Improve your driving preparedness during adverse weather conditions

The weather guys just sounded the alarm: more typhoons and heavy rains are to be expected in the coming weeks and the Inquirer Motoring team wants everybody to be prepared for driving in poor weather. As raindrops keep falling on our heads, we continue our series on safety checks by offering these valuable tips on how to increase your own visibility as well as the visibility of your car to other motorists on the road.

1.) Check your headlamps. A lot of cars, even brand-new ones come out of the factory with headlights mis-aligned or pointing in the wrong directions (either too high or too low). The first step is to bring it to a shop that has an alignment machine for your headlights so that it will be pointing in the right direction. Xenon Bulbs in Araneta Ave. as well as Autotechnika/DTM in Fort Bonifacio are two such shops with a headlight alignment device. Tommy Teng of Autotechnika/DTM says that ideally the headlamps should have a focal range of 75-90 meters on the passenger side (right-hand side) and 55-75 meters on the driver’s side (left-hand side) for left-hand drive vehicles. The reduced focal range on the driver’s side is to minimize glare for oncoming vehicles on the opposite lane.

I’ve seen a lot of cars have their headlights dipped too low straight out of the factory, and through years of use, or constantly switching out and replacing headlamp bulbs and assemblies, or retrofitting HID headlamp assemblies. If your headlamp housings are made of plastic and are older than five years, chances are the insides are slightly burnt and discolored, leading to impaired focal range of your headlamps and limited visibility for you. You should ideally have these assemblies replaced, or for more adventurous and frugal car owners, bring them to Banaue where a variety of sidewalk salesmen offer to dismantle your headlamp assemblies, use a professional-grade cleaning solution to wipe out the discoloration and have your headlights looking almost as good and as clear as new. The risk involved though is that the process can break the headlamp assembly completely, or will cause poor sealing, thereby allowing condensation/fogging to occur inside your headlamps, further reducing your focal range and limiting visibility in bad weather.

2.) Check your window tints. Tint that is too dark will adversely limit your night time visibility even if your headlamps are working properly. No amount of headlight upgrading will safely improve visibility; get headlamp bulbs too bright and you pose as a menace to incoming traffic who might be temporarily blinded by the intense glare from your headlamps, thereby causing an accident, especially in adverse driving conditions. At the very least, have your front windshield tinted with a neutral or very light tint so you can see clearly well ahead of you when it is raining hard or driving through thick fog. Technically, both the LTO and MMDA have issued strict rulings on how dark window tints can be especially for the front windows so you’ll be legally compliant when you install very light tint on your windshield at least.

3.) Clean your windshield. Over time, your windshield is exposed to a variety of adverse elements, chemicals and substances. Tree sap, bird droppings, acid rain, the decomposing rubber from your wiper blades and the lubricating oil from the rubber wiper blade itself, plus dirt, grime, and sometimes even mud will slowly form a layer on your windshield that will impede your visibility. Even rain water that dries up on your windshield causes water marks which severely limit visibility and prevent your windshield wipers from effectively removing rain water from your windshield in a downpour. Akira Caisip, professional detailer and owner of Wash ‘N’ Roll detailing recommends that you bring your car to a detailing shop at least three times a year to have the windshield professionally scraped off and cleaned of all chemicals using the proper wax and cleaning materials. You might need to do this more often, however, if you find yourself driving through heavy rain a lot, perhaps as often as every month during the rainy season. A detailing shop will also apply another sealing wax that acts as a water repellant, preventing water spots from forming, and allowing water to flow down smoothly to better aid your windshield wipers when heavy rains come. How to prevent this? As soon as the rains stop, wash your windshield with clean water and some mild soap and dry it immediately with a soft terry cloth, chamois or microfiber cloth to prevent scratching your windshield.

4.) Upgrade your existing headlamps. While the debate versus halogen versus HID/xenon headlamps continues, sometimes, especially with poor street lighting, extremely adverse weather conditions and poorly surfaced roads, we have no choice but to upgrade our current set of headlamps. While the super white/blue/purple and even green headlights might look cool, nothing brightens up a dark night better than gold/yellow or daylight colored headlamp bulbs because it ultimately gives a far better contrast between dark and light. Rally cars racing on a night stage back as late as the early ’90s usually run yellow-gold headlamps while driving through break-neck speeds, so if the pros do it, so should we! Using a yellow-gold colored bulb, especially for your fog-lamps/auxiliary driving lamps is extra effective in increasing visibility at night. Just make sure to wire them up properly using thick-gauge wires and using genuine relays when needed. Don’t make the mistake of installing ultra-powerful headlamp bulbs as well. Anything over 100 watts will cause increased glare for oncoming traffic, blinding them temporarily and potentially cause accidents. It will also severely diminish your car’s battery life if your alternator is unable to deliver enough amperes to it as your car was never designed for such powerful headlamp bulbs. There is a reason these bulbs are marked OFF-ROAD USE ONLY/CAN NEVER BE USED ON A PUBLIC HIGHWAY.

5.) HID/xenon headlamp assemblies. Ideally, xenon headlamp assemblies retrofitted into existing cars should only be installed in OEM headlight assemblies with poly-ellipsoidal lenses. These are the lenses that look like insects’ eyes on cars, such as the ones in luxury European cars and even in mass-market cars such as the Toyota Fortuner, Mitsubishi Montero Sport and a variety of compact-SUVs. Poly-ellipsoidal lenses are able to properly focus the light rays from xenon gas headlamp bulbs. Retrofit kits installed in headlamp assemblies with non OEM poly-ellipsoidal lenses typically reduce the overall effectiveness of xenon gas headlamp bulbs. Another factor to consider is the whiteness, (expressed in Kelvin or K) of the xenon gas headlamp bulb; the higher the number, the more the white turns into pure white, then blue, then purple then finally green. Aaron Go of Xenon Bulbs Philippines recommends a xenon bulb between 3000 to 4000 kelvin, which is closest to natural daylight. Current European Traffic and Safety Standards allow as high as 6000 Kelvin, which is almost pure white but with a tinge of yellow-gold although visibility during fog and heavy rain is compromised when compared to the recommended Kelvin range.

6.) Check your rear brake lamps. The rear brake lamps typically use a double-contact bulb; they turn on softly just enough to allow people to see your rear end while following you in traffic and brighten up when you step on your brake pedal, alerting the person following you that you are braking/stopping. Ask a friend to get in the car, turn on the lights and step on the brake pedal so you can check the condition of the rear lights and brake lamps yourself. Sometimes electricians fail to use the correct double contact bulbs or wire them improperly, causing the brake lamp bulbs not to brighten up when braking or, worse, not to turn on at all, causing a rear-end accident. Don’t forget to also check the third-brake lamp. If your car does not have one installed, it is highly recommended to retrofit a universal third-brake lamp from companies such as Bosch and Hella, available in auto supply stores. A lot of modern cars also have what is called a rear fog lamp, a bright beam of red light that is highly visible despite adverse weather conditions. European cars have these as standard, so if you are privileged enough to own one, turn them on driving in bad weather.

7.) Check/replace your wipers. People often forget to check and replace their windshield wipers, noticing only that they are in poor condition when the rains come. Check them especially during the very hot and dry summer months. To keep the rubber fresh and soft, soak a terry cloth with some silicon oil then gently wipe it on the wipers to reinvigorate the rubber. This should help it last longer and keep from drying up, cracking and eventually disintegrating when you least expect it. If these are more than 3 years old, replace them already with good quality brand wiper blades.

8.) Drive carefully. When it is raining hard, drive carefully. That doesn’t necessarily mean driving slowly. Driving slowly in itself increases your time exposed to danger; you ideally want to get off the road as quickly as possible and park your vehicle safely with you equally safe indoors. Drive as fast as conditions allow, but not too fast that your senses and your brain cannot keep up with your speed.