to seek better eye care.

Xyon of Calhoun

"now if only we could rid this continent of the combined stop/turn indicator..." Perhaps you need better eye care. I class this right up there with the European idea that making everything look like large lemons on wheels is somehow automotive styling. The yellow flashers are way too bright at night and totally kill the night visions of the drivers in queue in a left turn lane.

You should get Robert Dunn to do the same test with his fleet of cars. I somehow expect there will be a few black sheep there.

Michael

Now if only we could rid this continent of the combined stop/turn indicator... YESSSSSS. I freaking HATE that!! Europe makes separate, amber turn signals a legal requirement, and I'm super frustrated that the US doesn't.

coredumperror

In the UK we have always had separate stop/turn indicators.

Gadgetman

Digital vs. analog circuits :)

Paul Schuur

Those mosquito noises tho

Braxen