I was driving the long 1.7 miles from my office to home after sunset today, and I went down a long, 1/2 mile hill at 30 mph behind the city police car.

At the bottom of the hill, the road T's and I have to turn left. The officer turned left ahead of me and pulled into the parking lane. I saw him and thought, "Oh s--t, he's going to stop be over my HID lights."

I made my left and he pulled right in right behind me, lights flashing, and I pulled over immediately. He came up to me and chewed me out for flashing my high beams in and out of his cruiser and trying to distract him.

"Officer, I didn't touch the high beam lever. That's how Honda made this car. I know it is a problem, but, officer the lights are DOT approved and legal in Wyoming. I agree it is a problem and Honda should fix it, but there's nothing I can do about it."

"Sir, I know about HID lights. I have them in my own car," he said. "Just don't flash them at other drivers again or I'll have to give you a ticket next time."

When I got home and told my wife and my 18 year old son, Ben said, "Dad, you just should have said you wouldn't do it again. You couldn't convince him you hadn't done it to begin with. He just wasn't listening. That's how cops treat kids all the time. We know how to act."

I think it is time to offer the police chief, Vince Y., a night time test drive in my stook.



[Edited by Barry WY Silver/Black '01 on 02-22-2001 at 10:03 PM]

 

That's sincerely disturbing....

 

You should have offered him a test drive to see for himself

 

Barry, I've lowered the aim on the drivers side HID so the apparent flashing of the lights is not simultaneous. Now the passenger side appears to flash before the drivers side and nobody

 

There was a few times I got real nervous when driving right behind the cops at night but luckily never got into trouble (yet). Knock on wood...

 

I did exactly that and I saw the officer get a bit nervous and say, "Don't get out of the car!" I kept my hands in view. I showed him how the dims were off. When he got nervous, I GOT A BIT SCARED. "I'm going to get shot for stupid HID lamps!"

Barry

 

DOT standards are a joke. The US should match European standards for headlights. We should have self-levelling HIDs and we should eliminate those goddamn SUV lights that level into my MIRROR!!!! RRRRRRRRRR! Sorry.

 

Barry...

YIKES!

Sunchild... I agree about the european HID standards... Its ok to have some jacked up truck with stiff suspension that has the same effect as our lights do, but we get flashed... no one flashes a truck... heck, simply raising the height of the truck makes the already bright lights even brighter appearing...

 

Same thing happened to me and I posted it on the other forum a long time ago.

The problem is that the S2000 has a short wheelbase and stiff suspension and the car (and it's lights) bobs up and down over road irregularities. This combined with the sharp cut off point of the beam pattern gives the appearance that you are flashing your high beams as the beam bounces in and out of the driver ahead's rear view mirror.

 

I didn't realize small towns in Wyoming had skittish police like the one you ran into... Just imagine the d!ck-factor here in S. Florida where many of the cops are so green they're looking for any reason to shake people down...