I am not quite understanding DRL's.
What is the difference between DRL's & turning low beams on.
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I know when I start up, the low beams come on, but isn't that the same as just turning the low beams on manually.
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Also I can have low beams on & those lil fog lights in front at the same time, but I hear people saying they can't.
What's the deal here, what am I missing.
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the DRL's and low beams are different. the DRL's make the front turn signal lights to turn on as long as your car is on, the parking brake is off, and you haven't turned on any other lights. your headlights coming on automatically likely the result of having the twilight sentinel option turned on. if you go through the options on your DIC, you can turn that off so your headlights don't come on until you tell them to.

 

DRL's really do help. We've had them here (Ontario) for almost 20 years and I really do believe that they can help, so why not!!!

 

I'm surprised to hear some people in support of DRLs. There is another side to the concept though. not all DRLs are pure evil for other drivers. the C5 has better DRLs, they turn on the turn signal lights full time to improve the car's visibility. but most DRLs run off the headlights, keeping them on 24/7. this type of DRLs is terrible. they are road hazard devices which make streets more dangerous than they need to be.
they waste fuel needlessly. if you can't see a car during the day time without headlights blaring at you you don't have good enough sight to be driving in the first place.
they have been shown to reduce the visibility of anything which does have a DRL on it (traffic lights, signs, pedestrians, bicycles, trees etc) making them more difficult to see even in day time!
when a truck or SUV with DRLs pulls up behind a smaller vehicle, some drivers have been shown to switch their rear view mirrors to the nighttime setting, causing a dangerous reduction in visibility during the day.
DRLs turn on your car's headlights. have you ever seen a vehicle driving down the road at night with headlights on but no tail lights? those are DRLs. they turn on the headlights so drivers can easily forget to turn on their headlights at night thinking that they come on all by themselves, but that doesn't turn on your tail lights, you are invisible from behind at nighttime. (my dad had to convince my mom this was true, she thought she didn't need to turn on the headlights at night).
many DRL's run off the high beams, so at night you drive around with your high beams on all the time and you can flip the switch to high and low all you want, the high beams will always stay on if they are DRLs. there's no way to turn them off unless you remember to turn on your lights yourself.

C5 and some newer GM cars have better types of DRLs which don't have all of the previously mentioned problems. but there are still plenty of cars out there which use these dangerous lights. and even with the newer better turn signal DRLs, you still have your car turning on lights when you don't want it to. I have mine disabled and don't miss them for a second.

 

I totally disagree with the above post. The more lights you have on and the more visible you are, the safer you are going to be.

 

Your fog lights should work with the low beams on. The car is wired to when you turn the brights on, the fog lights go off. Then when you dim the lights back to low beams, the fog lights will come on again (provided you have the fog lights switched on).

 

On cars other than Corvettes, or similar, with hide away headlights, daytime running lights use lower voltage through the high beam element in the light. The high beam element is much stronger and lasts a lot longer with the low voltage than the low beam element would. And yes, we've had DRL here in Ontario for a long time, and I think it's a great idea.

 

Making you more visable to others, especially in a Corvette that has such a low profile, makes a great deal of sense.

 

I just think the DRLs on the C5 really make it look good, to.

 

 

 

Don't worry about 'em...I'm with you...DRLs suck. One of the first things I did was shut mine down. They

 

we'll just have to agree to disagree there! but I'm perfectly open to respecting everyone's opinion. to an extent I agree with you, that's why I use my parking lights as "running lights" 24/7, that's also why I'm a part of the thread about getting the C5's DRL's to work differently, that they stay off when my lights are off, but stay on full time when I have other lights on my car turned on. with the way I drive that will keep them on the entire time I'm driving down the road. like I said, I like the looks of many of the newer GM DRL's which run off the amber turn signal lights like our C5's instead of the headlights like many other cars. the once that really get me going are the ones which turn on your car's full headlights as DRL's and have all of the safety hazards that I mentioned above. they may make your car more visible, but they make everything else less visible, and they annoy and blind other drivers. they can and do make you less visible if you forget to turn your headlights on at night too. I see it at least a couple of times a week, a vehicle driving around in traffic with high beams on and no taillights after dark. pay attention to other drivers at nighttime, I bet you will see it too!

the more lights you have the more visible you are, tail lights, marker lights, parking lights are all good! just please keep your headlights off during the day time!

 

haha I won't get bent out of shape over anything like DRL lights, everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I find it interesting that on many forums when discussions of DRL's come up that everyone from the US hates them and everyone from Canada loves them! if they were mandated it would make me feel kind of like some agent of the government was reaching into my car and turning my lights on every time I get in. I just don't like anyone else having that kind of control over how my car looks.

Really though, my dislike for DRL's comes mostly from being a motorist. maybe 1/3 of all cars out there have them, many have the non-bothersome (and cool looking) bright amber versions, but many have the obnoxious high beam versions. as someone who drives around among cars using the second type, I firmly believe that the roads would be a better place without them. I mean you aren't supposed to get those little dark green/blue "sensations of light" during the day by accidentally looking into an SUV's blaring high beams during the high noon lunch run.

 

That was THE first mod on my car.

Anybody that can't see a moving object roughly 16 feet long, 5 feet wide, and 4 feet high has no business driving - or maybe walking.

There are no traffic "accidents", only collisions.

 

 

the flashy LED ones in the diamond cut housings are the hot ticket.

 

I always drive with my fog lights on, that turns off the DRL.

 

DRLs or equivilent are only temporary effective, take 3rd taillight, everyone is so used to it you don't notice it and thus it loses its effectiveness, you notice more when someone doesn't have one, same goes for DRLs. I turn my parking lights on while on the freeway to reduce my visibility to the cops who target vettes or other sports cars.