What is it with German Tailights in the US

...and lobbying groups that demand the "right" to travel "at a safe and prudent speed in the lane of one's own choosing" (translation: 54mph in the left lane).

Oddly enough, I was at an Indian restaurant last night with the girlie and the only available parking space was next to an old Peugeot. First time I've seen one of those in a LONG time. Anyway she was driving and I just had to turn and look at her car - an old Corrado G60 - parked next to this awful French thing and say to her "look, a car that's even harder to keep running than yours!"

nate

...yes, I do like sleeping on the couch, why do you ask?

I bet will. I bet he'll also try to deny that he's one of those "idiot US drivers" who don't know what fog lights are.

Not limited to the US.

We see this a lot in Sweden also, although there are stiff penalties for driving around with the fog lights on. Unfortunately it is very rarely enforced. I have also seen police cars running around with the fog lights on :-|

They used to be illegal in Sweden, and had to be disabled before a car could be registered. I don't think making them legal was a good move.

Thomas

Renault has been #1 importer to Germany since I can't remember when. And my Dad's Citroen BX is still behaving reasonably well at age sixteen and more than 220k kilometres. So is a pal's much older Citroen CX. Heck, even the German Post are buying Renault Kangoo these days.

Yours, Erik.

"Daniel J. Stern" wrote

#18) #1 importer: Renault (France) #2 importer: PSA (Peugeot+Citroen, France) #3 importer. Fiat (Italy) French cars are really common in Germany! And their quality rose significantly (whereas german cars....)

Cheers

Thomas

Ages back I had a Renault Laguna supplied by my insurance Co whilst my own car was in for repairs.

*Very* nice it was too.

French cars are no longer as oddly 'quirky' as they once used to be.

Graham

How do you account for all of the german cars sold outside of the german market.

How do you account for all of the Japanese cars sold outside of the Japanese market.

How do you account for all of the American cars sold outside of the American market.

(Proof: Virtually nobody outside

How do you account for all of the French cars sold outside of those markets.

Is it possible that you have never left the county in which you were born and are doing nothing but repeating nonsense you read somewhere else?

You already answered me before, dude, you are losing your mind!

What you are probably seeing is the idiotic "rear fog lamp" being used by equally idiotic drivers who turn on ALL their fog lamps whenever they get in the car.

To be fair to Dan S., the US laws ARE particularly idiotic in his particular field of work (automotive lighting). Not so much in that US lighting laws prevent good lighting function, but that the laws ALLOW for terrible lighting function. See 1994 Camaros and 1993 Chrysler Concorde/Dodge Intrepids for two simple examples where a candle with a wet wick would be about as good as the fully-compliant headlamps installed by the factories. There are lots of others, including all the GM vehicles that used the half-height style headlamps that the Camaro used.

As for idiotic drivers- do you not yourself encounter twits with their fog lamps glaring EVERY time you get out on the highway after dark? I do. People truly do not know when to use (and more importantly when NOT to use) fog lamps.

I can't buy that argument any more than I buy the Ford engineer's smirking claim that rear red turn signals are OK simply because they're the only flashing lights. The fact that ONE bright red rear lamp is on is ambiguous, because in the real world brake lights DO burn out (frequently, these days it seems to me). Is the guy braking with one lamp out, or is he driving with his fog lamp on?

"I neutered the cat and now he's French?"

:-)

Welllll.... from a US-centric perspective, the German and Japanese stuff we get here is fairly uniformly good (barring exceptions like Mitsubishi, which don't sell well anyway) whereas Renault has been run out of the US market completely at least twice, Peugeot once, and if people elsewhere are buying American cars, I refer you to P.T. Barnum.

nate

Well, Johnny, if you could read, you'd be able to figure that out all by yourself: The German *JUNK* stays in the German home market. The German *NON-JUNK* gets sold both at home and abroad.

Well, Johnny, if you could read, you'd be able to figure that out all by yourself: The Japanese *JUNK* stays in the Japanese home market. The Japanese *NON-JUNK* gets sold both at home and abroad.

Well, Johnny, if you could read, you'd be able to figure that out all by yourself: The American *JUNK* stays in the American home market. The American *NON-JUNK* gets sold both at home and abroad.

The point is that a single rear fog means there's a large and conspicuous change in appearance when the driver steps on the brake (new bright red lights on BOTH sides of the car AND in the middle come on). With duals, the only clearly conspicuous change is that the center brake light comes on. Oh yeah, and the bright reds on both sides appear to get larger.

Idiotic drivers, yes. Idiotic rear fog lamps, no. When implemented and used properly, they are a very good and effective safety device.

Well, they had an Alliance with an American Motor Corporation once...

Now they are kind of back in the US, having acquired control of Nissan.

The German stuff offered in the US is generally good to drive, but reliability issues can be bothersome.

Ford Focuses are reasonably common in Europe. Although they were designed by Ford's European division and made there. The Focuses in the US are somewhat decontented versions (decontented to sell cheaply, with disastrous reliability results the first year or two), and the US is not getting the second generation that Europe now gets.

When I went back to Italy for a visit, I have NEVER in my life experienced worse drivers. They even drive on sidewalks there. Accidents all over. Next to Japan, I think US has great drivers (Canadian drivers are same as US drivers). Germany - well, the drivers there were ok, but nothing special. I especially like the guys trying to pull a boat with a 4 cylinder engine car - driving 60 KM on the autobahn.