June 27, 2006

Question of the Day

There are lots of everyday things I wonder about. Here is today's question.

Why do Corvette drivers drive with their parking lights on during the day? At least in San Diego, every single Corvette I ever see on the road has its parking lights turned on while the car is moving.

Is this a default setting by the manufacturer? Is it some kind of "cool" thing that 'Vette owners just do? Did some TV show make 'em do it? What's the reason?

Posted by brian at June 27, 2006 06:13 PM

Comments

Daytime Running Lights seem to be standard on American-made cars (at least in California). I've heard that California law requires this but I can't seem to google any references. My 98 Chevy Blazer has lights on in a dimmer mode during the day as well. Sadly the lights are very conspicuous on the vette - I'm sure someone has a firmw4re hack to disable it though.

Posted by: chrisb at June 27, 2006 07:57 PM

GM cars started defaulting to "running lights" in the mid-90s, so it's possible that Corvettes (without external headlights) were designed to use their parking lights instead. However, I remember from driver's ed (don't laugh) that driving with just parking lights on is a no-no.

Posted by: Chris at June 29, 2006 02:15 PM

Exactly. It is still in the DMV manual as far as I can recall.

Posted by: Brian at June 29, 2006 05:40 PM

No, that applies only to night. The intention of the "no parking lights only" directive is that you need to use headlights at night. During the day, I don't believe there are any rules about what lights you can or cannot have on, other than those regarding high-beams ("Don't.").

Posted by: Joe Auricchio at July 2, 2006 02:18 PM

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